The Impact of a Street’s Name on Your Home’s Appeal
By Bill Primavera
Can the name of your street influence the perception of your home and its value?
The thought occurred to me a while back when I read a newspaper report about a complaint among residents of a town in Putnam County where a local motel housed a number of sex offenders. At the end of the article, almost as a throwaway, the motel’s street address was listed as Sodom Road.
The origins of street names can be a fascinating study, ranging from history, their locations, mystery or sheer whimsy. I happen not to live on a street or road, but rather at a “park” – Trump Park. Sharing my address, where I’ve lived for the past three years, always elicits some kind of response, either positive or negative. But the residents who live at the property agree that it projects an image of quality.
I was first aware of how streets got their names when I went to grammar school in Philadelphia and the nuns taught us that the etymology of street names there was based on the plan developed by William Penn, where the major east-west streets were the names of trees: Vine, Mulberry, Chestnut, Walnut, Locust, Spruce and Pine among them, intersected by a numbered grid.
When we took a class trip to Washington, D.C., I found that all 50 states have streets named after them and most of them cross diagonally through an alphabetized and numerical grid system. Rather than making an address clear, the intention of that system was to confuse invaders and to guard the Capitol, but today it serves to confuse tourists as well.
When I moved to New York City, I was relieved to find a grid plan that made finding any address very easy, except for the wildly erratic system in Greenwich Village, which was established before the grid was in place. It resulted in somehow having West 4th Street intersect with West 12th Street.
Until the mid-1800s, most of the population lived in densely populated cities where grid systems avoided chaos. Around 1850, people began moving out of congested cities to have cleaner air and less congestion. With increased value placed on nature, it became common to name streets after trees. As a result, my former neighborhood featured Hickory, Hemlock and Birch streets.
The roads in our communities might reveal the types of industries they originally supported, such as Mill Street, Milk Street, Commerce Street and Mechanics Road. Also, presidents were honored in nearly every town: Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Madison and Kennedy abound across the nation. Some streets simply reflect the surroundings, such as Mountain View, Lakeside and Hudson View.
But the most creative names came with modern housing track developments where builders became responsible for naming streets, harnessing the suggestive power of words that shape a neighborhood even before the first home is built.
Sometimes the personal interests of builders attached themselves to street names. The most interesting I’ve found is a neighborhood in Mahopac known as the “fish bowl,” where the streets are named Pike Place, Perch Drive and Trout Place. In the same town, my friends Jeanne and Gerry live in the “flower” neighborhood of Astor, Dahlia and Tulip. Nearby in Yorktown, we became American literary aficionados in Walden Woods with streets named Whitman, Emerson and Thoreau.
From the 1970s and 1980s, newer developments frequently adopted names of the developers’ wives or daughters, and only infrequently, sons. Today, that practice is generally discouraged by municipalities because those street signs tend to be stolen more frequently, presumably by young people of the same names.
We can be either drawn to or repelled by the mystery of some street names. I had a client who challenged me to find a house for her on Watermelon Hill Road simply because she loved the name so much. My personal favorites in this region are Pudding Street, Bullet Hole Road and Lover’s Lane in Putnam Valley and Fiddler’s Bridge Road in Dutchess County.
There’s no denying whether your street suggests picking a flower, enjoying the comfort of a shade tree, paying tribute to a founding father, making love or catching a fish, its name can indeed add character, charm or mystery to where you live.
Here’s a trivia question for you: Can you guess the most popular street name in America? No, it’s not Main, Maple or Elm. It’s 2nd Street. Surprised? Most towns in America started with a simple grid of numbered streets, but many times 1st Street was renamed Main Street, boosting 2nd Street to the lead. Therefore, second is second to none.
Bill Primavera, while a publicist and journalist, is also a Realtor® associated with William Raveis Real Estate and Founder of Primavera Public Relations, Inc. (www.PrimaveraPR.com). To engage the services of The Home Guru to market your home for sale, call 914-522-2076.
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