Houses in other countries (inspired by what baffles you about other countries)

[file]

Inspired by the thread on things that baffle you in other countries, where quite a lot of the discussion related to homes in other countries, I thought it’d be interesting with a thread showing standard homes in different countries and some information about how choices have been made when it comes to their layout etc.

So here are two links to two different homes in Sweden. This one (you’ll get straight to a gallery with pictures and the layout is at the bottom) is a fairly typical house built in the 1970s:
www.hemnet.se/bostad/villa-6rum-rodeby-karlskrona-kommun-fasanvagen-6-17145055#gallery

There are several areas to sit outside, wooden decking areas. There is a large hallway, easy to store clothes and put away shoes. There are two lounges – very common, and normally desired, for families; one for the parents, one for children to have friends in etc. The kitchen was probably a room of its own in the 1970s, but it’s now more or less open to the lounge. There is a separate utility room, and a big storage room with a separate entrance (“förråd”). There is also an indoors storage room, “Klk”. There are bedrooms on the ground floor as well as on the first floor – this is very common, people like not having all bedrooms next to each other (so do I!). Sometimes when the children get older parents like to move downstairs and leave the upstairs to the children completely (including cleaning haha!). In this house, the downstairs bedrooms are kind of tucked away, but it is also common to have a bedroom literally inside the entrance door for example.

When this house was built and bought, the upstairs probably wasn’t ready – people would buy a house that was ‘half-done’ and then when they had saved more money they’d do the upstairs too. So there is no proper bathroom upstairs, just a loo; this is very unusual. (And usually, all bathrooms and loos are fully tiled – all new built houses always have fully tiled bathrooms and toilets, so this is a house that has not been renovated to what is now standard.)

It is also very typical that there are no doors to the lounge/hallway for example. I think that is one reason why Scandi people feel that English houses are so crowded/small/narrow, there’s no open space (even without expanding it would feel more airy if there weren’t doors to three rooms on the ground floor from a very narrow hallway, for example).

So people buying this house would probably fit a proper bathroom upstairs, for example. The downstairs looks quite ‘normal’ and ready to go.

This is quite a standard, recently built flat for families (in fact, it’s just being built, so there are options for the first buyer to choose between, different bathroom tiles for example).

www.hemnet.se/bostad/lagenhet-4rum-majorna-goteborgs-kommun-fixfabrikens-gata-4-17184735#gallery

Three bedrooms, two bathrooms, one of them also has a washing machine and a drier. Two balconies (this is unusual, one is standard), open plan living again. Quite a lot of cupboards/storage, including in the hallway and built in wardrobes in every room. Specific cleaning cupboard in the kitchen area. Big windows – really important, this is one thing I miss in England.

(Bedrooms are never presented as 'double' or 'single' - I don't know any 'child' living at home who had a double bed, and everything is measured in sq metres - it'd be pointless information for someone that a double bedroom, it doesn't say anything about the size, apart from the fact that it is at least 2x2 metres ;-) )

Would be really interesting to see a standard home in Italy/France/Spain/Ireland/the Netherlands for example and hear about the choices made there/what people like and want, I’ve never been in any :-)

I can post some homes in Denmark later on too if anyone's interested.

I too noticed that. And was impressed aswell. Luxor they just spray everything with water each morning, and it's evaporated within the hour.

It's a very sensible practical way of doing it.

Oh yes, they all know the iskelmä music well, very popular. Fun to watch them dancing Finnish tango as well, also very popular here.

Concrete floors are definitely not nice in these cold Northern countries, we have one in our basement and decided to put carpet down to make it a bit more pleasant.

Some things I miss so much about Swedish homes

• If living in flats - a bike/pram storage room and a storage room in the attic or cellar for every flat!
• indoor window sills - Swedes have plants in every window. I live in a Victorian house in London and despair at not being able to put my plants anywhere sensible
• Flats don't have individual boilers - there's a big tank heating the whole apartment block and heating is included in the rent so no one really thinks about it

Swedish people don't draw curtains, this is a big cultural difference. I think you're supposed to not look hard. But the difference between us and the Dutch is that this is the same for all windows, whereas the Dutch seem to have one show window?

Swedes are suspicious of people who close their curtains. What have they got to hide?

All of the Swedish flats my DD has lived in have had a nuclear fallout bunker in the basement.

Oblomov you would need to be relatively wealthy indeed to afford the bigger Estonian house.
Middle- upper middle class for the smaller one.

For working class, you would expect rather an apartment in one of the soviet buildings, this type: www.city24.ee/et/kinnisvara/korterite-muuk/Tallinn-Mustamae-linnaosa/4524840?selectedTabMenu=list

Ooh @WhispersOfWickedness would you mind sharing the Norwegian rightmove site please? I love the houses over there!

Parts of Nottingham have district heating. I think about 5,000 houses.

I like to torture myself looking at Danish houses from time to time - the part of Denmark my in laws live in is very cheap compared to the UK, it's not the decor that makes them feel spacious it's the fact they're loads bigger.

