What direction does your house face?

[mom2akm]

We're thinking about moving to another house and the direction of the house is one of the consideration. From observation, north facing houses require more snow shoveling and the house tends to be colder in winter.

The direction of the house is where your house's front door is facing. Our existing house has the front door facing west so it's west facing. It is quite hot in the summer but we spend most of our time at the back of the house so it doesn't bother us.

Please tell me: what is the direction of your house? How much sun do you get in the winter and summer? Is there anything that the direction of the house is bothering you?

TIA!

[clc053103]

our house faces East. So the sun rises on the front and sets in the back. I like that the sun rises on our bedroom side of the house and helps rouse me! I didn't like that it made it harder to make DS's nursery dark for naps, as it's in the back of the house, but I liked that the room was nice and toasty in the winter from the afternoon sun. Because of this positioning, our driveway gets some sort of sun most of the day (the driveway is ont eh side of the house), so for the snow shoveling aspect I think you would need to consider the location of the driveway as well as the positioning, if my driveway was out front it would only get sun 1/2 the day.

[WatchingThemGrow]

East-facing. I think our tree canopy is what I like more about our house than anything about the direction of it, in terms of heat/sun. Of course our town is considering a "tree rule" that at least 40% of your land must be shaded by trees. Is that nuts or what?

Two friends live in west-facing homes and 1)the front door is scorching hot all afternoon, so much so that I wouldn't even consider buying her neighbor's house and 2)the other one's swing set is such that the kids swinging on the swingset in the afternoon are directly facing the sun. That would give me a headache and a sunburn.

[KrisM]

Ours faces north. Yes, the snow doesn't melt on the driveway as quickly as our neighbors across the street.

Our house is very warm though, because our family room is in back and so faces south.

That is the worse thing, really. Having the backyard and deck on the south side - very little shade in the summer unless you have big trees or something. I wish we faced west.

Edited to fix: the direction! I want to face west so that the backyard is shaded by the house in the evening. My parents does this and it is nice to be outside in the evening.

[WitMom]

Both this house and our previous house face east, and I hate it. After our first east facing house, I swore never again. Well, here we are with another east facing house. Our main living areas are on the back side (west side) of the house, and it becomes uncomfortably warm in the afternoon in the summer. Since our backyard is on the west side of the house, it also makes it too hot to play out there in the afternoons and early evenings. My other gripe is that when we open our windows, we don't seem to get as much of a cross-breezee with an east-west house as with a north-south house.

[scrooks]

Ours faces north. Yes, the snow doesn't melt on the driveway as quickly as our neighbors across the street.

Our house is very warm though, because our family room is in back and so faces south.

That is the worse thing, really. Having the backyard and deck on the south side - very little shade in the summer unless you have big trees or something. I wish we faced east.
This is exactly like our house. I like our family room being warm but I hate the fact that our deck is unusable unless we put up one of those canvas gazebos. We lost our first one in a big wind storm.

[khm]

Our last two houses have faced south, love it for the snow melt. It is amazing how much it helps. We've often commented that we lucked out there (it wasn't a factor when we bought, just appreciate it now!)

I can't think of anything I dislike about it, an area of our backyard doesn't get a lot of sun, but that's because of a massive amount of trees, not the direction....

[almostamom]

Our house faces west. We purposely bought this lot for that reason. The entire back of our house is windows and I didn't want the heat of the afternoon sun on those windows. (Our neighbors have the same model and they face east. The glass in their back sliding door has shattered from the heat.) The front of our house gets the afternoon sun, but for our model that's only one room and the garages. We also have a shady backyard in the afternoon and evening which I like for when we are swimming in the summer (and summer here is pretty much the beginning of May - mid-October).

Linda

[lchang25000]

Our house faces west. We purposely bought this lot for that reason. The entire back of our house is windows and I didn't want the heat of the afternoon sun on those windows. The front of our house gets the afternoon sun, but for our model that's only one room and the garages.

