American Reacts to Differences Between British and American Houses
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 20 พ.ย. 2022
- In this video I react to 15 differences between British houses and American houses. While a few of the items on this list were expected, some were downright shocking! For example, only 24% of Brits actually live in detached houses and the sizes of homes in America really are insane. Also, is it true that Brits don't really appreciate front porches?
This was a fun video. I came away knowing much more about the differences between British homes and American homes than I started with.
Thanks for watching. If you enjoyed this reaction please give this video a thumbs up, share your thoughts in the comments and click the subscribe button to follow my journey to learn about my British and Irish ancestry.
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The UK property listings generally don't show overall square footage, but they always include the dimensions of individual rooms, so you know the size you're getting.
We moved last year and nearly all the listings we looked at had overall square footage on the floorplan small print - but I agree with you that it isn't a common selling point.
Plus I think theres more of a buying concept of, I know what I can spend, I know what I need (in terms of bedrooms), I know where I want live, and that will translate to a specific type of property. Maybe Americans are more geographically flexible?
@@wobaguk Well they do drive more.
And it is more important to know if furniture fits the room rather than the overall building size
Yes they do show the overall squad footage
We have halls to keep the heat in our sitting rooms, not going out of the front door or up the stairs 🇬🇧🇬🇧🇬🇧 also when looking at houses the size of rooms are on the details i.e. 14 ft x 16ft that’s what I need to know
I agree with you about room sizes. We can usually tell how big a house is by the amount of bedrooms the house has.
A point they made about the space under the stair would make the room bigger if open, is not a good idea, as one can’t use it without bumping one’s head and it’s very handy storage space.
@@jeanplunkett5580 exactly. I'd rather things were stored away than cluttering up my room. Plus, some have the gas and electric meter in the cupboard under the stairs.
i also dont want outside shoes walking all over my sitting room carpet, the hall is for storing coats and shoes too
@@jeanplunkett5580exactly. Under the stairs is where we keep the vacuum cleaner, brush, etc.
Flat derives from the Old English (via Proto-Germanic) "flett," “a dwelling, hall, floor, ground." In the 1800s, a flat meant the floor or part of a floor set up as an apartment.
Thanks. How interesting.
UK here, our houses have hallways or st least entryway to put more barriers between the living space and the outside. It can get quite cold in winter, so not too convenient to walk into a nice warmed room with a fireplace just to drag the cold in with you.
The hallway also acts as a place to put on/ remove outdoor clothing to protect things like carpeted flooring from mud/rain.
I don't know about other peoples but I'm pretty sure the hallway wall in my terraced house is load bearing.
In big cities houses are smaller and often terraced. The UK has less space than the UK and Australia too !
26:36 My (UK) guesses are:
Maybe the walls are there so people in the living room don't freeze to death when the door is opened over winter?
Maybe it is easier to heat a smaller closed off room rather than a larger more open room?
Maybe they are there for added privacy when someone comes to your house?
But whatever the reason, it doesn't seem that beneficial to remove the walls. You would still need to leave the space there for the main walkway. It may look bigger, but it wouldn't improve anything...... apart from air flow during summer.
You’re not far off. A lot of terraced houses in the uk are Victorian and follow a Victorian plan…sitting room, dining room and kitchen downstairs and 2-3 rooms upstairs plus a bathroom which was most likely added mid 20th century
The fashion now is to have a larger kitchen/dining are and no separate dining room. It’s very common to build extensions onto older buildings to add space
Those walls are also usually the supporting wall for the floor above so removing them isn't just as easy as knocking them down and you have to get structural engineers in to fit an appropriately sized steel beam in place of the wall. Its a huge job to remove a supporting wall like that.
Our house was built in 1975 and we have a hallway.
In the UK, a 'porch' is normally a small structure protecting the front door from the worst of the weather (often for good reason), rather than a wrap-around covered veranda. Also, given our weather, historically, that does make sense ...
If you want to see more UK homes watch a bit of Homes Under The Hammer. You’ll see a good variety of diverse builds up and down the country. It’s a show about renovating properties for resale/rent or as a family home.
I think he was being sarcastic when mentioning dungeons. Some houses have cellars or basements. The terraced houses are very popular especially in the northern parts of the UK. The kitchen comparisons are to varied to compare. Many things like drying clothes outside rather than in a dryer are traditional. I personally don't know anyone without a dryer. All houses used to have a pantry but they faded out of popularity.
On closets we must have plenty of them because I came out of mine in 1977 🤣🤣🤣👍
Maybe not so much a pantry which tended to be a small room in bigger older houses but certainly a larder, with may be a slate shelf to help keep things cool.
Northern parts?.... It's popular everywhere, especially London.
Even expensive homes in London can be classed as terraced, wouldn’t say terraced are a northern thing or even poorer houses.
I live in a Victorian terraced house ( built in 1884)and have a hallway. A lot of these properties have had most of the downstairs rooms removed but when I was looking for a house to buy I didn't consider any that had this work done. I wouldn't want to walk directly from the street into my living space. A hallway creates an added protectio from bad weather and a place to leave my shoes and coat it also means that I have 2 doors between my living room and outside meaning I can keep it cosy warm in the winter
Also extra space to hang art/pictures on!
And privacy when the door is open.
Agreed, I would HATE the front door coming straight into my living room, its a private space, away from the gaze of strangers & the elements, I also don't want my kitchen coming off my living room, & all the stairs open & the TV noise & cooking smells wafting upstairs, &, a hallway is a decontamination place to take off muddy boots & to hang wet coats, & dry the dog off before they charge into the house.
I've lived in the UK for over twenty years and in the building trade and most of what they're saying isn't standard at all. Most of what he mentioned are with older properties. Most new modern houses have washrooms, walk in closest, single tap for hot and cold water, garages or private parking area. I guess the places they stayed here are what they could afford because these places are cheaper to rent. Uk homes are built to last and at very high building standards. Most of the materials used in the US would not be allowed here.
Our house (also dating from the 1880s). This is a midterrace house, in the standard 2 up 2 down configuration, with a small kitchen at the back with small bathroom above.
Our stairs are on one side of our dining room and the front door (we've added a small porch) comes straight into the lounge. We then a a sun room on the rear. The kitchen and dining room have been opened up for an open plan space.
We would love to have more space to have a hallway.
The hallways are usually in older houses (Victorian), the rooms were usually heated by coal fires, to save on the cost of coal you would just light the fire in the room you were using and the heat would stay put in that room.
My house has old fire place in the rooms. We have old system too. Back boiler that heats up radiators around the house. My town has loads of huge houses. They made from brick and must be Victorian lol
I certainly wouldn't want everyone walking through my living room to get anywhere in the house. Also all that heat going out the front door and up the stairs.
The majority of standard Social housing / buy to let / housing association builds have a front door, into a short rectangular hall, stairs possibly up, and the doors to the rooms radiating off it, bathroom usually straight ahead.
I still do!
@@elainesheldon5823 new ones, almost all, yes
A cellar is a basement. A conservatory is a room that usually has a clear roof and the walls are part brick and the top is all windows and is used for sitting in on warmer days, and is generally meant originally for having lots of plants, but is often just used as an overflow reception space and is cheap to construct compared to a brick extension.
Huge areas of forest in the UK were cut down to build ships in the Tudor period and napoleonic eras, and those areas have remained farmland ever since, so wooded areas are precious. This means wood for building is mostly imported.
