Its smaller than you think?

Barbara and I have decided to downsize our home in Atlanta as we use about a quarter of the space that we have (and heat / cool / pay tax on) and in many ways, Montaluce is "home". My preference is to rent as the concept of one bill and no maintenance is increasingly attractive. It will come as no surprise that the economic timing is crazy, real estate is not easy to sell and the rental market is booming because of tightened mortgage criteria and a fear of commitment on the part of many potential buyers. However, we are both puzzled by the fact that our country's economic woes resulted in unannounced deflation in the size of a foot (the unit of measure not the lower appendage). We know that the 1st floor of our house is supposed to be 1,500 sq. ft. (give or take a toe). The 1st floor is the only one of the three that we use therefore...a 1,500 sq. ft. apartment should logically meet our needs and yet every apartment of that size we have looked at has been way smaller than the 1st floor of our house. From this I can draw only one logical conclusion, just as many manufacturers have made product packages smaller and kept the price the same; the Federal Reserve has covertly reduced the size of "new feet" to restore profitability to the construction industry. Just a theory...