American reacts to GERMAN HOUSES vs AMERICAN HOUSES (why German houses are built better)

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[Wasser-fzub]

One short word. YES we take the complete kitchen, all lights, all furniture, everything. Everything is so expensive that we keep things for years. We don't waste

[RalfOltmanns]

About playing kids: In Germany, kids don't tend to get shot. So they have no issues to go to playgrounds, parks, or meet elsewhere to play.

[SmartAndy]

Please keep in mind that there is a wide variety of how houses and apartments are built in Germany. In my town you could easily live in a house built a couple of hundred years ago. I live in a house built around 20 years ago. We do have a huge double-size garage (enough space for two cars, bikes, storage etc.) and windows with screens. You can buy windows with built in screens or add them later. And for the kitchen: Most Germans will take their kitchen with them when they move and will adjust them a little to fit in the new home, f.e. buy a new counter top and arrange the segments according to the new room. Although we do have those "hidden" fridges, american style free standing fridges have become quite popular but they are often not that huge as in the USA. And for the attic: A lot of homes will come with attics. Some times they provide an extra room (bedroom for guests or an office) or they're just used for storage space. But what you might not know: A lot of German houses will have a basement (that's where the oil tanks were in the video) A basement will provide extra rooms for storage, or a laundry room, a small gym or whatever you need space for. You can never crawl under a German house! And for the oil heating: This is really coming out of use. You don't fill them up with small canisters but you'll order a road tanker who'll fill the tank with a huge hose.

[Briedys]

I am from Lithuania. It is absoulutely different to use air conditioning and opening windows. Every evening before our family goes to sleep we open window to let some fresh air in. It does not matter if it is winter and you have -20 outside. It is even better to get to sleep when it's a bit colder in the room, you will feel refreshed. That feeling when you are in a bed and getting warmer :)

[BenjaminBK]

There are so many points in the video where he says "here in germany it is this and that" while it not necessarily the norm.
The super secure vault door for example. yes our house doors are much more robust than in america, but they usually don't have the extra bolts and you could get through them with a ram.
Floor heating is coming up more and more (and thanks to the isolation it is not that inefficent), but normal heaters on the wall are still more common.

garages depend massively on the location and age. our cars are not that big as american cars (but unfortunately the trend is rising and more and more space is needed to have your lump of metal waiting for you 99% of the time until you need it for a short drive) and so garages built 20-30 years are much more narrow. And if you have limited space to build houses, you may want to use the area more for actual living space instead of space for your car.

Also the point with ACs could have some background. it is not just less common for us, because of the electricity price, we just did not need it. the weather 20 years ago was much more balanced. yes it got hot in the summer as well, but not that extreme and also switching between sun ain rain was more frequent. but with the climate change its getting hotter each year and the periods between sun and rain switches get far longer. either you have boiling heat for weeks or rain. in the past it was more like a week of sun and then some days of rain cooling everything down again. also our houses keep the temperature much more consistent due to isolation and material. So if there is a really hot day or two, we just keept the windows shut (or only open in the night) and the heat stays outside. But due to climate change the importance of ACs is rising. I myself have a portable AC, because i can not take the heat very well. The "heat pump" he mentions actually works exactly as an AC, but not a central with vents, but small tubes with special liquid exchanging the heat energy in the rooms. Modern Heat Pumps also can run in both directions, so warming in winter and cooling in summer.

So lets directly get to the "Heat pumps are inefficent, especially when it is cold". Thats simply bullshit. of course, the concept is "take a bit of heat energy from the outside air and put it into the system" works better if there is more heat energy in the air, but that is not much of a problem. if you look at the physical unit of heat "kelvin" water freezes at 274K. So even in really cold winter with 250K it is just about 10% of the Kelvinscale. Also stuff to Burn (gas, oil, palletts) or direct electricity heater can at maximum have 100% efficency (in a perfect system). so if there is 1kWh worth of energy stored in the gas, you can not get more then that by burning it. Heat Pumps have efficencies fo 300-500%, so for 1kWh of electricity it can get up to 5kWh of warmth into your home. compressing the heat energy from outside, even with -20°C (no idea about F), takes not as much energy as directly heating up the air. sorry for that nerdy deepdive, i love science and technology and physics too much.

the open attic can be a design choice but it is not common at all. really old houses might have it or if you really want it, but usually there is either an attic or it is converted into actual rooms (which get insanly hot in summer).