If you visit uk go to Bucklers Hard near Burleigh in the new forest, this is where King Henry VIII built his ships, hidden from view from the English Channel. Lots of interesting information there and a great day out. They have a museum, workers cottages and master builders tea shop/restaurant. Great!
@@Annie-hp1pk They also have a decree signed by the monarch of the time (one of the Georges?) exempting the menfolk from being press-ganged.
A flat just means that everything is all on one level with no upstairs .
Except I lived in an upstairs flat with nothing underneath the stairs, and only 1 front door
@@margaretflounders8510 she meant no upstairs within your ACTUAL flat! Not stairs to get to your flat. If your flat had two floors, it's a maisonette, if built above something else like a shop etc.
A flat is a dwelling, usually with the accommodation on one level within the dwelling, but not always. Buildings with flats usually have either multiple other flats, or other space in the building, like commercial space on the groundfloor.
In the UK a townhouse is distinct from a terrace house in that the garage and kitchen will be on the groundfloor with the living room on the first floor, and perhaps bed and bathroom, with a third floor for bedrooms. Terrace houses can be two or more floors, but usually have the kitchen and living space on the groundfloor. Old terraces built during the industrial revolution for the working classes also often have the only bathroom on the groundfloor.
Edit: A property on one level, no upstairs, which can be either detached, link detached, semi detached or terraced, is a bungalow and would have a garden.
A dormer bungalow is a building that does have an upstairs but the upper floor is within the roof space rather than an upper floor plus seperate roof space that does not provide living space.
@@tamielizabethallaway2413 Exactly well said .
I was always told is because the buildings generally have flat roofs whereas house don't have flat roofs
I think when people see all our old architecture, they think we've kept all this history for the sake of preservation. BUT new families are living in houses that the Victorians built, pre indoor plumbing, and where a bedroom had to be sacrificed to add a bathroom or lounge shrunk to make a kitchen etc. Being that the Victorians loved to build terraced homes, there's no way to extend them unless you buy two next door to each other. The majority of us live in homes that were built 50 - 500+ years ago! Some are even older than that! My local shops are in Tudor houses.... originals! The church in town is from the 12th century. That's why our houses tend to be small, only have one bathroom, and generally have the washing machine in the kitchen. The original house would have had something of a kitchen and lounge downstairs, and 3 bedrooms upstairs. No bathrooms, no toilets, no plumbing, no laundry facilities, and only a small courtyard garden out the back. Many of those that have extended outwards have only a slither of a garden remaining. Many huge houses have since been turned into hotels, flats or student accommodation. We don't build with anywhere close to as much wood as you use in your homes, so they last a lot longer. Our homes may have had generations and generations of people living in them previously. History is literally all around us and woven through us. Gives us a sense of being one small thing in a much bigger picture and keeps us humble, appreciative, and get priorities straight in our lives. Some people here are money oriented, but most people value time spent with friends and family way above anything material. We work to live....not live to work. 😁😁😁
My mums house in Colchester is a mere 550 years old, wood frame, wattle and daub (yes, mud, hay and blood) between the beams, with render on the outside. Downstairs she has her commercial art gallery, with the front room having a 12ft ceiling (it's a 1780's extension) with the remaining sections having 6ft ceilings to the beams which hold the house up, and which the living accommodation rests on. The upper floor has a great hall (approximately 30ft long) which was the traditional living space for the commercial property, with a barn style roof. I removed the drop ceilings on the upper floor when I repaired the beams (to remove weight which was causing the roof to bow slightly). The beams are approximately 1ft x 1ft sq of solid oak.
@@bobbobskin oh your poor Mum! Having to live in such a rickety old barn of a house!
And yes I'm being sarcastic and no I'm not envious at all! 😜 Wow! It sounds gorgeous. I love those hand smoothed walls between the chunky beams. There's something so basic about their construction and yet so solid and substantial. Probably my favourite period in English history, even though it was a brutal time to live. I love the way you add like a "pfft 1780's extension" as though it's a modern eyesore. 🤣 She sounds like she has a perfect set up, lives in a remarkable home and has space to create and display art. Working at what you love to do anyway makes it not feel like work. In comparison, my 70 ish year old council bungalow sounds positively shoddy! 🙄 What a lucky lady she is. Not least because she has a capable son who can do work on her home for her! I split up with my husband earlier this year, obviously like anyone's marriage ending there are a ton of reasons why. But one of those reasons was he just wouldn't get on with anything in the home. I'd be begging forever for some shelves to go up or putting some sealant round the shower! Useless! I know these days people are offended by gender norms, but I was raised with traditional parental roles, my Mum was a housewife and my Dad the breadwinner. He also did all decorating and DIY in the home. In fact, my Mum is no longer with us, but my Dad is, and almost 89 now...and he STILL helps me with DIY jobs in my home now! We've been trying to work our way together through the jobs my ex husband left bodged up for me to deal with! It's slow going, painfully slow, and I don't have money to buy lots of supplies or hire someone. I have health issues and obviously my Dad is old now, BUT it's still moving along faster than it was when the ex was here! Lazy bastard! I just lost all respect for him, and that was one of the bigger reasons why. So aside from your mother's house being the kind of home I can only dream about, I'm most envious of her having a son to trust her home repairs to! Fewer and fewer men these days are skilled in that way, and I don't wish to be gender rude, but to me, I just think such skills are so "manly". Your Mum is blessed in many ways it seems and I wish her continuous blessings in life! I may be envious in certain ways, but never jealous. I love to hear of people's good fortunes so thank you for sharing! 😊 Tell her I wish her well, and to you also. I shall picture her home in my mind now and imagine myself smoothing my hand over the daubing. 😘😘😘
Porches need land. Which we are short of. Nowadays most homes, have a microwave. I have one but would never cook in one,much prefer an oven.Living on my own I hardly produce many dirty pots. As well as you use less water, that lessens the need less heating. Saving electricicity.
@@iriscollins7583 erm.... Right ok... Did you reply to the wrong comment though...? Cos neither of us mentioned porches...or microwaves.....? Just saying.... 🤔
@@tamielizabethallaway2413 Yes indeed. Iris, you must be from out in the sticks to not realise that we are having a very English conversation here about houses, specifically other peoples and our own DIY ... and you are discussing such trifles as whether SMEG or Dualit make better toasters! City folk know to act better!
In the UK there is a very small, almost statistically insignificant number who live in mobile accommodation like vans, caravans, barges/canal or narrow boats...
I looked into a canal boat, it costs as much to maintain and run a narrow boat as my house does for a year... So its not cheaper to be on the water...
My daughter and her fiance live in a mobile home called a caravan in the UK .
Hallways exist in the Uk for lots of reasons .1 ,they help to keep draughts out of the main living areas ,it gets chilly here in winter and no one wants a blast of cold air in the living room every time you open the front door .2 ,Many Uk houses are pre WWI and in those days most home owners would have a maid who answered the door .Having a hallway meant that the home owner could say they were not "At home" that day and visitors couldn't see them just sitting in their living room .3 ,A hallway is a good place to keep outdoor coats and shoes , most of us don't wear our shoes in the house so it's useful to have a place near the door for them .4 ,A hall adds a sense of privacy to the house ,even today when most of us answer our own door .If a stranger calls all they get to see is a very neutral space containing perhaps a coat rack ,a shoe bench and a console table .It's a sort of semi public area where unexpected callers can be dealt with without disturbing the rest of the house .5 ,I think we are just used to the concept of having a hall and most of us like it .
