Languish.org

So, I just heard a stat that said that an American moves houses an average of 11 times during their lifetime, while an European will only move something like 5 times or less.

Given that we haven't had a good poll in a while, here's one about this very same topic. For the purposes of the poll count the number of times you've moved, rather than the number of houses (i.e., if you've lived in the same place more than once but in different times of your life).

As a bonus question, tell us your life story regarding moves and also if the place where you're currently living is where you expect to live for the foreseeable future/the rest of your life.

As for myself, I'm at 7 moves (and 6 houses), and don't really expect to move anywhere else for the foreseeable future.

It went like this:

Childhood home (where my parents still live to this day), until I was 20 -> Student appartment for university (2 years) -> Another student appartment for my year abroad (1 year) -> Rental appartment with 2 friends (2 years and a couple of months) -> Back to the family home (6 months) -> Tiny rental studio (6 months) -> My own appartment (16 years next month, and counting).

How short a period should be considered "lived in"?  I have some stints as short as a month or two.

My parents separated when I was young so I have 2 widely different tallies.

My dad moved me 5 times
My mom moved every year for 20 years + 2 with me and my dad.

I moved 2 times since leaving the childhood house. I voted for a tally of 7 times.

I've moved in this house 11 years ago and I expect to own it another decade before I sell it and move to la campagne.

I voted 9-11, but it might be 6-8.

Home
College
Back Home
NYC (one month)
Another place in NYC
CT (2 months)
CT 2
CT 3
CT 4
NC 1
NC 2

Did a quick count and got 17.

5 places in Denmark
3 places in Ottawa
9 places in Vancouver

... been pretty settled in the last few decades though.

I got 17 as well. Childhood was very stable, then moved around a lot during my studies and early career including stays abroad. These days it is stable again with no plans to move anywhere else.

Bizarrely I think I'm on 17 as well. :blink: :hmm:

edit:
Nope it's actually  24, but depends on how you class some student accommodation

I'm not even sure I can count them all, but easily 15+.

Wpg->Cgy->S'toon->Wpg1->Wpg2->Wpg3->Cgy2->Cgy3->Peace River->Ashmont->Whitehorse->Whitehorse2->Edmonton

So that's what - 13?

My parents moved me twice when I was a kid. Even though I had university living and spent six months in France I still had all my stuff at their house and all my mail went there so I don't really think I moved out until 2001 to an apartment with two roommates at age 23 (around when I started posting on Paradox).

I left that apartment in 2002 to another apartment (where I started posting on Languish) and then in 2004 moved to another apartment the floor above that apartment. Then my fiancée stole my money so I moved out of that place and back to my parents place in 2005. Then in 2006 I moved out of there to another apartment until moving in with my then girlfriend (now wife) in 2008. Then we moved to a house in 2009 and lived there until 2016 when moved sold that house and moved to a rental house with my Mother-in-Law. Then we moved into my current place in 2018 where I don't currently plan on ever leaving.

So that is 11. Currently. So I guess I am an average American.

But I will say every single one of those places were in the same metro area. Austin, Texas.

Quote from: Barrister on January 24, 2023, 10:42:07 PMWpg->Cgy->S'toon->Wpg1->Wpg2->Wpg3->Cgy2->Cgy3->Peace River->Ashmont->Whitehorse->Whitehorse2->Edmonton

So that's what - 13?

I forgot moving to Flin Flon back in '96.  So 14.

While living with my parents I moved 2-4 times, depending on how you count (twice was moving from downstairs to upstairs apartment in same building).

As an adult, 5 times in the past *checks calendar* 25 years. 4 of those were in Vienna. Though I've been living in my current place for nigh on 9 years, which is a record for me.

About 6.
From Germany to Flanders.
Then about 3 times in west Flanders during childhood.
And 3 more times in east Flanders as an adult.
I'm guessing I'll maybe move once or twice move before breathing my last.

6 moves during childhood/teens, including the family staying at my grandmother's when the house was foreclosed...
2 apartments in Quebec
1 apartment in Ontario
3 apartments in France
5 apartments in the USA
Returned to Canada in current house.

One fewer than the number of places I've lived in.

Damn...43 times  :huh:

Have not moved for 18 years though and my next move will be to my grave, totally sick of moving  :lol:

Too many.

