Thank you! And yes, makes so much sense that things differ state to state as the climate can vary so hugely. Thanks so much for joining in the conversation 🥰
From the USA. Most of thes are exactly right. However I purchased an electric kettle about three or four years ago. It is so handy I now cannot imagine not having one.
That’s so interesting! I wonder if they’ll ever increase in popularity and become as much of a staple as they are in UK homes 🤔 Folks clearly don’t know what they’re missing 🤣
Everyone should have a kettle! I've introduced them to Spain (not really, some people had them, but it was and is not the norm) even hotels tend not to have them, so I take one with me!
Ha ha! Good for you! I remember in the 1990’s little mini travel kettles were really popular for brits taking on holiday to Spain (or wherever!) along with packing your tea bags and your mini jar of coffee! 🤣 I wonder if you still get them🤔 On many cruise lines now British passport holders will automatically be given a kettle etc in their cabin. Anyone can ask but you might not know it’s available to ask for. A good cuppa is all about the water tho and ask any Scot and we’ll tell you our drinking water, straight from the tap, is the best in the world 😉😜🤣
Honesty in life is everything! So interesting though that it might be a question someone would ask. It would never even cross my mind! Also, you live in a beautiful state 🥰
Interesting. South African homes seem to be a combination between American and British homes. House size closer to USA and most are freestanding. Though in recent years a lot of small townhouses are being built. The following is more common: Built in cupboards, brick homes, no cupboard under stairs, no garbage disposal, letter box as opposed to door slot, master bedroom has en suite, no plugs in bathroom, washing lines to dry clothes, kettles are a staple. Air-conditioning and radiators are not common. We tend to have movable, freestanding fans and heaters that plug into the wall. Older houses are closed plan, new houses are open.
Thank you so much for your reply! Fascinating to think about all the similarities and differences. I’ve had the pleasure to visit South Africa and it’s a beautiful part of the world 😍 You’re right It does sound like a real mix of both. So interesting that freestanding/plug in heaters and fans are the norm. That’s a lot of electricity! Thanks so much for taking the time to reply - really appreciate it ❤️
Ann Arbor, Michigan here with cousins living in Ayr, Ardrossan, Saltcoats, and Edinburgh. Construction - there are many homes in America that are built of bricks. Especially our historical homes. I grew up in a home built in 1964 that was brick. New build homes (late 80's) are more all lumber. Brickwork is expensive. The UK also must use bricks because they struggle with damp so bad over there inside homes. Basement - probably the best thing for a home because we have tornados here and it is a cool place to go in hot weather. A bedroom is not a bedroom without a closet. You cannot even list it as a bedroom with realtor. Square footage. I would say people know this for many reasons, carpeting, flooring, taxes, realtor reasons etc. We are not obsessed with it. I think back in the 90's we built the McMansions here, but with housing prices you would be surprised most I would say are living under 2100 sq feet. Heat - we have electric, propane, natural gas. We don't have a lot of extreme heat in Michigan (although we are right now and I would literally die to go outside right now) but it is handy to have central air or a window air conditioner. Not all homes have that. My sister is getting one installed next week and her home was built in 1979. Global warming is causing the need for this. We run several fans too but it gets too extreme to survive on just that. Laundry - I remember my Mom and neighbors line drying clothes growing up. Washer/dryer units are now becoming available here. Front loaders have been popular for 20 years here, but IMHO are garbage. I am waiting for a new machine today as I type (it is 90 plus degrees outside) as the one I bought in 2017 died already!!! Letter box slot - Plenty of homes in America with them. Depends again WHEN they were built. We had a mailbox outside the front door on the porch, sometimes on a post on the road and sometimes a large area with many in a neighborhood at the entrance. We can place mail or go to the big letter box at post office, shopping malls and stick our mail in it. Electric kettle - plenty of those here. We drink hot and cold drinks all day. It is just the entitled that think they must line of at Starbucks and spend 10.00 on one! Fridge - more posh homes incorporate it into the kitchen cabinets in USA. Mulch - we don't mulch every year. that would be so expensive. But in the UK you all use pea gravel everywhere. gardens, driveways, etc. Death in Home - my Dad died in my parent's home and I have never heard of such a thing!??
I LOVE this! Thank you so much for putting me straight! I loved all the brick homes in Boston, Chicago, Washington- I guess I forgot about all those but yes they’re mostly all the historic ones I suppose. Maybe not so different after all!!
I've travelled to the UK and you've made some very good observations. I'm in Canada. My late Mum drank many cups of tea throughout the day and would have been lost without her kettle. When she would visit, turning on the kettle was the first thing I did when she arrived, but it's not necessarily a thing here in Canada. Unlike both Canada and the USA, eggs in the UK are generally not refrigerated. Another reason for smaller fridges.