I don't know how much staging goes on for sale photos, but all the Danish houses and apartments I've visited have been really nice and what I see online appears fairly typical and not elaborately staged.

In the part of Melbourne my sister lives in, the houses look tiny from the street as they're narrow and single storey but they go back along way. If you Google single fronted houses Melbourne you should get an idea

In the cities in Finland ordinary working families are mostly living in flats, or maybe terraces in the suburbs, as proper houses are expensive in the cities. Its normal for flats to have built in cupboards to maximise storage, then there are storage rooms in the basement (often doubling as emergency shelters) and a communal store room for bikes and prams. In one flat I lived in there was also cold storage (potato cellars) for each flat for storing, well, potatoes and suchlike. Balconies are quite common and if you don't have your own sauna in your flat there will be a communal sauna in the building and each flat gets their own time slot to use it. Most places I've lived I've had my own sauna but there was one flat where we had to use the communal one, there was also a communal laundry room but I never had to use it, with a drying room you could hang your clothes in to dry.

If you have to use social housing, you might have to use the living room as a bedroom as rooms are counted all together except kitchen rather than bedrooms counted separately from living room.

If you own a flat or terraced house you are usually owning a share in the housing company rather than owning it outright so you have to pay fees to them for upkeep and there might be talkoot (communal work) to do things like paint the hallways or plant flowers and trees in the communal gardens.

Out of interest can anyone tell me how selling/buying houses works elsewhere than the UK? It always seems to be a common gripe about how stressful our chain system is and how unfair it is that people can pull out at the last minute/make demands but I don't understand how chains don't exist elsewhere if people are moving to new homes

[quote PopsicleHustler]@afromeg
I dey fine. I just give birth na to my 5th pikin so just relaxing. Abeg which tribe you be ? My oba speak hausa too.

I love speaking pidgin so no Oyinbo knows what we are saying Haha
I'm Oyinbo too. Lol but naija on the inside abi[/quote]
Abi o! Na so na - you don be real naija pikin. We no dey carry last. Haha. Na sweet language e be, no be small.

Eyaa, congrats on your baby o. I trust say baby dey bounce and smile well well.

Una pikin dem go be polyglot by the time dem grow! Na real house of many languages - Impressive! I learnt a bit of Hausa too when I was growing up through our 'Mehguards'/gatemen and my Grandmum who was born in either Jos or Kano. She was fluent in Hausa (as well as Igbo) and they were always chatting away whenever she visited.

I be Igbo o - life and direct, no shaking! Haha. Na dat one I sabi pass.

All these other languages wey I learn before don comot for my body so I no too sabi dem well now but I love Nigerian languages tire! I still dey learn as I go. I dey like blast am any chance I get, I love it. If anybody wants, I go translate for am or teach am sef, me I no mind at all. Make e go mainstream sharp sharp.

My dear relax well well oo, nothing do you.

Make we no come derail this thread too much before dem go pursue us comot

@popsicleHustler Also, I been feel say you be Oyinbo even before you tell me say you sabi Yoruba and Pidgin too. At least, I assumed. Na why I talk say I wan give you high five and hug. No be everyday pesin dey see Oyinbo wey sabi these languages (and wan speak am sef) for Mumsnet You do well, my sister. O se!

Out of interest can anyone tell me how selling/buying houses works elsewhere than the UK? It always seems to be a common gripe about how stressful our chain system is

yes the chains are utterly baffling for me, and that you're expected to move out and in all the same day, sounds massively stressful! I've lived in several countries and you would get a so called home swap loan if you need to sell your current house to buy a new one (like most people do). So the bank would lend you money to buy a new house, but you will agree to pay back a lump sum you will get from the sale of your previous house by certain time (in Estonia, usually in 1 year). Yes in theory this means you have 2 loans at the same time, but usually you could then freeze the payments for one of them for a certain period.

Most people would expect to have time to renovate and re-decorate after they have bought the house and before they move in - we had I think 2-3 months for our current house.

Dutch windows - It is mostly the one on to the street, bedroom curtains woudl be shut. What I find interesting about it is that in most older houses in the UK we had long,thick, lined curtains, and it was essential to keep house warm (old windows, old buildings, no double glazing allowed) so to move to Netherlands and NOT shut curtains was odd.

We lived in a flat with block heating. We always had our radiators turned off as the pipes going up and down were enough to keep it warm.

And Dutch flats are amazing as everyone has a storage room in the basement, including spaces for bikes. Flats with sheds, so bloody sensible.

@file OP sorry for the slight derail.

@Zofloratheexplorer

Out of interest can anyone tell me how selling/buying houses works elsewhere than the UK? It always seems to be a common gripe about how stressful our chain system is and how unfair it is that people can pull out at the last minute/make demands but I don't understand how chains don't exist elsewhere if people are moving to new homes

In Sweden the sellers estate agents do everything. It's also very common not to sell your house until you've moved into your new one. We had a two week overlap on our last one so we had time to do the move ourselves and clean up properly. So from deciding to move, finding the house we wanted to buy, to the entire process being complete was 4 weeks.

