American reacts to 'Why American homes are Flimsy compared to Europe'

Thank you for watching me, a humble American, react to 'Why American homes are Flimsy compared to Europe'
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[@insu_na]

The problem with American houses isn't so much the material but the architecture. You can build really solid and sturdy houses with wood, but Americans just keep using 2x4s with drywall and plywood as walls. In America "punching through a wall" is a bit of a meme, but it's certainly possible. Anywhere in Europe, even the parts that build their houses from wood, you'll just break your hand.

[@marydavis5234]

No 2x4 are use in building houses in the US, don’t believe everything you read on the internet about any country.

[@shadmtmtn1603]

There is actually high buildings made in wood, the record being a 20 stories building in Sweden (over 250 ft tall). Knowing the codes are very strict, it means really resistant structures to be allowed, resisting to wind, fire, water and earthquake hazards ! Wood is indeed not the problem 😉🖖

[@PatsFanGermany]

If someone knows how to build good, sturdy houses from wood, it's the swedes.

[@holger_p]

@@shadmtmtn1603 That's new and "experimental". That's why it is in the news. But also things like hospitals, or schools are build of concrete and are more robust, resistent to the weather. They just decide to apply another technique to family homes.

[@AlexKall]

Exactly! Europe is vast and houses are built different in different countries but the houses are generally built sturdy.

[@claracatlady9844]

Suddenly the never ending trope of “Noise Complaints” in American movies, shows and books makes more sense. I always thought that was sooooo unrealistic, like how could you make THAT much noise even if it is a party. In my house (with closed windows) unless there are fireworks or a freaking parade I don’t hear nothing.

[@S.D.2016]

I can clearly hear people outside talking next door from inside the house; granted the very old house I live in has basically zero insulation. You can hear EVERYTHING.

[@jmi5969]

@@S.D.2016 Same problem with my urban apartment. The building's exterior walls are up to 1.5 meter thick (1.5x1.5 load-bearing masonry columns), but the 80-cm infill walls below and above the windows work like resonators of ancient cathedrals. I can not hear anything from the adjacent apartments and commercial space below me, but every voice from the nearby street passes as if there's nothing in between.

[@freakymeff]

it's mindboggling that anyone would tie themselves into 30-year mortgage payments over a house you can punch holes through. Like, this doesn't make sense to me.

[@woutdezeeuw1604]

If you look a bit beyond the surface, it's not that mind boggling. You can build a house to last a 100 years, but lets say it costs 2x more to build? If you build cheaper for a shorter life span, you allow for changing circumstances/demographics better. Like 50 years ago there used to be bigger families, with a lot more children, and a house with many rooms would make more sense. Today there are a lot more singles, so more smaller apartments, perhaps tiny houses are needed. If everything was built to last 300 years, this also makes it more difficult to adapt.

[@Soken50]

@@woutdezeeuw1604 Imagine being able to build a sturdy home, live in it while it accrues value, sell it, move to your new place of employment and see there are already sturdy homes you can buy and do minor repairs in instead of starting from scratch or worry it's gonna collapse around you. If you need a smaller home you can divide a property, my apartment is one of 8 apartments in a late renaissance era manor, my bathroom is older than the US constitution, it's gone trough quite a few remodels but there isn't much damage apart from some minor cracks in the plaster and wooden door paint from thermal cycling which is easily patched.

[@woutdezeeuw1604]

@@Soken50 If you know the future in advance that might be valid, but for all you know you would have built that house in a random area in Detroit that is dead 30 years later. In down town Paris a long term investment is less of a gamble, but depending on where you live it doesn't necessarily make sense to build for a future that far ahead.

[@Soken50]

@@woutdezeeuw1604 Oh yeah, sure, let's sink money in a disposable home in the very unlikely case your city is built on a single industry that can't weather the worst economic down turn in history, that's totally not an inconsequential calculated risk in aggregate. No wonder a third of Americans live paycheck to paycheck...

[@woutdezeeuw1604]

@@Soken50 I'm just saying there are many situations in which you don't need to build for something to last a 100 years (by the way Detroit is in no way an isolated/rare case). Even in my town brick houses are torn down because by today's standards insulation is no longer good enough, ceiling heights are now higher than what they used to be 40-50 years ago, stairs inclines are not as steep as they used to be, average room sizes are bigger, the list goes on. The houses could physically have lasted another 50 years I'm sure, but economically they are not viable for another 50 years. And therefore you can make the argument that these houses were overbuilt, and they are surely not accruing value.

[@annab6948]

In Sweden, Where I live, we use wood a lot because we have the materials growing in abundance. However, the more south you go, the more stone and brick you encounter. In my home country, Poland, it is almost always brick and stone.

[@jessepylvalainen2288]

We use a lot of wood in Finland too. Some houses are brick layered but still wood founded

[@Alfadrottning86]

Here in Iceland - we used to use a lot of wood (except the Alþingi being of solid stone) - but the more recent buildings are usually made of stone - and also rather ugly *used to build out of wood refers to the old times, before we actually completely deforested our island so it looks more like an alien landscape now.

[@annebritraaen2237]

@@Alfadrottning86 Norway was also pretty deforested at one point. So they wrote the obligation to plant new trees for every tree you cut, into law.

[@Alfadrottning86]

@@annebritraaen2237 well, i would assume so - after all, our ancestors are Norwegians. But it might be easier to re-forest when you have some or quite a lot left. Here we had to start from nothing; from decades of nature adjusting not to have trees at all. Oh, also the Elves!! lol

[@X33dbv]

@@Alfadrottning86 And ur trees are very little cause of ur environment and the time for actual growing is short. Nevertheless beautiful island and I hope u get ur forests back in future.

