The dining room: once a gathering place for delicious meals, a round of card games with friends, and now possibly on the brink of extinction?
For many urban dwellers, the absence of a truly defined dining space has steadily become the new normal. Developers and property owners instead suggesting the eat-at kitchen island as a suitable replacement. So, exactly how did we go from hosting friends and family in the seating-for-six eatery to bar stools and GrubHub on the kitchen counter?
At the surface, it’s easy to blame the demise of the dining room on a rapidly growing food delivery industry. We can all admit to, conservatively, using a food delivery app at least once this past month. Forbes seems to agree, stating “online food delivery is set to supersize to a hefty $200 billion by 2025.” Combined with a 2017 study stating just 10% of American’s love to cook and you’ve got a veritable recipe for a sans-dining room floor plan.
There truly isn’t anything nearly as convenient as your favorite restaurant coming directly to you. When delegating the laborious task of cooking to a third party is as easy as a few taps on a screen, it’s easy to see why digital ordering and delivery has grown 300% faster than dine-in traffic.
Lack of technical skill in the kitchen hasn’t been the only culprit in the disappearance of designated eating spaces. Rising taxes may be partly responsible as well. No, not on food, but on the real estate beneath your feet.
Developers across urban landscapes have often sought to increase revenue by upping the bedroom count on a given property, many times at the price of losing common living space. For example: a generally large one bedroom apartment, with a true dining room, generating $1500 a month can typically be converted to a small two-bedroom, generating $1800 or more monthly. With no additional square footage added to the property, a landlord in this scenario just upped their yearly revenue by $3600 on a modestly priced (Chicago) unit.
As a renter, I’m curious to know: is the defined dining space a must-have in 2019 or has it gone the way of the VHS tape? Let me know in the comments below.
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Cory
According to Cory 
A friend of mine just did this on his property in Lincoln Park and (with a small remodel as well) upped the rent by more than $500 a month. Sad, but it works!
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I need a dining table. I think people who love to entertains love to cook will always need a place with an actual dinning room. I don’t think it’ll disappear, at least not yet. Maybe a younger crowd wouldn’t be looking for dinning tables in their apartment search but an older couple will want a dinning table, but in an apartment which I think will be a rare find soon. Dinning tables could possibly be extinct for apartments but not extinct for houses.
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This site is impressive. I love your writing, and I too am saddened by the disappearance of dining rooms.
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