When I'm watching makeover shows in America I'm always baffled at the colour choices. For walls salmon, terracotta, orange and other variations of baby poo matched with painted brown skirting boards and doors!

Ava the kitchens with ugly dark woods everywhere and those busy patterned marble counter tops!

I'm often surprised by some people in countries like Australia, some of the Caribbean islands make their houses look like an old fashioned British house with their furnishings. If I lived in a hot country I'd want a light and airy house with fabrics and furniture to match and not a house with dark wooden furniture, heavy fabrics and patterned carpets.

[quote Afromeg]@popsicleHustler Also, I been feel say you be Oyinbo even before you tell me say you sabi Yoruba and Pidgin too. At least, I assumed. Na why I talk say I wan give you high five and hug. No be everyday pesin dey see Oyinbo wey sabi these languages (and wan speak am sef) for Mumsnet You do well, my sister. O se![/quote]
Ooh I know what Oyinbo means from Twitter! See many complaints about Oyinbo people daily

Thanks @KatharinaRosalie and @FatCatThinCat your systems seem much better!

Obsessed with this thread.

Live in Tasmania (Australia).

www.realestate.com.au/sold/property-house-tas-battery+point-129448426 - sold three years ago but my dream home

www.realestate.com.au/sold/in-sandy+bay,+tas+7005/list-1 - standard house in best suburb

www.realestate.com.au/sold/property-house-tas-lauderdale-132841254 - mid range beach suburb, 25 min drive to cbd

@Neonlightning

Obsessed with this thread.

Live in Tasmania (Australia).

www.realestate.com.au/sold/property-house-tas-battery+point-129448426 - sold three years ago but my dream home

www.realestate.com.au/sold/in-sandy+bay,+tas+7005/list-1 - standard house in best suburb

www.realestate.com.au/sold/property-house-tas-lauderdale-132841254 - mid range beach suburb, 25 min drive to cbd

www.realestate.com.au/sold/property-house-tas-sandy+bay-135117218 - standard house in best suburb

Wow, I think I may have to move to Tasmania.

Zofloratheexplorer
To add to the other comments about house buying in Sweden and factors that differ - this is a detailed description I wrote somewhere else:

Step 1: Find a house you like. Make an offer. (Bidding wars are common in popular areas, so expect the price to go up compared with the asking price, not down, like fairly often in England.)

Step 2: Vendors agree. Contract signed, a moving in date is agreed on and listed in the contract. At this stage normally 10 % of the price is paid. The moving in date can be anytime; for a ‘normal’ house move where a sale is involved too it is not unusual for it to be 5-8 months later on; so for example you’d buy (sign a contract) for a house in October and agree that the move in date is on 13 March. That date is now set in stone and you cannot back out. (Big fines if you do - I've never heard about it happening but I'm sure it does...) Contracts are normally signed on the day, or the day after, the vendors have accepted. Solicitors are not involved, just the agent.

Step 3: Undertake surveys. Contracts can stipulate that if anything massive turns up in x area, then the price can be renegotiated to x % for example.

Step 4 (in parallel with 3): Put you house on the market and sell it. Normal move out day is often a few days to three weeks after the moving in date.

Step 5: On move in date, if you live nearby, get the keys, check the house and that it has been cleaned. There are laws stipulating how homes must be cleaned when you move. Your home will never have been as clean. Almost everyone uses cleaning companies that come in once the home has been completely emptied. This also means that the sellers will not have to discuss if the cleaning was satisfactory with the buyer; the company is responsible for that. (What would normally happen is that the buyer will get any firm to complete it and bill the seller, but it rarely happens with companies doing the cleaning, only if people do it themselves.)

Move in as and when it suits, if nearby, sometimes a little at a time over a few days/weeks; if further away, normally all in one go (and then probably no pre-check either).

Once old house is emptied, cleaning company will clean it, keys directly to estate agent after that.

Funding: almost everyone has ‘bridging loans’ for the days/weeks when they have access to two properties. This is not a problem since the bank knows they’ll soon get their money back. (I tried to discuss a bridging loan with my bank in the UK, to try to make it easier to move, and they looked at me like I had three heads.)

Done and dusted, no pain, nobody pulling out, nobody stressing about moving and moving out the same day, nobody leaving a dirty disgusting home to the people moving in!

I cleaned my 1-bed flat myself when I moved. It took something like 15 hours. The Swedish National Estate Agents’ Association has a detailed list of what a ‘removal deep clean’ includes. This includes things that most people rarely clean, such as washing the ceiling (hoovering and washing), cleaning all light fittings, all drains, behind all radiotors, the back of the fridge, washing all sides of windows panes (normally four), all sides of the oven etc etc. All stickers need to go, all nails in the wall... It is so nice to move into a totally clean place, never happened in my 10+ moves in the UK.

(Here's a guide to removal cleaning, in Swedish but translation services can probably give an idea if interested! www.cleanipedia.com/se/familj/flyttstadning-checklista-och-steg-for-steg-guide.html)

@Firefretted
It's called Finn.no, it's also where they sell pretty much everything else, so you'll need to navigate to eiendom to find houses, but it's fairly straightforward Enjoy!