The piece is short on details. So is the framing from massive timbers trimmed by Paul Bunyan types wielding adzes? the glass handmade replete with waves and bubbles? the mortar soft, sprinkled with small stones? the plaster stiffened with horse hair, river sand and whatever else was handy and cheap? the windows site made and of whatever size seemed appropriate?

No plywood, OSB, ABS?

And door frames and ceilings based on a population where 6' and 200 lbs. was the exception? where fast food was food that could outrun you ?

Until you can get all that, it's not "authentic" in my book.

Check out the recreated heritage villages across Canada and the US. Nice to visit. I wouldn't want to live there. Nostalgia isn't all it's made out to be.

Did I miss it, or did it not really answer the question?
Are today's homes (when built correctly) better or worse?
Will a tract home last 100 yrs? (assuming maintenance is done)

There are not that many timber framed houses that have survived.

Like any wooden structure, the integrity of the weather envelope has a huge effect on expected life.

Roofs, siding, flashing, and drainage all work to keep water outside the envelope.
Even a minor leak over a long period can result in significant damage, and the size of the timbers does not prevent this.

It seems obvious to me that most of the older homes still standing today are the ones that were well-built to begin with (and then well-maintained.) Those that were built with shoddy workmanship in the first place have fallen down. So its not like we're comparing apples to apples when we compare the average new home to older houses that have stood the test of time. The "average" house of 150 years ago has probably crumpled into dust by now!

I suspect that a truly well-built house today will stand the test of time just as well or better than the well-built houses from 100 to 200 years ago.

We simply no longer have the "old growth timber" available to build homes the same way they were built in the past.
We also no longer have people with the know-how to create some of the fine hand-made finish work that was common in the past. Those few who retain those skills can command such prices that most of us simply can't afford them.

However, we do have a plethora of wonderful products that were not available to builders of the past. House-wrap, open-web trusses, i-beam trusses, high efficiency windows, fiberglass doors, 30 year shingles, insulation, better paints, fibercement sidings, etc. Where these new products are used as they are designed and intended to be used, a house built today should last as long or longer than one built 150 years ago.

The problem is, too many builders don't really know how to use these new products and don't care enough to learn. (You have to wonder how any builder still NOT know how to use Tyvek or how to properly flash a window. I mean, it is not rocket science. It takes about 10 minutes to figure out. But go around and look at a random sampling of houses in progress and I'll lay odds that nearly half will either have the housewrap incorrectly installed or windows improperly flashed or both!) If the homes built by these lazy good-for-nothing builders last 25 years, the homeowner will be darned lucky.

I agree. With the exception of newer methods, materials, (as Bevangel excellently puts "when installed correctly)", I dont think ther's much change. A house is either constructed correctly or it isn't with maintenance being a major factor,(along with correcting sub par techniques), that account for longevity.

Did I miss it, or did it not really answer the question?

So you noticed that too.

The economics of urban development is what dooms most old homes. There are for instance, thousands of infill homes in my community that have replaced structurally sound older homes. Thousands more have gone into landfill to make room for high-density high-rises, office buildings, shopping centres.

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Out with the old...

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Bye old paint...

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In with the new.

When I was razing mid '50s brick bungalows just 30 years later, it wasn't uncommon to run across tradesmen who had worked on the originals. Now, in this neighbourhood, some of the 1970s homes are meeting the same fate.

Thankfully 'out with the old' didn't apply here in my old county in England. These buildings, originally mostly houses and butcher shops, are 600 to 650 years old and have been in constant use since the 14th and 15th centuries. They are timber framed, of course!
The 'tear down and build new' ethos that prevails certainly in this part of the USA makes me wonder what will be left of the 20th and 21st centuries for our descendants of the 27th century to enjoy!

Here is a link that might be useful: The Shambles, York

makes me wonder what will be left of the 20th and 21st centuries for our descendants of the 27th century to enjoy!

Extravagant self-glorifying monuments to dead presidents aside, precious little of the built environment. The rest is electronic and ephemeral. Floppy discs. Lady Gaga. Michael Jackson. Pfft! And they're gone. Probably just as well. (Though, praise be, McDonald's is on the National Historic Register. As if the American Empire will be anything but a bad memory six hundred years from now.)

My Grandpa built homes in old town San Diego that are now in the historic district with mandates on preservation/maintenance. I hope that ordinance will always remain intact and those awesome homes remain "forever"! A handful were moved by the state to an area that is a state park where two are b&b's, one a gift shop, another a museum, one was an original schoolhouse, and another a library. All were "rescue" homes that were moved and preserved to this designated area.

Come on, in the middle ages, peasants who inherited property were often required to rebuild their houses. Why? Well, the timbers lasted, but the walls and roof would only survive one generation. Keep in mind that, typically, that meant about 20, 25 years from inheritance to the time the older of the couple died.

Ancient Rome was punctuated by the sounds of apartment complexes collapsing--huge, block-sized developments that collapsed and killed people at least weekly.

Used to be, most neighborhoods in urban areas were cleared out on average once a century with fire at the BEST of times.

There were many, many, many horrible houses build in prior decades. They just don't last. Even many good houses are often torn down or remodeled. In good neighborhoods, solid houses get replaced by bigger/nicer houses or remodeled out of recognition, and in bad neighborhoods they deteriorate until they're torn down.

"A house is either constructed correctly or it isn't with maintenance being a major factor,(along with correcting sub par techniques), that account for longevity".

I would like to think the old historic homes will be around forever, but that's not real world thinking. At some point they will be gone. The homes in the park could be effected by California's financial problems where maintenance funds will be cut, the others in old town will no doubt go due to "progress"!