Elevators

Going up, the easy way

More homeowners, often anticipating the infirmities of age, are installing elevators.

By Janet Eastman

Wednesday February 26, 2003

EVEN dreams can be practical. Take, for instance, Gregg and Ann Holden's dream home. When they were building it on Balboa Island last year, they spent an extra $20,000 to have an elevator installed to reach all three levels.

It's not that they need the lift. After all, Gregg, 61, recently hiked Half Dome in Yosemite, and Ann, 60, walks a few miles several times a week. But they know the day will come when going up and down 30 stairs will not be such high-stepping fun. And since they hope to live in their home as long as possible, they want to make provisions now for the future.

So they insisted that their architect carve out a 5-by-5-foot space from the ground to the roof and install a hydraulic elevator. They hid it behind doors that look like those leading to closets and bathrooms and decided they would lock it and forget about it for a long, long time.

Or so they thought.

Like other active people who install elevators to future-proof their homes, the Holdens are finding that their elevator is getting a workout.

Step into the expanding universe of convenience, where most residential elevators are sold to those who are able to walk stairs. (Only one in four is bought for people with long-term physical disabilities, say industry experts.) These homeowners are planning ahead for accidents or aging or the day they sell their home. Unlike a new pool, most of the expense of an elevator is recouped when ownership changes hands.

And they think it's handy and cool to have one.

For the Holdens, the elevator aerobics started the day they moved in. Their unit, which can hoist 1,500 pounds, labored as much as the brawny movers transporting furniture and boxes to the second and third floors. Since then, it's become a handy dumbwaiter when the couple need to haul heavy luggage, unwieldy dry cleaning, even food to the barbecue on the rooftop deck.

Visitors enjoy it as well. Friends who huffed and puffed up the stairs at the Holdens' other homes love the effortless glide to the top and back. The couple's granddaughters use it as a cozy playhouse that moves.

And when Gregg pulled his lower back kayaking seven miles on a recent Saturday, taking the elevator to the second-floor master bedroom was a pain-preventer.

Small lots, tall buildings

Elevators are becoming more common in beach and mountain communities where lots are small and costly and building up two, three, four and even five stories is the best use of the land. And the view's better up there.

Mansion-rich areas are also elevator hotbeds. Ron Clark, director of Beverly Hills' Building and Safety Department, says two-story homes in his city that are larger than 6,000 square feet typically have elevators. "If you have a lot of money, you don't have to walk up stairs," he says.

Although more houses and townhomes have elevators than in the past, they're still a novelty.

Gary Drake, whose construction company is based in Beverly Hills, says he's been seeing "strictly status" elevators. He worked on a $40,000 model that was hidden in a bookshelf, straight out of a "Scooby-Doo" episode.

"It's all for show," says Drake. "I don't think the owner has used it for anything more than to say, 'Hey, look, I have an elevator.' "Adding to their wow power is the way they're decorated. Stone floors, cherry paneling, trompe l'oeil cloud ceilings and soft-watt chandeliers convert drab cabs into personal statements. Those with radius, beveled or stained glass that can be seen from outside the cab add architectural pizazz as well.

Tony Ciabattoni, 58, whose Italian villa overlooks the bluffs in Laguna Beach, is putting a miniature replica of Frank Lloyd Wright's Mile High Building into a niche in one of the cab walls. And he's having it backlighted. "It's a beautiful piece of art that doesn't fit in the rest of the house, but it's in its own little world in the elevator," he says.

And a Huntington Harbour couple commissioned an artist to paint cartoonish figures from the waist down on the bottom half of their cab's walls. Mirrors take up the top half, so when people enter, they see their reflection above the waist. And below? Painted skirts, jodhpurs or board shorts with legs. The experience is a 3-minute fun-house ride.

The cost for all this gee-whiz? It depends. A standard 3-by-4-foot elevator for a two-story home starts at $15,000. If space has been created for it at the planning stage, material and labor costs are just a few thousand. But adding one to an existing home can at least double the cost, and it can take three months to dig a pit in the ground, cut holes in walls, add framing and metal tracks that the cab traverses and install the elevator, interior doors and call boxes.

Because of their expense, they're used mostly in trophy homes. Fewer than 10,000 residential elevators were bought last year in the United States, but CemcoLift, one of the largest manufacturers, says its sales have jumped 20% over the last few years and expects the growth to continue.

The company is basing its predictions on these stats: In the next 30 years, the number of people in the United States 65 or older will double to 70 million, says the Administration on Aging. And there are more multistory houses being built, especially as dream homes, according to the National Assn. of Home Builders.

"The expense of adding an elevator to multimillion-dollar projects isn't a showstopper," says architect Brion Jeannette, who has made provisions for an elevator in 95% of the Southern California homes he's designed over the last three decades.

One client, eager to use the elevator for practical reasons as well as an architectural element, opted for a $125,000 model with a rounded glass cab that is the centerpiece of his entryway.

Only a handful of Jeannette's clients put off buying the actual moving parts, but when they need it, he says, a unit can be popped into the waiting hoistway.

"People are living longer, and they see friends and family having to leave their homes because of age or health reasons," he says. "They appreciate that an elevator can be a part of the design of their house and be ready for them when they'll need it."

Louis XV was first

The first "home" elevator -- a counterweight lift -- was built for Louis XV for his personal chambers in Versailles. Mansions in the United States in the early 1900s had them, but they got their biggest boost in the 1980s when public buildings -- even small, two-story ones -- were required to have elevators. Makers such as Otis Elevator Co. and CemcoLift started cranking out compact hydraulic versions that were affordable to commercial property owners and, as it turns out, homeowners.

Residential elevators run on standard household power, and the electric motor, about the size of a dorm refrigerator, can be hidden in a garage or in the dead space under the stairway. They are as quiet as a humming refrigerator when in motion and have safety features such as locking gates, brakes, alarms and a phone that works like the others in the home. A backup battery ensures that the cab will safely reach ground even during a power failure.

Despite these precautions, Gregg Holden has been stuck in his elevator twice. Once, he jumped up and down in it, "just for fun," and it stalled between floors. But by the time he called his wife to the rescue, the machine had stabilized and was on its way.

Another time he wasn't so lucky. He backed into the cab with a sofa bed on a dolly and Ann was barely able to close the security gate around all the bulk. She was to meet Gregg on the third floor to let him out. Only she forgot. Gregg couldn't reach the button or the phone, and he tried calling Ann's name through the wall but she didn't hear him. Several claustrophobic minutes later, however, Ann remembered Gregg, her husband of 41 years.

"I bet in two years I can write a book about life with an elevator," says Ann. "It adds whimsy to our life. And peace of mind for the future."