McLean, Virginia

This week’s McMansion is brought to you by the neighborhood of McLean, Virginia, infamous for being one of the most McMansion-ridden neighborhoods in all the land. The cause of this phenomenon? Nobody has more money and less taste than DC lobbyists, and this week’s McMansion proves it. On the market for $1,699,900 is this esteemed estate home, built in 2003:

This certified dank™ McMansion comes complete with 100% guaranteed bad decisions including:



• Pre-lawsuit EIFS cladding (aka “stucco”) exterior featuring “detailing” and “quoins”

• Obese “rotunda” peppered with stick-on windows

• Three pairs (count ‘em) of French doors that open out to spacious and luxurious balconies metal grills.

• Great architecture: look at all those unique windows!

• In typical McMansion style, this 9,702 square-foot house was built on a 0.82 acre lot, so there’s not much lawn to take care of- low maintenance!

• No dealing with picky sellers here – this house is owned by the bank!

In all seriousness, this house was built cheap. 2003 was smack dab in the middle of the speculative housing boom, and bad mortgages fueled by investment bank gambling produced thousands of houses built just like this one. I tried to find data on how long this house has been in the bank’s possession, but alas my search came up empty.

The best part about this house? EVERY SINGLE ROOM IS BEIGE. (yes, that includes “honey beige.”)

Moving on to the inside:

Beginning our tour, we enter the house to reveal the textbook Church of Wasted Space (credit to @tikimama for the sweet phrase), an inescapable phenomenon. On the bright side, I bet this foyer has a seriously kick-ass echo.

Beige Count: 1

The Dining? Room Thing

Since there isn’t any furniture left in this house, it’s hard to tell the function of each room. This could either be a living room/den, or a dining room. I’m going with dining room because the ceilings are low, and you can peek into the kitchen.

When there are so many rooms in a house that each room loses their distinct function, a lot of the feeling of home gets lost, and rooms become places merely for things rather than people. In my opinion, anyway.



Beige Count: 2

On with our tour, which leads us to…

The Dining?? Room Thing

Huh, maybe this was the dining room. Lots of dining rooms have tons of panoramic windows and tile floors.

Beige Count: 3

Anyways, let’s move on to the next room which is

Maybe A Dining Room Still

ok I think this MIGHT be the living room, but so could the first dining room thing. I have no idea. My mind is numb to the possibility of any other type of room at this point.

Beige Count: 4

Dining room? Or is this a breakfast nook?? With a giant-ass chandelier??? Where does the nook end and the room begin??? Who am I???

Beige Count: 5

Ok I think we’re finally moving out of dining room territory.



The Kitchen

Now you’re probably thinking, but McMansionHell, what is wrong with this perfectly reasonable kitchen???

I’ll concede – the kitchen itself is not aesthetically displeasing. The displeasing part is how cheap the materials are. The cabinets look like they were made of plastic, the wall-mounted appliances don’t appear to be properly sealed. The wood-paneled dishwasher and refrigerator do not imitate the pattern of the cabinets around them. I’m not sure if that’s a wood-paneled oven beneath the stovetop, or if the only oven in the kitchen is the wall-mounted warming tray.

Beige Count: 6

The Master Bedroom

This room is very awkwardly shaped - look at the wall jutting out on the right. These inconsistencies are almost always builder errors, mismeasurements, or attempts to add features desired by the homeowners after the initial plans have been drafted - like a linen closet or extra storage. Errors like these are indicative of a house that was built cheaply and carelessly.

Beige Count: 7

Beige Count: 8

The Master Bathroom

Seriously, they were asking for foreclosure when they went with the indoor hot tub.

Beige Count: 9

The 2nd Living Room

Because who doesn’t have a living room upstairs??

What was the fireplace obsession that was going on in 2003? Why were there fireplaces in every room? I guess you gotta heat that giant house somehow.

Beige Count: 10

I’m skipping ahead to the other bathroom, because the rest of this house really does look the same.

Beige Count: 11

I’ve decided to save the best part of the house for last: the rear exterior. If you had any doubts that this house was built cheaply, you can safely put those to rest.

The Rear Exterior

Barely ten years old, and this house has already sustained all kinds of damage due to poor construction quality. It’s extremely sad when you think about what could’ve been built in place of this house, which wasn’t even built to last ten more years. A house with a life expectancy under a hundred years is a sad house indeed.

This concludes our tour of this week’s McMansion. Stay tuned for Sunday’s special post - Mansion vs McMansion: An Informative Guide in which I discuss in depth how you can distinguish a mansion from a McMansion, with examples of course.

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Copywrite Disclaimer: This post uses screenshots from Zillow.com, a real estate aggregate website, and are used in this post for the purposes of education, satire, and parody, consistent with 17 USC §107.