Why I stopped saying downsizing

3 min read

Downsizing is the wrong word, and I stopped using it.

It suggests a smaller life. Less space, fewer things, a step down. That is almost never what is happening. The people I work with are not shrinking anything. They are choosing a home that fits the life they actually want for the next ten or twenty years.

Sometimes that home is smaller. A couple whose children left a decade ago, heating four bedrooms they walk past every day. Sometimes it is not smaller at all. Sometimes it is the same size in a better place, closer to the lake, closer to grandchildren, closer to a hospital they would rather be near than far from. I have had clients buy larger, because what they wanted was room for family to stay.

What people are really deciding

The size of the house is the last question, not the first. The first question is what the next few years look like. Who visits. What you want to be able to do on a Saturday. How much of your week you are willing to spend on upkeep. Once that is clear, the house follows from it, and the square footage is just arithmetic.

That is why I say rightsizing. It puts the decision where it belongs. The right size is whatever size is right for you, and nobody else gets a vote.

Why the word matters

Words shape how people feel about a decision, and feeling is what stops most moves from happening. Tell someone they are downsizing and you have told them they are winding down. Tell them they are choosing their next home and you have told them the truth.

I have watched people put off a move for years because the word made it sound like a loss. It is not a loss. It is one of the few decisions in later life where you get to choose exactly what you want.