You can’t beat a good cuppa! ☺️ Thanks so much for taking the time to leave a comment. It’s always lovely to continue the conversation. I hadn’t thought about where eggs are stored here. I keep mine in my (cool) pantry but never in the fridge so yes, another difference! I tend to go with where/how the supermarket displays them and in the UK you’ll never find them in the fridge section.
I’m always curious about people’s houses. We live in Toronto, in an older part of the city, and our house is a Canadian version of a Victorian terraced house. Whenever we watch a police procedural show based in the north of England, I always feel I know what is coming around the corner, because the layout is the same as our house. Once when we were watching a Mike Leigh film my husband and I jumped at the same time when we spotted an unusual feature on a row of houses that we happen to have on our street: a narrow covered passageway between the row of houses. It is called a “ginnel” in the north of England, I believe. The streets here were built with laneways behind. There would have been outhouses at the bottom of the garden. The laneways allowed horse and cart collect the “night soil” from the outhouses. Where the outhouses once stood, most homes now have a garage. We have a mixture of UK and US features. Basements are essential here because of the cold. You need that pocket of warm air under the house or the cold would radiate through the floor. We have no built in cupboards and very little storage space. We do have a Harry Potter cupboard under the stairs. We have an electric kettle and a front load washing machine. Forced air gas heating, though heat pumps are increasingly common. In the last 20 years there has been much more air conditioning going into homes, and we have needed it!
Thanks so much for this! So fascinating! Yes I’ve often heard the lane behind the houses called a ‘Vennel’. I’m sure these terms were just misheard at some point then someone took off to a different part of the country and a whole new word for something started 🤣 I had no idea that the basement was a way to keep the house warm in winter but it makes perfect sense. I guess there are many more similarities between Eastern USA / Canada and the UK than I realised! Maybe more traditional style houses there? I just find it all so interesting ☺️
I live in a town in the midwest of 20 thousand people. Probably 95% of people live in a single family home, mostly on large lots. I think America was settled with lots of timber homes because we have vast amounts of forest land so it is readily available. In my town many of the large homes from around 1900-1920 are brick. Mine was built in 1965 out of stone. Mostly the only people living in apartments are either young singles or low income. You are right, to be called a bedroom it must have a window and a closet, but any houses built after about 1970 tend to have large walk-in closets. I notice we all have laundry rooms and people in the UK seem to have a washing machine in their kitchen. My laundry room in a small house(1600 sq ft) is probably the size of a UK kitchen. American bathrooms have something called a ground-fault circuit interrupter, or GFCI, it is a fast-acting circuit breaker designed to shut off electric power in the event of a ground-fault within as little as 1/40 of a second, that is why we can have outlets even above the sink. People in cities do tend to have mail boxes on their house or a mail slot, but suburban and rural houses have mailboxes on the street and the postman drives around. The main reason we use mulch is because it gets very hot in the summer, her in Illinois it has been 95 degrees F. all week and mulch holds the moisture in. Our city grinds up all the limbs and things and we go to the city lot and get free mulch, so that is how we recycle our yard waste. My daughter lives in Florida and they all have stone around their landscaping as it is humid and they would have bugs and snakes in mulch. I never heard of the last one and I am 70 years old and have owned eight houses. I looked it up and there are 3 states out of 50 that require you to disclose it if the death has been in the past three years. All states require you to disclose material facts when asked, so that would include a death if asked. Very interesting video, I hope you don't mind me responding to your points. US is hard to generalize, it is so vast and so different. If you drove a couple hundred miles you would be in another country. I have to drive 700 miles or 1200 to visit my daughters. I could drive 2000 and not be at my aunts yet.
Thank you so much for taking the time and care to reply. I really appreciate it ❤️ That all makes so much sense. Yes with vast timber reserves of course you’re going to use it in construction and you reminded me that of course I’ve seen brick built houses in Chicago, Boston (lots of red brick!) and NY. My family are in IL too hence seeing the mulching! And again, makes sense to keep the moisture in!! I remember seeing lots of stones in FL and AZ too. Yes, you’re absolutely right, it’s a hard country to generalise on. It still blows my mind that you can fly for 5+ hours and still be in your ‘homeland’ 🤣
Your home looks lovely! Yes, U.S.A. has regional homes built for that environment.
Thank you! And yes, makes so much sense that things differ state to state as the climate can vary so hugely. Thanks so much for joining in the conversation 🥰
From the USA. Most of thes are exactly right. However I purchased an electric kettle about three or four years ago. It is so handy I now cannot imagine not having one.