:yeahthat: Same as our house, that way, the snow on the driveway melts very quickly. DS's bedroom gets the afternoon heat shining in so his room is the warmest in the winter, but also hottest in the summer. The front of the house has the office, garage windows, front door, and DS's room so all that gets plenty of sun. The back of our house contains a lot of windows also and it's where our living room, dining area, kitchen, master bedroom, and deck/backyard is so it gets plenty of shade which is very nice in the summer time. There is always a breeze in the backyard (due to the hill that is behind us) in the warmer months so it helps keep it nice and cool even though the temp outside is in the 90s.

[catpagmo]

Ours faces west, too. I prefer it, actually. The front of the house has the living room and entry and garage. The back of the house (where we spend the majority of our time) faces east, so we get sun in the morning, and shade in the afternoon/evening. The back yard is nice and cool in the summer, as is our deck, where we spend a lot of time in the spring/summer.

[smilequeen]

North. Yeah, our front yard keeps snow A LOT longer than our back. We have a rear entry garage though, so the snow melts right outside the garage and I don't shovel (but will pay the neigbhborhood kids to do it if they come over and offer :)). I never thought about it making the house colder in winter? hmmm.

[belovedgandp]

We face south and I do like it. I think my preference is either south or west facing. The house I grew up in and our first townhouse faced north and it was pretty high up on my criteria list to not face north. I hated that the front steps never cleared and all the shoveling. Plus the south sun coming in the living area of the house was almost too hot with a wall of windows in the winter.

We live in our backyard in the summer. Because the house next to us is staggered back and decent trees it's not too hot at any time back there. Plus we're on a cul-de-sac, so we also do the driveway and street a lot too.

[kayte]

Well I never really thought about it until this year when we were mounting our mason bee hives (which have to face a certain direction). But then again snow isn't an issue here. We face north east.

[smiles33]

Our house faces north, but snow is not an issue for us either. DH likes it because he is very sensitive to light so it's great that our bedroom remains dark as a tomb on most mornings. I like it because most of our bedrooms are on the western and southern side of the house, so it's warm in the evenings. DD1's bedroom actually is on the northern side and it's the coldest in the house, but she is such a little furnace that she kicks off her blankets every night anyway.

We bought a tented gazebo for the backyard as the existing trees don't provide enough shade in the summer sun. DD1's play kitchen, water table, etc. all go in there.

[becca_g]

North facing house with woods along both sides and back of house, so we typically have more snow all around our house than most of our neighbors, which we actually like. We live in a hilly neighborhood and have one of the best sledding yards.

We seem to do about the same amount of shoveling/snowblowing as everyone else in our neighborhood since we're typically doing it soon after a snowstorm before the snow in anyone's yard/driveway has had time to melt.

DH hates sunlight in a.m. Most of the windows in the MBR are on the front of the house, so we're good there.

Our house is very well insulated, so we haven't had any concerns regarding it being especially cold in the winter.

Personally, I much prefer a house to face either N or S to avoid having one long side of the house be especially hot during the summer.

[inmypjs]

Ours faces north. The driveway doesn't melt as fast as our south facing neighbors across the street, but we love our sunny back yard and I think the house is warm. When we were looking for houses, our real estate agent told us that houses that the order of popularity in the way houses face are: north, east, south, west with north being the most popular.

[bubbaray]

East-facing. The entire back of our main floor (west-facing) is floor-to-ceiling windows and skylights. It is like a greenhouse in the spring and summer.

[o_mom]

West, and we really like it. The morning/afternoon sun are not as hot and the garden does really well in the back. By evening the patio is well shaded for dinner outside or playing after dinner. The front door does get hot and when we replace the storm door I'm going to look into something that would shade that (UV blocking or tinted?). Any ice on the driveway melts readily (part of it is on the north of the house as it is a side-load garage).

There are plantation shutters on our west-facing first-floor windows. I'm not a huge fan of them, but I see how the would really help the heating.

