I know a wealthy couple who have a gorgeous property, complete with acreage, gardens and their own private pond. Their house is charming, updated throughout and offers terrific views. And by almost any measure of American affluence, it's tiny.

"We just really didn't want any more space, even though there's room to expand," said the wife. "We didn't want to have more to take care of."

Several other Realtors I once knew complained about their gracious and enormous homes. They couldn't wait to sell them, one confided, because they felt like maids, constantly trying to keep up with the cleaning and maintenance. I don't know who had forced them to live under such conditions.

Current home buying trends (such as they are, this year) suggest that more buyers are in tune with the small-house couple than with the owners of the big houses.

For most of the past 25 years, our boom-and-grow attitude toward housing caused homes, especially in suburban areas, to grow like Alice in Wonderland. Bigger was better, and homes not only gained square footage, they grew taller, with higher ceilings and towering rooflines.

It took a housing crisis, along with changing demographics, to get builders and buyers to agree that perhaps things had gone far enough. In the past two years, the average new home size has shrunk for the first time since the early 1980s.

After growing steadily from an average of 1,700 square feet in 1978, Midwest homes may have topped out in 2005 at around 2,262 square feet. In 2007, according to the National Association of Home Builders, the average size of new homes in the Midwest was down to 2,257.

And since then the trend has continued, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, which says new homes started in 2008's third quarter shrank almost 9 percent in just three months.

While you can measure homes and average the data, the word "small" is still a relative term. In a recent Builder magazine, three homes built at just under 3,000 square feet were dubbed "little gems," and were spotlighted for their efficient use of high quality amenities in less space.

In the article, architect Donald Powers says conspicuous displays of consumption are out of style.

"Everything now is swinging around to compact," he told Builder. "The economy is demanding it, and the environment is demanding it. If the '90s were defined by the McMansion, I'd love to think the first part of the 21st century could be defined by a return to small and high quality."

In addition to economic and environmental factors, the boomer population needs less space as their children move out. And, says John McIlwain in Changing Metropolitan America, the younger, "echo boomers" want to live in urban areas, which necessitates smaller spaces.

I've always wondered if smaller houses might not also foster better family communications for those who do still have children at home. When my own family of five lived in a 1,500-square-foot split-level, I always knew where my kids were and what they were doing. When we moved to a 2,300-square-foot two-story, I started losing my kids.

"Dinner time!" I would call out, over and over, starting on the main floor, wandering upstairs, and sometimes down to the basement, until I found everyone. In the bigger house, we spent less time together. We had more than one place to watch television, and to do homework and projects. That might have suited our teenagers just fine, but in that one aspect I kind of missed the smaller house.

Someday I suspect sociologists will do a study on family interaction and find out that, lo and behold, small houses -- with no bonus rooms or finished basements, play rooms or separate breakfast nooks, dining rooms or homework rooms -- were better for children after all.

I still think, however -- and Rick Santelli, who ranted on TV that we shouldn't have to pay the mortgage of our neighbor whose house has an extra bathroom, can take this to the bank -- that more bathrooms are a good thing.