"Stoßlüften" ~= "rush airing" is something you do especially on cold days. As we don't have AC, the air does not exchange much until we air. but having the windows open a bit is bad for temperature differences. So you quickly exchange as much air as possible without cooling down your walls or anything. warm air takes more water, so the more humid air gets out and cold air gets in, is getting heated up and picks up water again. otherwise it can get moldy.

Integrated or free standing fridges (and dishwasher, oven, etc) are a competely free design choice. I have a fridge similar size to his one and it is nothing special. But it looks neat of course, if everything kind of fits together.

last but not least the point of taking everything with you when you move. it again depends. sometimes apartments have a built in kitchen. it is simply part of renting that place. Sometimes you may take over the kitchen of the person renting that place before you, if they don't want/need that kitchen anymore. And most of the kitchen stuff like cupboards, ovens, fridges are more or less normed, so does not completely not fit in another kitchen. sometimes it may need some adaptions or a new counter top, but in the end you simply stack these things next to each other and its done. if you own your own house or plan to live somewhere for a long time, you might get a perfectly fit in kitchen, but that is something you don't do that often. same with lamps and closets etc. if you have a 20m² bedroom in one apartment and a 20m² bedroom in the other, it most likely fits pretty much the same and the lamp, which design you have chosen because you liked it, will most likely look similar in the other bedroom. Personally i kind of like the idea of build in closets, but on the other hand: then there is a closet. And you can do nothing about that. with the furniture you can put it left or right or wherever you want. I had it in one apartment as a room devider, it was great.

So of you managed to read all that stuff, have a nice day

[Dschonny]

You asked about lifespan of a german roof. My House was built in 1912 and still has its first roof. There was damage by a bomb in WW2 to the roof, but that could be fixed and was used to strengthen the construction a little, but basically its still the first roof with mostly the original 'Dachpfannen' on it.

[hape]

The three piglets are exactly what we in Germany also think about American houses. 🌬

[grahamgarlic]

In Germany an AC was never necessary. Our houses are built so solidly and insulated that it takes several days for the walls to heat up. But rarely was it so hot for so long that the heat radiated inwards. So it was actually always pleasantly cool.
It is only in the last few years that we have noticed global warming and the heat periods are becoming longer and longer. Since then, our houses have become increasingly heated. Since then, new houses have been increasingly built with AC.

[normalgermanguy]

"Here in America, we need bulletproof houses ...."

Here in Germany, we *HAVE* bulletproof houses.

[jBear-kuvp]

Some of the really old houses here in the UK are build with mud, cow dung and straw (cob) some houses in my village are older than the US it’s self dating back to the 13th century. Still standing with thatched roofs, very warm in the winter and very cool in the summer. Many of the walls are 2-3 foot thick.

[HafdirTasare]

09:04 So, something that is often overlooked with german housing:

If you move into a german house or Flat, you can choose what to use the rooms for.
You dont need to use the designated Bedroom as such, you are much more flexible in how you want to use the space and how to furnish it.

[karinwenzel]

German here: Personally, I would hate closets since if I have three rooms altogether I would like to decide how I use the rooms. E.g. I might want to use the "bedroom" as a living room, the living as a study and maybe the study as a bedroom. So many Germans prefer flexibility and customize the house/appartment including the kitchen. I am a tall person and my kitchen worktop is higher than in a standard kitchen, so no bending down or cooking in an uncomfortable position for me. And curtains? Many of us don't have them, maybe just for decoration. To shut out the light we have "Rolladen" (outside shutters, not blinds).