That’s so interesting! I wonder if they’ll ever increase in popularity and become as much of a staple as they are in UK homes 🤔 Folks clearly don’t know what they’re missing 🤣
Loved this video - very interesting! I'm nosier than I thought I was😅
Ha ha! Love it - you’re definitely my kinda girl Lisa 😂
Everyone should have a kettle! I've introduced them to Spain (not really, some people had them, but it was and is not the norm) even hotels tend not to have them, so I take one with me!
Ha ha! Good for you! I remember in the 1990’s little mini travel kettles were really popular for brits taking on holiday to Spain (or wherever!) along with packing your tea bags and your mini jar of coffee! 🤣 I wonder if you still get them🤔 On many cruise lines now British passport holders will automatically be given a kettle etc in their cabin. Anyone can ask but you might not know it’s available to ask for. A good cuppa is all about the water tho and ask any Scot and we’ll tell you our drinking water, straight from the tap, is the best in the world 😉😜🤣
I live in Massachusetts, we do not have to disclose if someone died in a home BUT if asked we can not be deceitful.
Honesty in life is everything! So interesting though that it might be a question someone would ask. It would never even cross my mind! Also, you live in a beautiful state 🥰
Interesting. South African homes seem to be a combination between American and British homes. House size closer to USA and most are freestanding. Though in recent years a lot of small townhouses are being built. The following is more common: Built in cupboards, brick homes, no cupboard under stairs, no garbage disposal, letter box as opposed to door slot, master bedroom has en suite, no plugs in bathroom, washing lines to dry clothes, kettles are a staple. Air-conditioning and radiators are not common. We tend to have movable, freestanding fans and heaters that plug into the wall. Older houses are closed plan, new houses are open.
Thank you so much for your reply! Fascinating to think about all the similarities and differences. I’ve had the pleasure to visit South Africa and it’s a beautiful part of the world 😍 You’re right It does sound like a real mix of both. So interesting that freestanding/plug in heaters and fans are the norm. That’s a lot of electricity! Thanks so much for taking the time to reply - really appreciate it ❤️
Ann Arbor, Michigan here with cousins living in Ayr, Ardrossan, Saltcoats, and Edinburgh.
Construction - there are many homes in America that are built of bricks. Especially our historical homes. I grew up in a home built in 1964 that was brick. New build homes (late 80's) are more all lumber. Brickwork is expensive. The UK also must use bricks because they struggle with damp so bad over there inside homes.
Basement - probably the best thing for a home because we have tornados here and it is a cool place to go in hot weather.
A bedroom is not a bedroom without a closet. You cannot even list it as a bedroom with realtor.
Square footage. I would say people know this for many reasons, carpeting, flooring, taxes, realtor reasons etc. We are not obsessed with it. I think back in the 90's we built the McMansions here, but with housing prices you would be surprised most I would say are living under 2100 sq feet.
Heat - we have electric, propane, natural gas. We don't have a lot of extreme heat in Michigan (although we are right now and I would literally die to go outside right now) but it is handy to have central air or a window air conditioner. Not all homes have that. My sister is getting one installed next week and her home was built in 1979. Global warming is causing the need for this. We run several fans too but it gets too extreme to survive on just that.
Laundry - I remember my Mom and neighbors line drying clothes growing up. Washer/dryer units are now becoming available here. Front loaders have been popular for 20 years here, but IMHO are garbage. I am waiting for a new machine today as I type (it is 90 plus degrees outside) as the one I bought in 2017 died already!!!
Letter box slot - Plenty of homes in America with them. Depends again WHEN they were built. We had a mailbox outside the front door on the porch, sometimes on a post on the road and sometimes a large area with many in a neighborhood at the entrance. We can place mail or go to the big letter box at post office, shopping malls and stick our mail in it.
Electric kettle - plenty of those here. We drink hot and cold drinks all day. It is just the entitled that think they must line of at Starbucks and spend 10.00 on one!
Fridge - more posh homes incorporate it into the kitchen cabinets in USA.
Mulch - we don't mulch every year. that would be so expensive. But in the UK you all use pea gravel everywhere. gardens, driveways, etc.
Death in Home - my Dad died in my parent's home and I have never heard of such a thing!??
I LOVE this! Thank you so much for putting me straight! I loved all the brick homes in Boston, Chicago, Washington- I guess I forgot about all those but yes they’re mostly all the historic ones I suppose. Maybe not so different after all!!
In my town in Illinois we take our yard waste to the city lot and they grind it into mulch. We can get free much anytime.