Indeed, plus...not to mention that they are internal structural walls. When a house is made from a wooden frame, and as is common in the US, with asphalt shingle roofing etc that is vastly different to a multiple story home made of brick or stone with several tons of hefty ceramic tiled roofing. It's a lot of weight...and that all needs supporting...and many internal walls do exactly that...hold the rest of the house above them up.
As others have said most home's in the UK are old. There is a very large stock of Victorian homes in particular and small separated rooms were how they were built in order to keep Inthe heat from coal fireplaces..Many of the walls are also "supporting" walls i.e if you tried to knock through the whole house could come down. Instead,it requires structural steels to be put in to support the upper floors. It can be done but is expensive and because the homes are so old, you can't always be sure what you will find when you remodel...problems can arise that add to the costs..
Individual room sizes are listed on estate agent details, just not the total floor space. We are more concerned with how many rooms/bedrooms etc there are overall.
I used to work in property insurance, and was told that we stopped building houses mostly out of wood due to the fire hazard, which would make sense considering how close together our houses are compared to in the USA.
Remember the great fire of London , all wood houses.things changed after that.
@@sarahhoops9696I’m from a small rural English town.
We had a fire that took out most of the town centre in the 1500’s.
Only one timber framed house survived right on the edge, and the medieval church which was stone.
Today there’s still a number of timber framed buildings that were built after, and the original one that survived the fire. They’re pretty much all joining, some even join above alley ways. Some of the roads are one way single file roads. Because the buildings are too close together. Some of the side roads you can’t get cars down because they’re too narrow.
Once you had a bad building fire going. It would just keep spreading. That’s why most historic towns are built near rivers.
@@JarlGrimmToys I live in an English county medieval town, my house back onto a church parts of it dating back to 11th century. The whole town is built in loop of the river. We still have many shuts ( small alleys) still used from the original medieval town.
I'm from the UK and I know literally no person who doesn't have a microwave. We don't use it for water obviously but we have a lot of thing that do use microwaves. E.g. microwave ready meals.
Typically the standard minimum kitchen counter top appliances would be kettle, toaster, microwave.
Over the last few years air fryers have also become popular. We use one everyday for cooking loads of everyday foods e.g. chips, fish fingers, chicken strips/nuggets
Generally speaking wooden buildings are holiday chalets or sheds in the UK. I live in a mobile home. They're called park homes here but are static. They don't get moved about.
I thought those were called caravans. Like by the seaside in parks where they stay static.
@@Julia-uh4li Absolutely incorrect. 'Mobile Homes' are indeed essentially caravans and although too big for general towing behind the family car are capable of being moved around on their wheels if absolutely neccessary. The construction of mobile homes is much like the construction of a caravan. 'Park Homes' on the other hand are generally bigger than the biggest caravans and are built upon a solid brick base, with full plumbing, etc., etc. Although they do have wheels to comply with the legal definition of a Park Home, they are not designed to ever be movable. They are built to a MUCH higher standard than any caravans are and designed to last for anything from 60 - 80 years - for example the walls in our park home are over 8 inches thick and fully insulated both in the wall cavity and on the outside. It is without doubt the most insulated home we have ever lived in and has halved our energy bill from what it was in our previous traditional brick house.. Park homes are also 90% built of wood, unlike caravans, which are usually built mostly of aluminium or similar. There is far more similarity to a traditional bungalow than there is to any top of the range caravan. 😉
We have (in older houses) hallways with doors to the living rooms and kitchen for one main reason. To prevent loss of heat when the front door is opened. This goes back to harder times before Central heating, fitted carpets and double glazing. "Shut that door, were you born in a barn" was a common shout if you forgot to close the door. We all used to have coal fires in our living room and that would be used to heat water through a back boiler system.
Sometimes the dividing hall wall is part of the structural integrity, but often these are removed in older houses.
Flats are called flats because the rooms are all flat on one level and there is a main shared communal entrance to the block.
We also have maisonettes, these are flats with their own external entrance. Let me first explain that what you call 1st floor we call ground floor, what you call 2nd floor we call 1st floor. So using UK terminology the 1st floor maisonette will have external stairs to their own front door.
I have lived in about a dozen homes and all of them have had an entrance hallway. I bought a mid 19th century terrace in the early 90s and decided to increase the size of the living room by removing the hallway wall. Big mistake. The living room became colder and more draughty and the floor became dirtier more quickly.
The knap of Howar is the oldest preserved stone house in the UK. It was built around 3700BC .
We dont generally express the size of the property as a total, we list each room by its width and length. The property agencies in the UK are beginning to put sq ft or sq m on listings, mainky due to the number of people from overseas who are used to seeing it expressed this way, but it's quite an alien way to imagine the total space here! We understand the space by seeing that the main bedroom is say 14ft by 10ft 6, the kitchen is 12ft by 9ft etc. When we use property websites we dont filter by sq ft total but we specify how many bedrooms we want and the lowest and highest price and the location, and whether it has a garden, garage, and the type like flat, bungalow, detached etc
Edit:
Lots of houses in the UK do have seperate space for laundry, with sink, cupboards, space for washer and dryer, but it costs quite a bit. You can also buy washer dryers all in one. We also line dry our clothes in the garden or on a 'clothes horse' or 'maiden' in the house.
I always call it a clothes horse but my daughter calls hers an airer which I suppose is a more modern term. Years ago my mum used to have a wooden one which opened out sideways.
Hall ways and Passages in the UK are to prevent heat escaping from the house when opening the door, the separate indoors door and wall system keeps the heat localized to a specific room and prevents draughts (air moving round the house making the house cold)
The reason our houses are traditionally built is that it's impossible to get a mortgage on what is called Non Standard Construction and also they have a higher energy efficiency rating.
Also, we do have utility rooms for washer/dryer in modern houses. It sounds like this couple were viewing "doer upper" houses which need modernising.
A Tudor house was one built during the Tudor period 1485 - 1601. Hope this helps
I'd also add that there are three types of flat.
You have a flat, which is a single level home with separate bedrooms, a studio, which is an open plan single level and finally a two floor flat which is instead referred to as a maisonette.
Few points - house details, the estate agent usually post room sizes but not total square footage. Most houses are either old Victorian terraces (built to house factory workers) or semi-detached. Detached homes are typically luxury homes. Lots of new build in city centres is apartments. Front porches are not a thing or are very small and focused around the front door. Hallways provide a break between the outside and the living room and prevents rain ingress etc. when you enter the house :). As for dryers, most people has combined washer dryers due to the limited space.
Hi Steve. In the video they mentioned a conservatory but never actually showed one. A conservatory is basically a greenhouse extention to a house. It consists of a low brick wall approximately knee high, or a little higher. On that are erected glass walls and ceiling. It will have windows you can open. Ideal for enjoying winter sunshine. When it's too cold outside you can sit in sunshine and benefit from greenhouse effect. My mum's comes off the kitchen and has one side as a solid wall where the washing machine and dryer are, with a fridge freezer alongside. From her conservatory you step out onto the patio.
I should say that this is one of many styles of conservatory. Some have the low brick walls and brick corners. Others are a totally glass construction. No bricks involved.
