Observations on English Houses

One thing about the English landscape that is so distinctive is its rows of terraced houses snaking up and over hills, through valleys, in wiggly patterns so unlike gridded streets and house lots of America. There are three kinds of houses in England: the vast majority are terraced houses (row houses), a substantial number are semi-detached houses or "semis" (what we would call duplexes back home except these are usually two-storied), and a minor number of fully detached houses (what we consider a normal house in America) on its own lot. These last do not include "bungalows" which are indeed detached but much smaller in dimension and therefore don't rank with the wealthy detached houses. So in fact, there are four main kinds of houses, in addition to which, many people refer to flats (apartments) as "houses": friends who say "We're in the process of buying a house" often mean they are buying a flat.

Typical semis (this word always reminds me of semi-articulated trucks [lorries], not houses) 

Terraced houses are quite a diverse lot. I tend to dislike them because they often open up directly onto the street, with no front garden at all, and many front doors open directly into the living room with no hall/entry-way. These aspects gives you a sense that terraced houses are quite (very) small and rather dumpy inside. However, do not be misled! Terraced houses can be immense: four or five floors, with the lower below street-line and accessed by an outside staircase (many of these have been turned into hotels/B&Bs in London). These are the older Victorian buildings constructed with basements – a feature that few if any modern houses have.


Old or modern, one defining feature of English houses is that they usually have their plumbing on the outside walls of the house rather than running internally. This is unsightly but functional: in the days before central heating and combination boilers (pre-1980), despite winters not getting very cold here, pipes and holding tanks would often freeze up in the few cold snaps. One could get into the loft (attic) to unthaw the pipes and tank with a hair dryer (personal experience speaking here). Same with the outside pipes: they are accessible without having to rip the walls apart.

Outside drainage pipes normally do not lead directly into under-ground sewers but discharge into open drains, much like eaves-pipes in America. The fact that there is a space between pipe and drain causes two problems: a minor inconvenience is that the drains are always filling up with leaves and need periodic cleaning out;  but worse is that spiders can climb up the drain pipes into sinks and baths, and they do regularly! A normal feature of English houses in wintertime is large (2–2.5" diameter) house spiders appearing overnight into one's bathtub...

The final thing about houses is that their relative economic values are not confined to certain neighborhoods (neighbourhoods). When house-buying, it is necessary to check out each individual street rather than rely on quality of neighbourhoods. Large detatched houses can sit next to or across from a row of terraces. And modern housing estates are often created from a mixture of the two to appeal to both income levels.