[mommylamb]

We face North. DH is very jealous of our across the street neighbors who had much less shoveling to do that we did this year. Also, we had an ice dam at the front of our house and a bit of leakage. Obviously, this can still happen if you face South, just the damage would be at the back of the house, but it still stinks!!! OUr house doesn't feel cold though. Our Kitchen/family room are at the back of the house and get a lot of sun, and this is where we spend much of our time. Though DS's room is at the front, and his room does get cold.

[jent]

Ours faces north. Yes, the snow doesn't melt on the driveway as quickly as our neighbors across the street.

Our house is very warm though, because our family room is in back and so faces south.

That is the worse thing, really. Having the backyard and deck on the south side - very little shade in the summer unless you have big trees or something.

This is us too. When we moved in there was a huge oak tree in the backyard that provided terrific shade, but part of it fell during a storm and we had to get the rest taken down. Now our backyard is too sunny and bright for most of the day in summer. It took me 3 summers to figure out why we don't like using the backyard/deck anymore.

And it's impossible to keep the front path clear of ice. We don't even bother shoveling and use the side entrance in the winter.

[BelleoftheBallFlagstaff]

South facing. We have a crazy steep driveway, but our driveway is clear after we shovel and the sun comes out, we just finished shoveling a half foot or snow, and are waiting for the sun! If It was north facing we would be screwed, seriously!

Here is a pic to grasp how steep our driveway is! (http://picasaweb.google.com/BelleoftheBallEvents/BBB#5440809796355394610)

An another from the bottom looking up, that's DH on the roof. (http://picasaweb.google.com/BelleoftheBallEvents/BBB#5440808820960588946)

[LexyLou]

Northern Exposure but no snow to shovel.

Our bedroom has the southern exposure and it's awesome to lie in bed and look at the moon every night.

[kijip]

due West. Shoveling snow is not a factor here for North facing homes.

[Indianamom2]

Ours faces north. The front yard is frequently shaded by the house. However, we have lots of windows (first floor anyhow) on the south side, so it keeps things nice and sunny.

I think in a well-insulated house you'll be fine no matter what direction it faces.

[ThreeofUs]

North, as our previous house did. I liked it in the previous house - we lived in Santa Barbara, and it kept us from getting too hot. In this house, though, it might keep us from staying warm!

Honestly, with a sunroom and 3 windows on the east side, back with lots of double windows to the south side, and sleeping porches/lots of windows to the west, we get enough sun in the house.

But the front of the house is always in shadow and, while I'd like at least our plantings out there to get *some* sun, that doesn't happen.

[DebbieJ]

We face south. Love the sun to melt the snow!

Our previous house faced north and it was HORRIBLE! We got no good light.

Our house before that faced west and we ROASTED! Oh my, it made our house so hot!

[aa2mama]

Ours faces north. We do shovel snow more than our south-facing neighbors across the street but otherwise I am happy with the direction our house faces. We get plenty of sunlight in our house, and it stays warm in winter. I usually enter the house from the attached garage, though.

The backyard is sunny but shaded by big trees so that it's comfortable all day long in summer. We love spending time there.

[Globetrotter]

We have late afternoon/evening shade in the backyard, something I love since that's the time we go out!

[MoJo]

The front of the house faces east, although the if you stand in the doorway, you're actually looking south. The front door is now part of an addition that wasn't originally there.

We really don't have any snow or heating issues based on the orientation of the house. (There's plenty of snow everywhere, and the warmest/coolest rooms are determined by proximity to the furnace/AC, not which side of the house they are on.)

We have trees on every side except the north, so there's plenty of shade in the yard and deck in the summer, with a place for a garden in the northwest side of the back yard.

The only real issue is that all of the bedrooms are at the back of the house, which faces west. In the summer, we typically go to bed before the sun sets, and that's a problem. It's not as big a problem now, though, as when we first moved here. . . DH became a teacher with summers off, and I no longer work the morning shift, so we try to move our bedtime later.