A conservatory is the modern day version of the orangery. These were heated glass rooms built on the side of 'big' (as in rich people's) houses where they grew oranges... obviously... pineapples, peaches etc. Basically out of season and exotic fruit and vegetables. They were also used for leisure activities. They had a lot of leisure and a lot of money. All that fruit and veg were status symbols.
The measurements are normally on the listing. Its also part of the Energy Performance Certificate figures.
Mobile homes in the UK are often kept in parks where you cannot stay all year round, this is to prevent people from making them their main home. You're usually forced to stay away for several weeks a year, even though you technically own the property. I say technically because there are usually conditions attached to the purchase which means you can only sell the mobile home back to the owners of the park where it's kept. They can then offer you whatever they feel like paying and there's little you can do about it. I looked into this myself for a holiday home but didn't go ahead because of the restrictions.
This is great. We def select housing by number of bedrooms!
I live in a late 19th/early 20th century terraced house. It is long and narrow, 3 up 3 down with high ceilings and original fireplaces. We have a tiny yard at the back and super lucky that we have outside space to grow a few veg 😁
My house is a 2 up 2 down Victorian semi with a walled backyard . Over here backyard means a small paved yard and no grass. Otherwise they are called gardens....🇬🇧♥️
We have an abundance of quarries. The stone from some quarries built entire cities. Where I live, in Glasgow you would see a lot of white sandstone and this all came from one nearby quarry over the course of 50 years or so, and for the following 50 years we got red sandstone from another particular quarry on the opposite coast. So you can look at buildings and know exactly which quarry the stone came from.
Great video Steve, I live in the countryside in the Uk, it’s so expensive as we are near a county Town, which is easy to get to London. If you have a detached house in dollars it would be anything from $800,000 to $1.5 million all the way up to $25 million. Our houses take a longer time to build. They have to be inspected and pass regulations here.
Wow so expensive.
Sounds about right with conversion. And small 3 bed house with a garden was about £120k about 10yrs ago in my area
Yes inspected by an sider of the industry and signed off by the same industry, hence why our modern houses need to have so much rework and need professional snagging to ensure its built correctly
my house my granddad got house for £1000, that's all and he said he wish he got the whole row at the time as he could got the other 3. £1k to now just over £200k and thinking about it was not so long ago, that price increase you think hundreds years think it war times when they moved to house im in , 2nd largest garden in the row and stream running through back garden not so bad, but rubbish parking and no front garden straight on public path. crazy thing looking at old plane pictures of area my house was an end house but granddad sold land at the side but refused to sell garden so next door has a alleyway they must keep clear and 2m sq seating area, new owner / landlord next door was not happy when he found out, hard to rent place for what he was asking £700 a week at one stage for two bed end with no garden and lucky to get parking spot , now it £1k a month is prob a bit high but closer to what it worth. he asked many times to buy land, answer no and now a new wash room a workshop and storage area, quite clear now land not for sale @@England91
Our house that was built in 2009 has a closet in the master bedroom, but most older homes are going to need wardrobes. Maybe 20-30 years ago those fitted wardrobes were pretty fashionable, but not so much any more. As for porches, our houses are built to keep heat in, whereas American style porches are for sitting in the shade on a hot day.
Hey man from a perspective of someone who lives in the UK but has a lot of American family come over regularly. They love our homes. I think the consensus is that our houses might be smaller but they are built to last. They have character. American houses might be bigger but usually they lack character and are drab as hell.
The funny thing is, I also had a friend from Utah who moved here and has a much bigger house than he did in the USA. The point here is that if you want to find a decent sized detached home, it isn't as hard as people make it out to be.
You just have to be able to pay for it 😖😖😫
Our counter tops are made of pressed wood and covered with a heat resistance veneer and the ends that are on display are covered by a shaped metal guard ,you can pick any colour and texture you want ,that's the cheapest option ,but some homes have marble counter tops ,some have solid wood and some have granite counter tops .
We have porches here in the UK but they are usually small rooms with a roof, doors each end and a window. It's build over the front main door to the house and is to generally keep the damp and cold air away from the house, to keep coats and shoes in and have a small seat/box to take and put on your shoes before you enter/leave the house, creating more space in the hallway
Here in Britain we are more interested in how many bedrooms a property has as opposed to how much room we have to move around. Other than period properties, the majority of our buildings are built from brick or stone. We do have one wooden church at Greensted-Juxta-Ongar (claimed to be the oldest wooden church in the world) which is thought to date from 1053.
Because of space considerations we do not have separate washing and drying machines! However, we Europeans are a little bit more canny than Americans so we have machines that both wash AND dry in one cycle.
We've (my family) have always had separate ones, never knew you could get one that does both.
My dad says that we don't get the combo one because we like to be able to dry and wash our clothes at the same time, and if one were to break down you've only lost one function rather than both. Would save a lot of room though. Great for if you live alone.
Combo machines are crap, even back in the 70's we had separate washing machines and dryers as I do to this day, everyone I know has two machines as well.
Everyone Ive ever known has a washer and a dryer
Most people have washer dryers. Thought the world was trying to not chop down trees wherever possible- are houses still being built using wood?!
Usually the combo washer dryers are rubbish plus people tend to hang their washing out on the line even if you live in a flat there's usually a communal drying area. And you tend to find there are many people very particular as to how they hang their washing. Also frosty clear dry days are great for hanging out the washing.
We also have bungalows which generally are either detached or semi-detached, rarely terraced. Bungalows are a home all on one level, they used to be popular for elderly brits however becoming more popular with a younger generation due to the land that normally comes with a bungalow. Or you get dorma bungalows, these homes are based on a bungalow but have an upstairs to provide extra bedrooms or office space. But bungalows are rare and getting rarer due to land being at a premium here. We are not building so many new bungalows here anymore.
We do have porches, but they are simply a small covered entrance around the front door. Somewhere to stand in the dry while you unlock the front door or take your boots off. We can’t usually have American style wrap around porches because,yet again…..no space to extend the footprint of the house. Plus, it’s rarely warm enough to sit on a porch and watch the day go by.
Gardening is a very popular pastime in the UK. Many areas have garden open schemes where home owners open their gardens for charity. These are not huge house gardens but the gardens of everyday houses. There can be a lot of quiet competition to have unusual plants.
I live in an end terraced house, built for textile workers in about 1800. Because it predates the railways, so brick and slate was more expensive, it is built from local stone with a roof of sandstone tiles. About 30 years ago we had the roof renovated, they replaced 8 of the tiles and just turned the others over, fixed with new pegs. I have no idea how many square feet it is.
A conservatory is a room that is mainly made of glass and many UK homes use them as a cheap extension. The dungeon they are referring to is the cellar. This is usually a one room in the past that stored coal underneath the house. A basement could be a kind description.
Many terrace houses are the same all over UK towns and cities as they were built for workers 100 plus years ago. Hallways were used in the past to save heat as heating was by open fires in each room.
Mobile caravan parks here are unusual We have static caravan parks which are similar but gearered more to holiday stays with many don't allow you to live there all year. 9-10 months stay are more normal.
There a lot of residential mobile home sites where people live all year long and pay council tax, these are not easily moved and are semi permanent.
There aren't "mobile caravans in America. They are called" mobile homes because they are movable from manufacturer to site but you can also move them for a LOT of money to a new sight. They aren't meant to travel really ever after being in place.