I've travelled to the UK and you've made some very good observations.
I'm in Canada. My late Mum drank many cups of tea throughout the day and would have been lost without her kettle.
When she would visit, turning on the kettle was the first thing I did when she arrived, but it's not necessarily a thing here in Canada.
Unlike both Canada and the USA, eggs in the UK are generally not refrigerated. Another reason for smaller fridges.
You can’t beat a good cuppa! ☺️ Thanks so much for taking the time to leave a comment. It’s always lovely to continue the conversation. I hadn’t thought about where eggs are stored here. I keep mine in my (cool) pantry but never in the fridge so yes, another difference! I tend to go with where/how the supermarket displays them and in the UK you’ll never find them in the fridge section.
I’m always curious about people’s houses. We live in Toronto, in an older part of the city, and our house is a Canadian version of a Victorian terraced house. Whenever we watch a police procedural show based in the north of England, I always feel I know what is coming around the corner, because the layout is the same as our house. Once when we were watching a Mike Leigh film my husband and I jumped at the same time when we spotted an unusual feature on a row of houses that we happen to have on our street: a narrow covered passageway between the row of houses. It is called a “ginnel” in the north of England, I believe. The streets here were built with laneways behind. There would have been outhouses at the bottom of the garden. The laneways allowed horse and cart collect the “night soil” from the outhouses. Where the outhouses once stood, most homes now have a garage.
We have a mixture of UK and US features. Basements are essential here because of the cold. You need that pocket of warm air under the house or the cold would radiate through the floor. We have no built in cupboards and very little storage space. We do have a Harry Potter cupboard under the stairs. We have an electric kettle and a front load washing machine. Forced air gas heating, though heat pumps are increasingly common. In the last 20 years there has been much more air conditioning going into homes, and we have needed it!
Thanks so much for this! So fascinating! Yes I’ve often heard the lane behind the houses called a ‘Vennel’. I’m sure these terms were just misheard at some point then someone took off to a different part of the country and a whole new word for something started 🤣 I had no idea that the basement was a way to keep the house warm in winter but it makes perfect sense. I guess there are many more similarities between Eastern USA / Canada and the UK than I realised! Maybe more traditional style houses there? I just find it all so interesting ☺️
I live in a town in the midwest of 20 thousand people. Probably 95% of people live in a single family home, mostly on large lots. I think America was settled with lots of timber homes because we have vast amounts of forest land so it is readily available. In my town many of the large homes from around 1900-1920 are brick. Mine was built in 1965 out of stone. Mostly the only people living in apartments are either young singles or low income. You are right, to be called a bedroom it must have a window and a closet, but any houses built after about 1970 tend to have large walk-in closets. I notice we all have laundry rooms and people in the UK seem to have a washing machine in their kitchen. My laundry room in a small house(1600 sq ft) is probably the size of a UK kitchen. American bathrooms have something called a ground-fault circuit interrupter, or GFCI, it is a fast-acting circuit breaker designed to shut off electric power in the event of a ground-fault within as little as 1/40 of a second, that is why we can have outlets even above the sink. People in cities do tend to have mail boxes on their house or a mail slot, but suburban and rural houses have mailboxes on the street and the postman drives around. The main reason we use mulch is because it gets very hot in the summer, her in Illinois it has been 95 degrees F. all week and mulch holds the moisture in. Our city grinds up all the limbs and things and we go to the city lot and get free mulch, so that is how we recycle our yard waste. My daughter lives in Florida and they all have stone around their landscaping as it is humid and they would have bugs and snakes in mulch. I never heard of the last one and I am 70 years old and have owned eight houses. I looked it up and there are 3 states out of 50 that require you to disclose it if the death has been in the past three years. All states require you to disclose material facts when asked, so that would include a death if asked. Very interesting video, I hope you don't mind me responding to your points. US is hard to generalize, it is so vast and so different. If you drove a couple hundred miles you would be in another country. I have to drive 700 miles or 1200 to visit my daughters. I could drive 2000 and not be at my aunts yet.
Thank you so much for taking the time and care to reply. I really appreciate it ❤️ That all makes so much sense. Yes with vast timber reserves of course you’re going to use it in construction and you reminded me that of course I’ve seen brick built houses in Chicago, Boston (lots of red brick!) and NY. My family are in IL too hence seeing the mulching! And again, makes sense to keep the moisture in!! I remember seeing lots of stones in FL and AZ too. Yes, you’re absolutely right, it’s a hard country to generalise on. It still blows my mind that you can fly for 5+ hours and still be in your ‘homeland’ 🤣
This is so interesting!!!!
Thank you Cindy! ☺️