Worldwide, migrants are building expensive and conspicuous houses in their countries of origin. Without local income opportunities, however, many migrants hardly occupy these new houses. When migrants return, it is often for only short periods of time. Previous studies have highlighted the ambivalences these global dynamics imply for local and transnational communities. So far, little research has been published that develops an understanding of the consequences for households, and especially for relations within them based on gender and generation. This article, based on long-term ethnographic fieldwork, scrutinizes changes in house construction in the Mexican community of Pueblo Nuevo (Estado de México) within the last twenty years. The previously common practices of patrilocal residence and ultimogeniture are gradually changing. These transformations are linked to a strong increase in US-based labour migration since the 1990s. As a consequence, houses as constructed meanings of life have become simultaneously more and less important.