It seems I should have left more room for nuance at the higher end of the poll.  :lol:

8, but 7 of those where before I turned 16

3 times as a kid. 3 times in Bristol. 8 times in London (so every other year :weep:) - and looking to move again.

It depends how you define move.
I don't really count places I lived as a student as they weren't home. They were just places I was crashing whilst at uni that year with a few of my things there. Then there's one or two places even post uni I've had on a strictly temporary basis-do I really count the company provided flat where I lived for 3 months when I moved to Switzerland?

At the most liberal 14.
In terms of places that were stable enough to count as home maybe 5?
Places where I fully settled and started setting up like I was there to stay just 2- even in a flat  I rented for 4 years I stayed in a very temporary mindset.


Edit - that's different places I lived. Most of them had a spell back at my parents place in between. So more like 25 really.

Personally I'd count changes in student accomodation as moves. You had to look for it, carry your stuff in and out, etc.

4 times.

Quote from: Josquius on January 25, 2023, 05:26:31 AMPlaces where I fully settled and started setting up like I was there to stay just 2- even in a flat  I rented for 4 years I stayed in a very temporary mindset.

This reminds me of a story with two friends of mine that lead to an in-joke in our group for a while.

One of them got a job in Portugal, and after working there for a while they needed new workers, so he put a word for another friend from our group to work there, who was hired as well. These two friends started sharing an appartment, but had very different attitudes to life there. One of them had a "temporary mindset" as well, even after living there for several years, and would block any investments in the house (mainly buying a washing machine) because "after all, we're only here temporarily", while the other assumed they were there for a pretty long run. When asked the first friend would even claim to still be living in our hometown (even if he only spent there one weekend every couple of weeks or so), while the other friend  would say he was indeed living in Portugal. Thus, we deducted that they must had been sharing the world's largest appartment, able to cover two different countries.  :lol:

They ended up being flatmates for like 7 or 8 years in that place in Portugal. I never knew if they ended up buying a washing machine or not.

:lol:

Yeah I think there's a mindset difference because I get what Jos is saying - especially about university - but I always stayed in my university town over the summer and I didn't view my parents' home as "mine" after I moved out. So "home" has always been where I am with my stuff for however long that is.

It might possibly also be because my mum and dad moved at around the same time as I went to university so whenever I've gone to them it's to a part of the country I've never lived in, to a house I've never lived in and I've always been in the guest room rather. So there's nothing about it that feels like going home to me.

Quote from: Sheilbh on January 25, 2023, 07:26:35 AM:lol:

Yeah I think there's a mindset difference because I get what Jos is saying - especially about university - but I always stayed in my university town over the summer and I didn't view my parents' home as "mine" after I moved out. So "home" has always been where I am with my stuff for however long that is.

It might possibly also be because my mum and dad moved at around the same time as I went to university so whenever I've gone to them it's to a part of the country I've never lived in, to a house I've never lived in and I've always been in the guest room rather. So there's nothing about it that feels like going home to me.

Yes, I see where it comes from but I think it's rather disingenious. If you're living somewhere most of the time, even if it's just remporarily, that's your home for me, not your family home where you only come back every once in a while. When I was in university I would spend 4-5 days in the city where the uni was located, and would come back home almost every weekend, sometimes even on Thursdays or early Fridays, but I wouldn't say that I was still living at my family's place, I would say I was living where my university was located.

After my year abroad I also had to use the guest bedroom in my family's house as well, my younger brother had wanted to remove my bed from our shared childhood bedroom since I left the house for the first time, but my mother prevented him from doing it until then.  :lol: I still stayed in that guest bedroom for 6 months in my second stint living there, and considered that my home at that time.

By the same thinking though, wouldn't staying in a hotel for 2 weeks also count?- likely not, that's mad. But then a month? 2? Where's the line?

And the friends in Portugal sounds very familiar to me. I definitely held off on getting new furniture unless judged absolutely necessary in my 4 year flat. Lived very minimalist.
There's 2 aspects at play there. Both the living somewhere temporarily ala university and also the expat/immigrant distinction- my GF tells me her grandad, though he lived in Switzerland for 50 years, still considered his village in Italy home and considered whether it was time to move back more permanently until he died.

