Mansions – East West North South facing?/ low-high floor benefits?

[HankNeva]

Hi...I’m considering buying a mansion. I’m not in a rush so can afford to wait for something I really like. My general tendency is to want an East facing veranda on a high floor as that is the experience I have had and was quite happy with. But that is my only experience.

Is everyone the same? I wonder if people could share their experiences and preferences about the direction of their mansion veranda and floor height. I understand that many people like a south facing veranda but in my town the view is better in the other directions and the summer could be quite warm on the south side of a building. I once looked at a north side veranda mansion and it seemed dark and cold in winter but the floor was fairly low. I’m guessing most everyone would like a high floor but obviously other floors will have to fill up. Is that just because people don’t have the luxury of waiting for what they really want? I’m trying a get my values straight but have limited experience with mansion living. I only know a view is important to me as is light.

[RetireJapan]

We have an east facing 3rd floor manshon. Light and views have been reasonable so far but the 2F slot place opposite us has just been demolished and rumor is that it will become a mega Donki. That would be... undesirable.

After going through 3-11, lower floors are nice in that you can access them easily without elevators. I probably wouldn't choose to live above say the 5th floor in the future.

[Tkydon]

East West will give you the Morning Sun on one side and the Evening Sun on the other side. It will avoid the South noon day sun, which is the hotest, so maybe reduce the requirement for cooling in the summer..

East West are likely to have the Living Room on the West side to catch the evening sun
North South are likely to have the Living Room on the South side to catch the Midday sun.

In either cast the bedrooms are likely to face the less favorable direction.


Tower manshons are likely to be expensive to maintain in the future as they get older.

Lower buildings are more easily maintained.

Larger developments (larger number of units) are likely to spread maintenance over the larger number of units, and so likely to be more reasonable on the management / maintenance fees...

[adamu]

Higher can be difficult if there's a natural disaster (which happen once every few years) and you have no utilities. You'll either need to move out temporary or lug bottles of water / gas up 10 flights of stairs / climb a mountain every week to have a shower. Could be healthy, though!

I decided never to live in a place with only north-facing windows again after doing it once. That was in Scotland though, where it's dark at 15:30 in winter.

I'm also not a fan of buildings that sit on a big main road. I don't think the constant traffic noise is healthy.

I would also be careful about the surrounding property. In Fukuoka the car park or small house opposite that grants you lots of light will be a 15-20 storey building in the next 5-10 years.

[sutebayashi]

I have a house not a Mansion but we have South facing primarily.

What is really good about south facing during the winter is that the low sun shines in the windows and warms the place up.
Whereas at this time of year (from March through summer months and Autumn) the midday sun is high, and the sun therefore doesn’t directly come in our windows during these hotter months.

An old apartment we used to live in was facing South, South west, and not only did we have a view of Mt Fuji on a fine day, but also even during the winter months that late afternoon sun shone in our apartment and made it nice and warm for when we came home from work. We don’t get that late afternoon sun in our current house, which I miss, but the south facing is overall something we’re happy with.

[Isodora]

An east facing (main) balcony is probably good if you live in one of the hotter parts of Japan, except of course that in winter that side = most likely the living room will be colder and darker from midday, also they may be rarer than south facing ones. If you look at prospective apartments, maybe tour them in the afternoon to judgde whether there will be enough light, also for comparison you could look at apartments with the directions you don`t prefer.

For me some of the priorities are (or were):

Either on a higher floor or on a hill (unblocked view, natural light) and thus good natural ventilation possible (via opening all windows) = to avoid running the air con all summer long.

A large balcony, with either a glass balustrade or metall railngs, not the type with a solid wall - which takes away light and blocks the view.

No or little noise from traffic, neighbours or otherwise.

If a higher building, I would avoid anything higher than 7 to 10 floors, especially Tower Mansions (this was mentioned already), you are too much depending on the elevator and other infrastructure functioning - three years ago, in a Kawasaki Tower mansion - due to torrential rain caused by a typhoon - ground water leaked into the underground part of the building where the electrical equipment was stored and caused elevator but also water outages for a number of days; outages due to earthquakes are of course a bigger factor to consider, also probably relatively higher maintenance and repairs costs than in a "normal" apartment/mansion.

As you asked, I also often wonder why people would want to buy expensive - often darkish apartments with little privacy in new buildings on the ground floor next to the busiest streets, crossings or in built-up locations, I have seen the strangest things in our area. They may be a bit cheaper than the ones higher up, but surely not cheap, and there is not even a shortage of living space. One possible reason is the strong desire to live as close as possible to a train station, at least in the bigger cities, it could be that all other factors are considered secondary for some or many?

[HankNeva]

"If a higher building, I would avoid anything higher than 7 to 10 floors,"

Thanks, Isadora...OK, will keep that in mind. My real estate agent told me that higher floor (let's say up to 7) apartments are hard to find as a lot of people buy them to rent out for 20 years and then move into when paid off.

He said count on each floor going higher you will pay a million yen more.