26:40 Generally speaking from experience in those type of houses the wall between the hallway and living room tend to be q fundamental supporting wall that cannot be taken out without damaging the houses structure. I had go do a bit of reading before knocking walls out in my own home for renovations.
I'm confused by the average American front door opening directly into a room...allowing cold winds and rain to come into the living space. We don't like draughts in UK, so that's why we have rooms with doors.
I prefer it like that it's cosey , never liked open plan .
No hall but I have a large enough front room to be able to construct an interior `lobby` just inside the front door, thus giving an entrance with 2 doors to come through .In the UK you sometimes see this on the outside, called a `porch` but my property fronts on to the street pavement so it had to be inside.
I live in Australia a lot of newer homes are open plan but weather is more a deciding factor. Many parts of Australia have warm winters and very hot summers. Small rooms is not a good idea in hot climates.
NO In a lot of countries theirs a porch or verandah so you don't walk straight in like British homes.
@@robertmurray8763 I would consider a verandah to be outside so, effectively, you are walking into the living space from outside.
When we talk about a "porch", we are sometimes talking about a roofed structure which is otherwise open to the elements but very often the "porch" is totally enclosed, effectively a tiny room, so protected from draughts and the elements.
You don't know what a Tudor house is!
Well I would recommend you do a reaction to a Tudor house.
I have a feeling you will very much enjoy it 😉
A conservatory is a glass extension on the back or side of the house (usually facing south to catch maximum sun). It is a great place to relax and observe the back garden etc and great for growing plants too. I guess it replaces the porch in American homes but they are not nearly as common.
One thing they didn't mention was, in the UK, we don't have HOA's! That is a very American thing - and from what I've seen I'm really glad of it to!
yep sure are i have lots cacti growing but sadly it is NW facing but gets loads sun in summer and winter cacti having winter rest dormant cool dry winter better chance flowering so as they resting lack sun not issue for winter, young cacti & cacti seedlings they facing same direction but floor above looking over conservatory so gets extra sun in the shorter days. very handy having a conservatory, must have way over 30 larger cacti in conservatory and they do very well, also a lot other house plants too and soon building a plant display and extending room for more plants
So, mobile homes / trailers (or as Brits would know them better by - "static caravans") are a thing in the UK, but most of them are used as holiday homes. I've worked at a few holiday parks where statics caravans are used as accommodation, and only one of those parks allowed residents to live in them full time - the others were just used for the holiday seasons (usually from about Easter, to about October time).
Flats are called flats, because it comes from the Old English word "Flett", which means "dwelling"/"hall".
As they mentioned briefly, detached houses aren't as common here, just because of the amount of space we have available. Terraced and semi-detached houses are most common, and our gardens are much smaller than your yards on average.
We have a lot of people to fit into such a small space.
I've looked at plenty of places, both to buy and to rent, here in the UK. What you'll often find for sale listings, is that the size of each individual room is listed, instead of the overall size of the property/land. If the property is on the larger size, they might have the land size listed (I've only really seen this for lots over 1 acre in size), and on even rarer occasions you might be able to find the whole property size. But thats usually just for much larger properties.
For rented listings, the size usually isn't listed. (size is often listed on the property deeds after you've bought a house though).
If you're interested, you can use sites like RightMove or Zoopla to check out properties currently on the market - just enter a town/city you know in the UK, and see whats available!!
Conservatories are similar to what you first thought. They're glass additions, usually to the back of the house. They're not just used to grow plants in though (that would be a greenhouse, and is usually separate from the house), they're used as a living space that almost bridges the gap between indoor and out. I think you guys might have something similar, called a "Sun Room"?
Some people will put a small dining table in there, to eat breakfast at, whilst enjoying the morning view of the garden... Others might turn it into a little games area, with a pool table and comfy chairs... the uses are pretty much endless.
We do have microwaves in British homes, they exist to heat up leftovers.... the one difference that is pretty noticeable though, is that we mostly have freestanding / countertop microwaves, not the ones I see in a lot of US homes that are built in and go over the stove top - those ones weird me out.
Countertops vary. We still have the "stupid granite counters", but we also do quartz, marble, non-glittery granite, laminate, or (what you're thinking of) butcher block wood. The difference is that, because we have more older houses, we don't get the standard "this stuff is cheap, so we'll use it in every house ever built" builder-grade materials that the "stupid granite counters" would fall under.
Oooh, its been nice to write out another essay comment on one of your videos! I've loved watching you learn more about the UK / Ireland. Glad you're enjoying yourself!
I hope the family are doing well, and Happy Thanksgiving to you all 💜
Most modern houses in the UK are usually brick for the outside walls and concrete blocks for the inner walls ( with a gap or cavity between for insulation) which are then plastered for a smooth finish. Roofs are usually made of tiles or slate.
"Brick & block Construction" 👍 Great for insulation 🇬🇧 😁
With regards to the house size, I think it's more to do with what we take into account when considering purchasing. Most people will have a 'ball-park' spend figure, so look at price first. Then other factors come into play such as amenities, travel time, schools and similar details. And we like to view flats or houses first and get a feel of the place. Obviously if you need three bedrooms, that too is another factor, like off-street parking or a garage.etc. With regards to semi-detached houses (American duplex), because our houses are generally brick, unlike maybe the wooden one I have stayed in the states, neighbours sound is not usually a major issue.
Mobile homes will be in the less than 1% category. You mostly want to know how many bedrooms, living room etc and available utilities. most estate agent websites will provide plans of the building with meters displayed, so if you want the information it is available, it is just not high on the priority list. People will build houses from locally available materials, a lot of OLD dwellings would be built using liberated stone from abandoned local Abbeys, Castles etc which is why a lot of our old ruins are ruined. An interesting bit of information is that we had prefabricated homes (at lease the timber parts) centuries ago. they would be made in a factory, loaded on carts and assembled miles away. As for hallways, think heat retention. If you are heating your living room by coal fire etc.. it is easier to heat that one room by closing the door rather than trying to heat the whole house and upper floors.
Thank you for this interesting reaction video. Wow! it feels like Americans have so much space. I am jealous! I never knew the difference between an apartment and a condominium before so thank you for that explanation. I think the square footage of houses would be a great idea for buyers. I think we only have the sizes of the individual rooms so I suppose we could work it out. We just don't tend to.
Plans of houses shown on property websites often show the sizes of individual rooms and sometimes the gardem. Where we are living now, the plans did not show the size of the garden, so it was a lovely surprise when we found it to be large and beautiful and perfect for our rabbits.
A hall way is like a reception area in a UK house. Having the walls there helps to keep the rooms heated if the front door is open, plus it's more private. Anyone at the front door can't look into the living area of the house. Having a hall way also allows any visitors to go to a specific room, (that the hall way is attached to), rather than having to go through the living room to get to say, the dining area, kitchen, etc. The hall way leads off to these separate rooms.
The thing that equates most to the US porch in the UK is the conservatory. While the conservatory was originally built 200 to 300 years ago to grow and 'conserve' exotic plants, most nowadays are used as a covered glass sun-room, with doors that open wide to the patio or terrace. I guess conservatories are more popular than porches in the UK because of the weather. My house has a conservatory which is marvellous on a cold rainy day like today. I grew up partly in Africa with deep wrap-around porches, and I miss those.
Porches protect the main walls of wooden houses from being wet, (standing wet).
