Which way should I face my house?

[Hazel2006]

We finally chose a yard to build our house in. It is completely encircled in trees with trees along a short driveway. Cannot decide whether to face east or south. We live in North Dakota so it's cold here. Most of the living spaces are located at the front of the house with a covered porch on the left side and garage on the right if u are facing the house. Facing south we would be looking towards the drive with porch facing the drive and meadow. Facing east we would be looking towards a tree line where we would someday like to have a barn and porch would face the tree line and the meadow. I like the views to the east but want the sun exposure to the south. Any thoughts. We did discuss doing it at a slant but it would require a lot of backfill because the garage would end up in a low spot of the yard

[simi-steading]

For me, I'd like an east facing house with the south side having a lot of windows to let in all the sun..

[Cyngbaeld]

I'd face it south. The west side porch could then shade that side from the hot afternoon sun in summer. You don't get much sun on the east and west in winter, but lots in summer. You want all the help from the sun to heat the house that you can get in winter.

[kilgrosh]

I agree with Cyngbeald. Face the house South so you can capture the natural heat in your bedrooms and living spaces. It will help immensely during the winter. You can always build a small porch off the back to view your tree line behind the garage.

[Harry Chickpea]

Consider the prevailing winds as well. The primary entrance door wants to be somewhat sheltered, but not in a place where snow will accumulate. Your trees may mitigate some of the problems.

[gila_dog]

It's refreshing to see somebody actually thinking about which way to face their house. Most people just point the front door at the street with no thought at all for what sun is doing during different seasons. Then they try and make up for it with money spent on air conditioning and heating.

The sun comes up in the east and sets in the west and during the winter it sweeps across the sky much lower than it does in the summer. So if you face the part of your house with the most windows south you can pick up a lot of free heat in the winter. Those same windows will pick up little or no heat in the summer because the sun is high overhead. But if you face those windows west the summer sun will blast right in during the afternoons and evenings. Shade trees on the west, or putting a garage on the west side will keep this unwanted heat out. Any porch that will shade the house should not be on the south side. East, west, or even north is much better.

Another thing to think about, especially in the cold north, is not putting the entrance to your house, and your driveway, on the north. If your driveway and entrance walkway come in from the north it will be cold, snowy, icy, and muddy much longer than if you come in from the south, east, or west.

Added later: Shade trees are wonderful but be careful about putting your house under one. Especially if it's a cottonwood. Other trees may be better, but remember that they all drop branches at times. Cottonwoods make great shade trees but they are weak and can drop big heavy branches full of water and smash everything below them (houses, cars, fences, etc) to smithereens.



Summary: windows to the south, shade to the west, windows, doors, and sidewalks on the north should be minimal.

[where I want to]

For me it was a big deal to face it to get the most sun in winter and the most shade in summer. In fact I put stakes in the ground at the shortest day to mark where on the property had the best sun for the longest time.

Meant porches on the south and west side and a clerestory on the south side that was shaded by the eaves in summer but in the sun in the winter.
I definitely wanted both things.

[o&itw]

The way you face your house should mostly depend on how the rooms are arranged in it. The only good I see about facing your house to the east is that the front door is out of the wind for the most part.

With that said, it is best that a kitchen wall is on the east as you are wanting light in the early morning. If you want a room (sunroom, living room) with lots of windows, face that room south so that the sun will help make it warm in the winter (the sun arcs over to the north in summer) The rooms on the north side of your house should have the least windows, because you really don't want the sun shining in in the summer, and you don't want the added heat loss from winter winds.

So, yeah, it would be best if your "main" entrance (not necessarily the front door) faces East, but the rest of the orientation is my a function of where the rooms are in the house. The main wall of our living room faces west which means the sun is comming in to the eyes in the afternoon, and it is excedingly hot in the summer. We didn't build the house. As one of the other posters mentioned, shade trees to the west (and if you live in the central or southern US, the Northwest) We have a huge red oak on the north end of our house and it does a terrific job in the summer, the sun shines unerneath the shade trees on our west after about 5pm and the rooms facing that way heat up quite a bit. Since you live farther to the North, the sun may not arc to the north of you in the summer, and you may not have to plan for that.

[Hazel2006]

Thanks so much for the replies. Great things to think about!

[SolarGary]

Hi,
One thing you might want to do to see how much sun the south side of the house will get in the winter with the trees possibly shading it would be to do this solar site survey:
http://www.builditsolar.com/SiteSurvey/site_survey.htm

Takes about an hour, and it will tell you how much sun is on the house and how much the trees shade the house for every day of the year.