[eaglevision]

The German door is supposed to keep out EVERYTHING. Heat, cold, air, and every enemy in front of it.
Even in my old 1980s house the original wooden front door is around 4 inches thick and is impossible to lift alone. It must be around 200 lbs or more. I removed it to repaint, no chance without help to handle it.

[Anna-iut]

On the topic: Where do children play if there is no (large) garden? In Germany, renting is still the most common form of housing, so it's normal for children to grow up in rented apartments without a garden. But, don't worry, German children still play outside :) 1. playgrounds. You'll find a playground in almost every village in Germany, with slides, swings, seesaws and sandpits. Not every playground is in super good condition. But on the whole, you can't complain about them. And it's not just a meeting place for children alone. If the children are still very small, they are of course accompanied by their parents, who can meet and chat with other parents there. So in Germany, parents spend a lot of time with their children in playgrounds :) 2. clubs ("Verein"): In Germany, there is always the option of joining a club. It's not just an option, in Germany clubs are part of the cultural heritage. There are clubs for almost everything. Sports, i.e. soccer, volleyball, table tennis, swimming, rowing, bowling, climbing, ect. But other leisure activities can also be enjoyed in clubs. For example, singing in choirs and music clubs. The good thing about clubs is that membership is comparatively cheap and they tend to be inclusive. I would say that German children play less in the garden. They spend most of their free time outside their parents' property.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

[fjolnir]

21:22

Energy costs are very high in Germany, which is why the houses are usually well insulated. Thanks to the robust and well-insulated construction, the houses don't get extremely hot even in summer. I have an 80-year-old house. in the summer at 38°C (approx. 100° F) it was 23°C in my house without A/C. It was only very hot in the attic, but there are mobile cooling devices that cost a few hundred euros so you can bear it well

[dan_kay]

What you have seen in the video was a newly built house for sale. And yes, they come empty, just like a closet is also not filled with clothes when you buy it. I would HATE to have to remove an ugly cheap kitchen just to install the one I like and bought. Same goes for the lamps and basically anything else in the house. I want my couch, not the one an investment firm has chosen.

Another thing: You don't change houses in Germany like in the US. Once you bought (or better said financed) a house (and pay it off for the next 40 years) you stay in that damn house, no matter what. Houses in Germany are built to live in, not to generate the biggest profit possible. And if you don't move every three to five years like the average American, it doesn't really matter how much of a hassle moving the fridge would be because you don't move it (unless your wife tells you to so she can clean UNDER the fridge... Yeah, those women exist in Europe.).

AC: What for? For those three months a year when the rain gets a little warmer? Meh...

[kazemitsuki]

He forgot about one heating method in bigger cities: Central heating, which is heat that is produced by factories or heating facilities and gets delivered to your house, typically housing blocks...
Talking about housing blocks, he also didn't mention that also a lot of buildings are made of steel concrete...
Also only high end houses have floor heating and most houses have attics for storing stuff or sometimes drying you laundry

[hansmuller]

About the attic/heating situation: German houses have actual basements. They are like a proper floor, but at least half its height is below ground level. So there's space there to store stuff, install heater etc.

[CrazyManuel]

19:25 the walls are so thick becaus of regulations in terms of heat insulation, these blocks are 50% hollow. Also there are other regulations that say, you have to calculate the max load the building can experience ( people and stuff inside, heavy storms outside ) and then add 40% just to be sure. So if you live in germany and you house meets up to regulations, you're pretty save from heavy storms.

You are "supposed" to change the rooftiles after about 20 years. Reality is, those rooftiles live up to a hundred years. Often the even get reused after the construction underneath gets renewed.

[claracatlady]

You absolutely take *EVERYTHING!* My parents have had their kitchen 25 years and moved with it twice. You payed for it so you keep it. It’s also way more sustainable to invest in good quality pieces that you know are going to stay with you regardless of whether you move or not. And yes you can rent fully furnished (unless you are renting with like a 10 year lease) just if you *buy* something then it usually won’t be