Would you buy one? I'm not a fan, but I know several people who've happily purchased one of these "eave-less" homes. The biggest downside I see is increased cooling costs, due to the baking sun being able to enter and heat up the house more rapidly. Another disadvantage is water entering the house more easily (don't try leaving these windows open when you go out for the day!). Yet they remain a popular building choice, for first home buyers and those wanting to sacrifice "normal" building practices for space and more space! Each to their own when it comes to taste as well, I suppose, but what a boring world it would be if we were all the same
You would also get alot more water running down the walls onto your footings (if there isnt any paving etc around the house) which could lead to problems down the track. Also if your gutters overflow certain types of guttering will allow the water to possibly flow internally onto your ceilings, make sure the front of the gutter is lower than the back alternatively get slots put in across the front to help drainage and dont skimp on down pipes. I do like the look of the design but would it date any quicker than others? I guess any design does after time !
Excuse me but thats not a home, thats a garage with windows. Actually, my garage is prettier than that lump.
They are stupid and totally inappropriate for the climate in this country, and the climate to come. They also look ridiculous in my opinion. There is one that I used to regularly drive past, it was a two story place on a smallish block so it had a 'taller than it was high' look about it, and the eave-less design made it look like someone wearing a hat that was too small for them and had rammed it down onto their head.
Hi guys new to this board here. I'm actually buying one of these 'eave-less' homes. It's our first home and a very respectable builder is doing it. All of his homes are like this in this area BUT I did see one with a bit of a eave so maybe there is a option there. I notice though in the draft plans I recieved yesturday there are a heap of down pipes. More than other homes I'm sure. Is that to make up for the no eaves 'just in case' of heavy rain fall? The plans are perfect everything we want on the first draft so we are happy except the eaves hmmm.....
I prefer eaves on most designs but some look 'modern' designs would not suit eaves. It really comes down to 2 issues for me. 1 - Cost, they're no longer standard with most project home builders and they will charge like a wounded bull for them. And yes, I understand long term energy savings bla bla bla..... 2 - Block sizes (frontages) are getting smaller and people much prefer the extra space inside instead of eaves. My local council (Baulkham Hill SC) requires 900mm from the fascia to the side boundaries, if your eaves are 600mm each side, there's 1200mm that you could have extra space inside if you were going to the max. That house is a product of the width of the block. So council and the developers are to blame. On a 14m wide block you loose 1.8m either side for setbacks so you end up with a 12.2m wide house. Your garage is ~6m so your only left with ~6m. Can you imagine if it had eaves, that extra 1.2m is coming off you living space because you cant reduce the garage, unless you go single car that is. So it would end up being more lopsided with ~6m for garage and 4.8m for living, even worse then it is. Of course your garage is going to stick out like dogs balls width frontages like this.
So if I requested eaves I would have less space inside most likely? Hmmm. Do you know if a house with no eaves, correct amount of Dpipes have problems long term?
Only if your on the setback limits already. A way that you can reduce the impact on 2 storey house is have eaves on the top floor only. With some designs this wont affect the setbacks at all or only on one side. Even though it doesn't sound very aesthetically pleasing, I bet you've seen hundreds of them but just never noticed. You can see in the pictures below that there are eaves on the second storey but not on the garage. The second storey eaves will encroach on the side setback on the opposite side of the house but not of the garage side. And some designs look good without eaves Only if it rains upwards or you aim a hose up there.
This is not entirely true, unless your local council has a special development condition. The BCA (Building Code of Australia) stipulates that any material within 900mm of a boundary is "to be non=combustable" and walls on boundaries need to have a certain fire rating. This does not preclude and eave being built within this 900mm. Council reg's usually have other controls that keep you from building a wall closer than 900mm, but this doesn't apply to the eaves. Probably the only reason these builders build houses without eaves is simply because they are cheaper to build this way and they make more money selling them. Andybob