The major difference is that very few conservatories in the UK are positioned as the main outside entrance to a dwelling whereas I should imagine that a porch in the UK or US always is. Porches are generally at the front of a house; conservatories in the UK are normally at the back or at the side.
21:09 No room for porches here. UK
The space between the front door and the pavement (side walk) isn't that big at all either. In places like London there can actually be no space at all between them.
We prefer private outdoor seating areas, like the patio in the back garden.
I feel that, if we had the room, we would have porches too.
I've not long renovated my home and fitted solid wooden work (counter) tops. It is blocks of wood stuck together and then sanded smooth. Looks great, waterproof but unfortunately you cannot place anything warm or hot on it. Strange enough the original MDF / laminate top was extremely hard and handled hot items easy. Its the cheapest tops we have!
Regarding not knowing the size of homes, I just assumed that it’s not really relevant because it’s rare to not bother looking at a home in person before putting an offer in. Especially since you can get from the top of GB to the very bottom in like 13 hours I think.
We did make boats out of stone - concrete barges anyway. They are popular homes having been converted from their original purpose. Yes they float. Estate agents do show room sizes. I moved because I wanted a bigger garden and it was really difficult to get the information required to find out the garden sizes. That isn't poor taste, its just a bit dated. Being able to move a wardrobe to a different spot gives you the option to move your furniture around. We have patios in our beautiful gardens so we can look at our plants privately and enjoy a coffee in the open. We have four patio sets around our garden so we can sit away from the prevailing wind, or choose either a sunny or shady spot beneath the trees. I love sparkly kitchen worktops. Ours is fake wood.
My last house in the uk was a four bedroom detached house built in 1980. My present home is a Victorian terrace house with 3 bedrooms and built in 1880. The surface area of my present house is greater than the detached house.
My house is on 4 floors and consists of a hallway, lounge, dining room, kitchen, utility room, 2 more large reception rooms, 3 large bedrooms and a bathroom. Next door they have 5 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms in the same size house
Also, during the Tudor period there were a number of city and town wide fires that were due to wooden houses being built extremely close together, so it was considered safer to build out of brick or stone.
“After the 1666 fire the London Building Act of 1667 banned the use of timber framed houses in the City of London and stated that masonry be used as the structural material. This was extended to Westminster in 1707, and to the rest of London by 1774”
I live in a Bungalow, I'm not sure that's even a word in the US !!!
A hindu word originally taken from the days of British rule in India
It is used in America.
I agree with you about what you call porches. I had a house in Australia and the verandahs were lovely, really beautiful. We built a wooden balcony/deck on our English house, unfortunately it needs replacing after 35 years, but it's great to sit out on for drinks and the view. We couldn't have a roof on it unfortunately.
We used all the wood for construction over thousands of years, from iron age homes, through Tudor homes, to the ships of empire and even the Hawker Hurricane, (amongst other planes) , in WW2.
Turned out we had loads of clay in the ground, so, bricks 🤷🏼♀️
You help make my day better ☺ much love
We do have mobile homes over here.
Some houses have utility rooms with washing machines laundry etc.
Something that is important to a lot of people when house hunting in Britain is the proximity to schools and transport links.
Much depends on the location. Detached, semi-detached and terraced houses tend to be in the suburbs (uptown) whereas apartments and some townhouses are in the bigger cities or near the centres (downtown). Not much unlike America I think.
Been waiting all day to watch this, steve. Halfway through and I dunno why I love your content so much but you just engage so well with what you react to, it's awesome to see.
We also hang our laundry outside to dry. Also differences we don't have a mail box but a letterbox on door, we have switches on plug sockets, a kettle for our tea.
I’m Ian the U.K. and live in an apartment
Yes “flat” is a more common expression but apartment is creeping in. I think flat is used for the more high rise buildings of more than 4 or 5 floors. My home is a 4 floor building
Flat is also used where a house has been converted into a few separate accommodations.
We tend to go for the number of bedrooms rather than square footage/meter.
A conservatory is an extension to the house usually made of glass or half brick half glass. As for dungeons some of the older houses have basements or cellars.
A flat can be in just a 2 storey building. Apartment tends to be used if the seller or landlord would like to charge a bit more for the property as it's deemed a bit more fancy. It tends to either be newer developments or properties that have had a bit of a renovation and "apartment" sounds more high end than flat.
I think the reason we use the word 'flat' in relation to self-contained living units within a larger building in the UK, is because they're most often all on the one level and are, therefore, flat! Large houses and buildings formerly used for other purposes (hospitals, school, factories, churches, etc.,) can be divided into self-contained flats, alternatively, flats can be in both low-rise and high-rise blocks that are normally purpose-built. Low-rise is usually 3-8 storey or floors and high-rise are all the taller ones. The word 'apartment' is used slightly differently - either to describe a flat that occupies more than one floor of the building (with its own internal stairs), or the total number of reception and bedrooms, excluding the kitchen, bathroom, etc. For example, a one-bedroom flat might be described as two-apartment if it also has a living/sitting room/lounge/whatever you call it; two bedrooms and a sitting room would be 3-apartment, and so on. A flat that has only one room used for both sleeping and sitting with a separate kitchen and bathroom is a 'studio flat', unless the large room also has an area for cooking (and a separate bathroom, which may also be shared with others in the building), in which case it is called a bed-sit. (Incidentally, a block of purpose-built flats that are on more than one level (including mezzanines) or a larger house subdivided, but that all have their own external entrances, are usually referred to as maisonettes).
What and when they were built is usually dictated by what material they're built with, or what the builder or owner can afford to have brought in. For example, the city of Aberdeen is largely built with granite, as that can be quarried locally, Glasgow is largely red sandstone for the same reason, and traditional stone cottages up in higher ground or near the coasts, often have walls that are two or three feet thick - to insulate them against the cold winds! Brick is especially popular in former coal or shale-oil mining areas, as brick manufacture was a by-product of coal mining, when mixed with lime. Modern buildings erected for multiple occupancy or non-domestic purposes are often built with a double row of prefabricated concrete 'breeze blocks', the space between which is often filled with an insulation material - and/or externally faced or enhanced with brick or other surfaces. Roofing is usually slate where available, otherwise layers of dried reeds may be used (especially in South and Eastern England). The majority of larger semi or detached houses are built using wooden frames - but wooden-sided buildings are relatively uncommon in most areas. (Remember, earthquakes that are powerful enough to cause structural failure are virtually unheard of - gas explosion, terrorism or subsidence is the usual cause of the few building- collapses that do take place in the UK. Buildings dating from the Tudor period or built in that style normally have obvious wooden frames with the spaces between filled with wattle made by weaving frames of ash, willow, etc., and sealing them with crushed stones, sand, lime, etc. These are most common in the English Midlands & Welsh Borders, although the style is also much copied in small villages and towns and rural communities elsewhere! Although most have not been retrofitted with modern heating systems, buildings erected prior to the 1970s usually had at least one fireplace and chimney breast. Likewise, toilets were often external and sometimes also communal. The Scottish cities in particular have huge numbers of low-rise, terraced tenement flats that all share a street entrance and a communal hallway/stairwell. In the past, communal toilets were often found within these. Mainly constructed during the 19th and early 20th Centuries, these were originally lit by town gas, and had no bathrooms as such - a zinc bath often placed in front of the kitchen range and shared by the whole family, once a week!
