Housing tastes don't really change that much. Yes over the years we've had to fit things like double glazing and better insulation but that's a whole lot cheaper (and better for the environment) than building a whole new building.
- older houses tend to be a lot more inefficient in their use of square footage
- the rooms inside tend to be a lot less open, and one man's "fun/quirky layout" is another man's "why do I have to go down a step then immediately go up a step to cross a hallway"
- and, I begrudgingly admit (as I don't like how they wreck house aesthetics) people really like big, attached garages
My overall suspicion is that when a lot of people say they like old houses, what they really mean is that they like buildings that look beautiful on the outside and, to a lesser extent, have a sense of being rooted in some kind of context.
Why do most people prefer older houses?
Character and history - they tend to be more individual and different, and have more character than the cookie cutter modern mass builds.
Solidity - they tend to be more stone and brick, instead of the timber framed buildings that are more common in new builds.
In fact in most of the western US that’s the norm…
> then use wood and plasterboard for room walls and floor
One of the things I LIKE about older houses is that the interior walls are more solid than plasterboard. There is zero plasterboard in my house and brick gives far better noise insulation than anything timber framed.
It was also common to build lathe and plaster covered interior partitions in the past. Way before plasterboard.
A modern one off house may well have concrete block downstairs walls to hold the floor up. Albeit, they may get covered with plasterboard 'dabbed on' anyway, to reduce drying time