20 moves for me.

13 by the time I was in grade 12.  Including 2 house fires and dad moving to find jobs.

4 moves during undergrad and law school.

4 moves since then.

Seems like a pretty mobile bunch, I'm surprised we don't have at least a few never-movers. I know at least a couple of people from my "hometown" (which, oddly is really the town my parents / grandparents were from, we moved so much as a kid that it was kind of like a home base but never really my home) who are in their 50s that are living in the same house they grew up in.

I count 15, excluding temp stuff (places where I stayed just a few days or weeks). It's been 4 years since my last move, this has been the stablest period of my adult life.

So would moving South for the winter count?

I ask as suddenly this Winter I've begun to understand the benefits older Brits get when they fly to S.Spain for warm weather. :brit:

15+ for sure (only thinking of those with 2.5/3+ months of residency). I'd already live in 3 different houses by age 10 and then as I'd lived in university housing, had to move out and somewhere else every summer (only one of those times back home).

Quote from: mongers on January 25, 2023, 09:40:43 AMSo would moving South for the winter count?

I ask as suddenly this Winter I've begun to understand the benefits older Brits get when they fly to S.Spain for warm weather. :brit:

I only counted moves as ones where I took all my stuff; so a stint at boarding school where I holidayed at the parental home in Germany counts as one move from our former home in Brighton for example.

I was born in '76, and moved in '78 from one town to another in suburban Philadelphia.
I didn't move again until 1994 when I moved to Massachusetts for college.  I'm not counting moving back and forth between MA and PA for summers.
I then moved in 1998 to an apartment in Boston, and in 2001 to a house in suburban Boston.
I next moved in 2007 to Kentucky, then to a new house in Kentucky in 2015, and a third one, my current home, in 2017.

So that's 7 moves.

I have to admit that after moving every couple years for so much of my life it feels weird that I've now been in the same house for 12 years, and while I won't say I'm likely to die in this house, I'm probably not moving out of this house until my kids are well and truly gone.

With the kids firmly settled into school/friends/hockey I'm highly unlikely to change cities.  Then within Edmonton we're finally at the point where was can see paying off the mortgage entirely, so I feel like it doesn't make much sense to move to a bigger house and pile on a bunch more debt.  Besides it's not impossible to imagine that in another 12 years the kids will be out of the house and we'd be stuck in a house much bigger than we'd need.

Come to think if it, while I moved technically 7-9 times, I only switched towns twice. Town where I grew up in Germany, town where I lived for a couple of years in Germany, and Vienna.

14 I think. Been at the current place since 2005. Will downsize shortly after retirement but spend a year renting in central London (probably Marylebone) in between before coming back down south again.

When I was a kid, we used to follow my dad around the constructions sites he worked on as a foreman, so we moved pretty much every year until I was in mid 4th grade, but mostly came back "home" on the week end.  While home was pretty much in the general area of where I live (switch street sides, move a few meters), we did change our permanent house 3 times.

Then I went to university had an appartment, came back home, couldn't stand being treated like a child and living with a chain smoker, got my own appartment and eventually bought my dad's house and moved back home.

Renting a house for university counts I would assume, but what about living in a dorm on campus?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on January 25, 2023, 06:42:39 PMRenting a house for university counts I would assume, but what living in a dorm on campus?

I don't because that was not my primary residence.

But I was also within short driving distance of my parents. I guess if I moved across country to go to school it would be different.

Three times as a child, then my own place. Then Germany, then back. About to move again, somewhere quieter and closer to work.

Not counting Poland. I spent almost as much time there as in Germany, but I never intended to stay.
Not counting my ex-gf's flat in Barcelona either. In my mind it was her place (she'd probably been pretty pissed to hear that).

Quote from: Iormlund on January 27, 2023, 04:16:39 PMThree times as a child, then my own place. Then Germany, then back. About to move again, somewhere quieter and closer to work.

Not counting Poland. I spent almost as much time there as in Germany, but I never intended to stay.
Not counting my ex-gf's flat in Barcelona either. In my mind it was her place (she'd probably been pretty pissed to hear that).

I'd still count those two places (Poland and your gf's appartment), unless you stayed there for a very short time. The fact that you didn't intend to stay there doesn't meant that you were actually living in those places.