Whilst we may not mention the size of the whole properly on aproperty lsting, you will see the size of each room listed.
We're very private people so most of us sit in the back garden. But some people have porches that is often used as a sheltered waiting area for a visitor waiting to be welcomed in
A conservatory is a glass room that juts out from a house normally into the garden, not very common, it's mainly used as a hangout area or just part of other rooms. On the hallway debate, I wouldn't want strangers to see into my living room and see what the rest of my family is doing when they are delivering something, maybe its that American openness and hospitality.
A "Tudor" house is typically one built between the years 1485 and 1600. They have oak frames with brickwork in between. Just to confuse you, the word "Tudor" is Welsh for "house of steel ".
Some of them have wattle and daub in between as well.
Ty dur means steel house, Twdur is not etymologically related (it's a name, cognate with Theodoric). That Tudor is derived from Tydur is a false etymology.
Not the same word. They are called Tudor houses because they were built between 1485 and 1603 when the Tudor family reigned.
For uk house sizing we get the floor plans with the size of each room but we can also judge the size of the house by the number of bedrooms rooms it has
the term Flat for apartments comes from the old english word "Flett" which means "level" referencing to the many levels at which people can live in in a block of Flats
Land is very expensive in the UK, which is one of the reasons why detached houses are very expensive and therefore less people live in them. We have a lot of green belt countryside, which is protected from being built on, which limits the land available to build on, keeping land prices high. Really enjoying your channel 😀
Good point about some land being protected as 'green belt', although I have the suspicion that this land is now being whittled away (in an underhanded way). I'm not sure if the US has this policy, given the size of the country. Robert, UK.
In the UK we will see a floor plan with the size of significant rooms, so living room, the bedrooms etc, we can see the room size. This is maybe more useful than just knowing the total floor size of the house
Honorable mentions: there are also bungalows and dorma-bungalow houses. Flats are called that because they dont have pointy roofs, Also there are a couple of types of flats one is a bedsit where the living room is also the bedroom and a studio flat where the kitchen and living room are the same room but separate bedroom.
part of the house hunting experience is looking at the houses, size can be guessed on how many rooms, a lot of us prioritize, how close to work and facilities most houses are very similar in an area. We dont build houses ourselves because of laws and regulations, they are built by commercial building firms.
this also means they are similar in a similar area. There are laws about wood as building materials though you find it in floor and roofs etc, a lot of regulations came in after the 1666 great fire of london. Terraces were built as less expensive housing for workers after the start of the industrial revolution like my home town which was a famous railway town, most had outdoor plumbing and "Bath houses" were common rather than having your own (people later converted a bedroom). due to lack of central heating rooms (coal fires) were smallish with hallways so each room can be heated and not loose heat when the front door was opened. tully houses in my town didnt have washing machines and would go to the Laundrette.
Hallways often double as a cloak room for hanging coats and wet muddy outdoor clothes.
The front sitting room (parlour) was kept for guests/ entertaining/ courting/ and funerals , many working class families would sit in the kitchen for small houses of the dining room/ lounge
That's not a studio flat. If the bedroom is separate to the rest of the property, it's a one bed flat. Bedsits have shared kitchens and usually shared bathrooms, but they may have an ensuite. Studio flats can be open plan with a combined sleeping/living/cooking room, or they can have a living/sleeping room with a separate private kitchen. Some small ones just have a kitchenette. If there is a separate bedroom, it's a 1 bed, no matter the layout of the rest of it.
In the UK a townhouse, is a home with the ground floor having a garage at the front being part of the building (not on the side) and plus a kitchen and dining room behind leading out to the garden. The sitting room/lounge is on the first floor with bathroom and bedrooms on the floor above (second floor) with another bathroom. (So ground floor/first floor/second floor....in the US first/second/third)...I lived in one for a year!!
We (Brits) generally aren't interested in square footage and are more bothered about how many bedrooms, and whether any of them are box rooms (a room that's arguably too small to fit a single bed in it). Property listings will sometimes have bedroom dimensions on them, but I'd reckon it's mostly meaningless to us 🤣 Also... don't assume that just because a house is terraced that it's small. A lot of Victorian era terraces stretch WAY back and have lovely high ceilings. Probably still smaller than a US house though.
Hallways are useful because the UK is quite a cold and windy place so as you come in through the front door, the warmth in the other rooms isn't sucked right out the front door. They also allow a space for shoes / coats and other general detritus to stay separate from the living spaces. I suspect they exist more as a hang up from the Victorian era where reception rooms were places to show off so the 'splendour' was saved for a grand reveal once guests were in the house. There's also something about the way doors are hung for the same reason.
In the North of England there are a lot of terraced houses. Old miners cottages, and Mill workers cottages. It's very varied indeed. Some have gardens , some don't. We don't call it a yard.
Also, a lot are built of stone, not brick.
Hi Steve, firstly excuse my essay!! ha ha .....The Uk being much smaller than the US, land is obviously at a premium, so houses are more densely packed in and therefore have to be smaller. There are big houses and houses with big plots, but they are very expensive. Plus, obviously lots of house houses were built hundreds of years ago . Generally speaking small old houses, such as cottages, terraced houses etc would of been built for the working class. For instance, I live in a tiny 200 year old stone build end of terrace cottage in a very small village; the cottage was originally built for the local farm workers as it is a rural community, but is also known as a lacemakers cottage, as lace making was done by the women in the village, as an extra income at that time. The cottage would have originally just had one big room downstairs and one upstairs and all generations of one family would of lived in the cottage. There is a well in our garden that would of been shared by other families in the row of houses. I am pleased to say it has been extended and extra space added , but still retains all of its character, such as beams and no straight walls!! which I love! Most houses are built from whatever materials were about at the time and are built to keep the heat in, which is why most old houses were built with small rooms, thick walls and doors on each room. In the big cities and towns, lots of the older terraced town houses, that would of been one big family home originally, have now been split and made into flats as the population has grown. We just accept the sizes of houses here and are used to it. We don't need to know the size of the house as you can tell by the details and photos. Modern homes are still brick built but I doubt they are built as well as the ones that were built 100 or more years ago.
In cities there are more flats because of lack of space:: In towns there's also not much space so houses are /were crammed together with very small gardens. The more countryside homes are semi-detached or detached with larger gardens....these tend to be owned properties, as opposed to rentals. It does vary though across the UK.