If you really want to face east, but would still like the solar gain from the south, think about a low thermal mass sunspace along part of the south wall of the house.
http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects....htm#LowMassSS
These are gang busters solar heat generators and you can duct the heat to where you need it. The advantage they have over regular passive gain solar windows in a south wall is that they don't have the large heat loss at night. They also provide some nice extra space at a low cost that can be used for a variety of things.

Gary

[haypoint]

With the price of solar panels coming down, I'd want a lot of south facing roof now, to retrofit later.

[Awnry Abe]

I'd go with the angle that gets the best view, unless you want to hedge your bet for SHTF like we did. We have lots of large, south facing windows, plus the entire living space was designed to be a giant sun-soaking heat sink to help keep us warm in the event of long term grid failure. We do get by quite on the cheap in winter. But what we get for free in the winter, we pay for in the summer. We do stay comfortable in the summer, but had to pay $$$$ for blinds. Around 20K, if I recall correctly. I doubt they will last 10 years. It isn't difficult math. Given the chance to do all over again, I'd pick the exact same facing position...because the view is pretty darn fantastic...and my opinion about the future hasn't budged.

[MushCreek]

It depends upon what you mean by 'face'. Our house has the public rooms in the back to enjoy a mountain view, while the front is private, and has fewer windows. We angled the house so that there would not be a side facing dead north, which tends to be cold, uninviting, and encourages mold and algae to form on the siding.

I agree that the kitchen should be on the east side, and we put our bedroom on the east side as well.

The front of our house faces southeast, with a big porch to shade it, since we are in a hot climate. The west side is sheltered from sun by a garage. The result is that we can still see our view, which is dead north, but we get early morning sun in the back as well. No afternoon sun enters the house at all.

[SolarGary]

Hi,
You can have overhangs over the south windows so that they get winter sun but not summer sun.

This calculator helps you pick the best depth for the overhangs:
http://www.susdesign.com/overhang/index.php

Gary

[PrettyPaisley]

Ours faces due north and I don't like it. Seems like a cave in here.

[Old John]

Our house faces West, a little bit WNW across a valley.. We get the Storms , blowing in from the West, across the Valley. And some of the storms seem to lose a bit of their steam, dropping down into the valley, before they get here.

It's kinda cool, going out on the covered 2nd floor Deck and watching the approaching storms. The house sits on a hillside, a bit below the brow of the hill.
So, the storms sometimes sort of just slide or bounce right above the house as they pass over.
It gets a little rough when a storm comes straight across the hill & the valley, & hits the house dead-on, though.

[badlander]

Our Amish built home faces South with lots of windows for natural light and heat.

Definitely configure your overhang for your latitude to maximize its efficiency.

That's the only problem with our house. While he faced it the right way he didn't put the required 27" overhang on it so we get too much solar heating in the summer. We are going to have to remedy that oversight with new overhangs.

[gila_dog]

One more thing to think about is thermal mass. If you have lots of windows facing south you will gain a lot of heat from the sun in the winter. But if there's nothing inside the house to soak up that heat the house can get too hot. That's why you see some houses with south facing windows, and the curtains or blinds all closed. So, along with gathering all that heat you need to store it in something that will then let it off later when the sun goes away. To do this you need something massive inside the house that will soak up heat. The best way to do this, and the simplest, is to have ceramic tile floors in the rooms that face south. The floors need to be well insulated from below. They can be either well insulated concrete, or wood over a crawl space, with Hardi Panel and tile on that, insulated from below. If you cover your floors with carpet, they will lose their ability to soak up heat. Another thing you can do to add to your thermal mass is to have a rock or brick or adobe wall inside the house, maybe behind your woodstove. Or make some of the inside walls out of massive material. This will also soak up heat from your fire, moderate the temperature, and release that heat later when the fire dies down. Massive interior walls need to be designed into the house from the start. You need good footings under these walls.

Passive solar design really works, but you have to understand a few basic principles. In winter gain heat thru south facing windows and store it in thermal mass inside the house. Minimize heat losers like windows and doors on the north. Shade the house on the west in the summer. Use trees or hills or other structures (barn, garage, etc) to shelter the house from the cold north wind. That's really all there is to it. And the principles that make a house work for passive solar heating also improve its performance when heating with wood. It costs more to build a house this way, no doubt. But after that it's much cheaper and easier to keep your house comfortable.

Another advantage of a house that partially heats itself by the sun in the winter is that you can go off for a trip in the winter and not worry about things freezing up inside if a big storm knocks out your power while you're gone. It may not be toasty warm in there, but it will be warm enough to keep your pipes from freezing.

[Wulfespirit]

Just an additional thought about all the great "solar gain" advice... you can always plant deciduous trees vines on the S & W sides of the house to restrict solar gain in summer (leaves) while allowing it through in winter... probably the optimal way to shade away the summer heat.