The lack of space is not entirely true. The Victorians built most of the original terraced houses, and they were smaller because they predated indoor plumbing. No bathrooms, toilets, laundry or big efficient kitchens. The other reason they were cramped together is because of who they were built FOR....working class people. At a time when industry was taking off, factory, mine, land, farm and mill owners (rich people) needed to have a ton of staff (poor people) so a lot of those homes were built for workers and their families to live in. Those homes have since sacrificed a bedroom for a bathroom, and squeezed in a bigger kitchen and downstairs toilet etc etc....and it's modern living that makes the houses feel small. All of our electronics, entertainment equipment, bigger toys, bigger furniture, far more clothing, toiletries, cleaning supplies, shoes, .... actually even WE are bigger and taller than the Victorians were on average. Those houses are still habitable and have been updated over the years, but it's those updates, mostly plumbing related, and all the STUFF that we own these days that make the houses feel small. So they weren't ORIGINALLY built because space was an issue, they were built small for poorer people who would still find them a vast improvement on where they had been living. If you had no money you'd be sent to the workhouse to live, producing stuff for the owner to sell for merely a roof over your head and a bowl of slop to eat per day. And made to feel like you should be grateful they'd taken pity on you! 😳 The streets stank, the people were cramped in and filthy....it was mainly a "class" thing....not lack of space to build. Just saying, not hating. 😊😊😊 THESE days, space is limited in more popular areas obviously, because our population is massively higher than back then. And back then if you lived past the age of 5 you were lucky. I've got a Victorian nursing book, and it's not surprising people would die....fancy some arsenic, mercury or deadly nightshade as a cure? 🤯 Let's fill your home with asbestos, decorate with lead based paint, have leaking gas lamps coming through the walls and wash things down with lye or lime! No wonder their population didn't expand much at that time. 😂🤣😅
Thanks for the History lesson, I was merely giving an outlined reason for lack of space...thanks for filling the gaps 😊
@@roseoconnor5938 for a minute there I thought you had taken offence! 😳 None was intended and I hope you know that. These days space is limited, but back then those worker's homes would have seemed like a palace to them. Four kids in one bed, one pair of shoes each, two sets of sheets if they were lucky, maybe two outfits each. I can't even imagine queuing up with all your neighbours to use the one or two outhouses! 🤢💩😂😘
Not at all….but a reflection of the times . I guess we were luckier in the 50s…only 3 in a bed: one pair of shoes, if there were holes in them you filled the insoles with cardboard 😂,
@@roseoconnor5938 good old cardboard! My Dad told me he had to do that! I was born in 1970 into a brand new build 3 bedroom house. It was still a council house. It was because my Dad's firm, up in London, were opening up another office location, and had offered him a job, which entitled him to a council house. My Mum said she could not believe it as up in London they'd had a "flat" that actually wasn't a whole flat, they were renting two rooms, and she hated it. Her, my Dad and my two older brothers at the time. So when they moved she found it incredible to have an entire house, front and back gardens, own garage and driveway, bathroom upstairs AND a downstairs toilet! I came along a year later. I had the smallest bedroom, but it wasn't tiny. I remember my carpet was cream with small pink rosebuds all over it, very sweet and pretty. I had a pink candlewick bedspread and pink curtains. I wouldn't say I was spoilt, they were still very much a 1950's traditional married couple. Born 1933 and 1939, so there was no messing about or talking back to them! I did as I was told and was a good girl. But I didn't go without anything either. We had a touring caravan back then, and we'd go away for two nights on nice weekends, or a few weeks at a time if going to Europe for a few nights per country. 😘😘😘
Some are a lot smaller then others but they do have a LOT of big historical houses
I think those fitted wardrobes look super nice. They might not be the most practical if you have to basically stand on the bed to properly access them... but they DO look nice xD
Apartments are named such in posh developments, rest are just flats. We are very efficient at getting houses in a space so whilst lots of us live in houses they are close together. We do have park homes, which are better than trailers but are deemed movable (usually in 2 sections on trailers). These homes are on land owned by a company that they pay land rental to, and some other services too. Often there are age limits and aimed at the over 50s. But these are not a large part of our housing stock.
Greensted Church in Essex, England, has been claimed to be the oldest wooden church in the world, albeit only in part, since few sections of its original wooden structure remain. The oak walls are believed to date back to the mid-9th or mid-11th century
The oldest wooden building is in Japan and that's a temple.
Religion seems to be a cause to build quality buildings
Houses were built using local materials. Stone, brick some old houses are timber framed. Timber framed are usually oak framed with voids infilled with bricks or wattle and daub/cobb, which is basically a mud type mixture that's rendered. I live in an old semi detached cottage, don't know how old it is, predates 1838, as it shows up on old Ordinance Survey Maps. Estate agents give the room measurements in details, not square footage. I have a drier, had it years.
Yes, UK house sizes and gardens are shrinking. We do tend to have separate hot and cold taps for baths and hand basins in the bathroom and toilet, not always; Kitchen sinks usually have mixer taps. We have something called a butler sink (yes, you might see one in Downton Abby): these had a short revival a few years ago and they have to taps, but it retro.
Spare rooms can be turned into studies. Newer homes may have garages, depending in the size of the plot of land. My street has a mixture of smaller houses with now garages and slightly larger ones with them. Some are detached, others are small terraces. All have back gardens, with parking and / small gardens at the front.
I absolutely love American wooden houses with big terraces (porches).
Our houses are tiny because they are very old with small rooms. Each room had a fireplace and some poor devil had to get up in the freezing and light the fire. There was ice on the inside of the windows too.
We didn't have big wardrobes because we didn't have many clothes! We do have porches but they are tiny little things in front of the door. We all have microwaves. We have kettles to boil water!!!! In fact l know the girl who's father invented the automatic kettle at GEC. The reason we have washing machines in the kitchen is because it's near the water pipes and only newish houses have utility rooms, for washing and drying clothes. You come into the hall from the front door and the living room, stairs and dining room are off it. The reason it's stupid to have the front door opening straight into the living room is because the freezing weather would blast straight in. Brrrr! The information about the sizes of houses and the layout is all there on Rightmove along with photos....♥️🇬🇧🙂
I would say the only buildings in the uk with a dungeon is a castle. In houses they would be called basements 😀
Basements are quite unusual in UK houses though aren't they. I think you'd have to have a pretty big/fancy house to have a basement, or an attic for that matter... we have lofts but they're basically Christmas decoration storage aren't they! 🤣
They are called cellars, not basements. I think terraced houses are probably a bit warmer if it's a mid-terrace, because they have just two outside walls, front and back. They are built from the local resources, either stone or brick. Conservatories are basically sun rooms........x 🇬🇧♥️
Is basement an Americanism? we called ours the cellar.
@@gordoncampbell3514 basement is more common in America but like many words it was in common use in the UK long before the US existed. Technically a cellar is a storeroom, specifically for food or drink. "Wine cellar" is actually tautological. If your subterranean storage room has been converted into a liveable space it is a finished basement (made-base i.e. levelled) floor. Floor, by the way, is etymologically connected to the word flett which means a habitable level structure, from which we derive "flat" meaning a one-level dwelling.
Similar to basement, apartment (made-apart i.e. divided) used to be a common term in Britain especially in its technical sense of a partition within a building used as a separate dwelling. Therefore you can have a basement flat (one level) which is synonymous with a basement apartment but a two-storey apartment certainly isn't a flat (not one level), a two-storey flat is nonsensical, just as "detached apartment" doesn't make any sense.
We may be two nations separated by a common tongue but the differences are not insuperable and they are usually rooted in our common history.
@@Cazzdevil it depends what the topography of the area is like. In some parts of the country, basements are more common, even in terrace houses although they'd be better known as a cellar and may not really be usable due to damp.
I have just started watching this video and YAYYYY right at the start 1:10 Yorkshire Tea. I was just having a mug myself watching this. The best cuppa for me!
As for trailers / caravans they are used more for holidaying and when not used in the winter months they are parked on driveways or are stored in a compound and we also have wooden holiday chalets used during the summer months and rarely in the winter
we always have halways because its a privacy thing so the mailman/delivery man, etc... doesnt look at your living room, what your doing, what program or movie on tv etc.. and also theres a place next to door to leave coats, umbrellas, even shoes sometimes... so we separate the wet clothes from rain and dirty shoes from the "living rooms".