[@sarahlemke9803]

Up until like 10 years ago I used to think that those thin walls were just built for movies, sitcoms and such, for the effect of punching through them. Because our German walls are usually made of bricks. Actually, I thought that several things that wouldn’t make sense in Germany were just for the camera: windows that slide up (so teen girls’ bf can climb through at night), toilet bowls with much water in them (so the highschool bully can have their moment), doorknobs instead of handles (so it’s easier to break in), vents instead of radiators (for the villain to poison an entire family by gas or sth) etc… 😅

[@FloofersFX]

Oh man, the toilet one too, you're completely right on that, I've thought about the others a lot.

[@pikachuchujelly7628]

It really depends. Most middle class US homes have brick walls (on the outside), and even the inner walls can't be punched through. However, many of the cheaper homes just have vinyl or stucco exterior, which is incredibly weak.

[@sarahlemke9803]

@@pikachuchujelly7628 thank you so much for the insight!

[@mademoiselledusfonctionell1609]

In Sweden since like 50 years, we mostly build partitions using drywall. But we use thicker sheets of drywall.

[@mademoiselledusfonctionell1609]

@@pikachuchujelly7628 I watch a lot of funny animals-clips (mainly to cope with depression), and I saw one of a dog chewing through a door. An entrance door. The door seemed to be made of plastic and very thin. There is no way a dog could do that here. A beaver - yes. A dog - no. And many doors to flats are steel to prevent fire from spreading and also to make burglary more difficult.

[@TheJackD67]

I live in North Peloponnese, Greece, on the slope of a mountain about 800 meters above sea level. My place is a two-story stone house build 103 years ago, so it's relatively new since there are some stone houses in our village made way back in 1820's, after the greek revolution against the Ottomans. We have pretty harsh winters with lots of rain and snow and the temperature falls well under 0C specially at night. In the summer the sun is very hot and the temperature reaches many times over 36C, sometimes even over 40C, specially in mid/end July. We expect such temps at the end of this week actually. The Corinthian Gulf is right below us, very close and is a territory well known for it's seismic activity. We have tectonic tremors/earthquakes (2-3R) every 2-3 months, a couple of 4-5R eartquakes every year and a big one about 6R every 10-20 years.Our houses are made to protect us from all these elements, stay cool in the summer, warm during winter (stone walls are over a meter thick) and while they shake hard during earthquakes, they don't fall. Only the inside plaster surfaces get cracked, but that's something that some new plaster and paint easily covers. I understand that the problem with american wooden houses is that are not made to last like wooden houses in northen Europe do. It's a shame because once upon a time american products in general were famous for their sturdiness, a few still do, like Harleys❤. I think Americans nowdays treat their houses like any other product, use it while it's new and then throw it away and get another. No sustainability concept involved, probably because of your newer-bigger-better approach to things. Might be good for a few things, definitely not for houses.

[@e.o.7177]

1m thick walls! That’s amazing!

[@MIGBMWLOVER]

tell me brother!

[@jakej2680]

I live in a wooden house in the US built in the 1700s. And the earthquakes don't cause any damages. Seems like maybe the Greek financial skills crossed over to architecture 😂😂

[@TheJackD67]

@@jakej2680 Yeah,funny you should mention that. "Architecture".I wonder where that word comes from...🤣😂

[@jmi5969]

@@e.o.7177 Why? It was built before modern codes downgraded wall thickness to current low values. Even then, the recommended aerated concrete wall in my area must be 60cm; add 10cm for exterior rockwool cladding and 5 cm for interior finishes - that's 3/4 meters. My unheated summer house was built to these specs, and although usually unheated, winter temperature inside never falls below +5C (+10C at the slab under the screed) even when it's -30C outdoors. Fortunately, we haven't had -40s since the 1970s, thank you Greta. And of course there is no need for AC - inside temp never rises above +23..25C even when it approaches +40c outdoors.

[@avmavm777]

Europe has a past history of building wooden houses, but it also has a history of large fires - The Great Fire of London 1666 for instance. Building regulations were often strict to encourage sturdier houses made of stone to cope better

[@letheas6175]

Same in Amsterdam, after a big fire in which a lot of the city was burned to the ground, they changed to brick /other materials mostly

[@vomm]

But modern wooden houses are just as fireproof as concrete blocks

[@avmavm777]

@@vomm and most houses aren’t modern in Europe. They certainly can use more wood in their modern production now than they used to but couldn’t previously.

[@jeffafa3096]

@@letheas6175 In Amsterdam a lot of houses have a combination of wood foundations and brick walls, or a mix of brick/concrete/wood walls. Nearly all the older houses (18th century to pre-WW2) in the wetter parts of the country have this, because wood just works really well as a foundation in these parts. Modern structures can now also be built on reinforced steel foundations, but wood is still used quite often as a foundation for buildings in our country. So we still build a lot with wood, only it's always been more of a mixture between wood and stone here...

[@letheas6175]

@@jeffafa3096 Yes, I know. Lol. Thanks for explaining to those who dont, though! I especially love the modern architecture in (mostly) wood, like the Haut building near Amstel. Top notch building honestly. I think it even won some awards.

[@smol_hamster_]

Strong(er) earthquakes and tornadoes are pretty rare in Europe (the tectonic plate is pretty stable and the continent is very mountainous), that's why you don't really hear about this stuff happening in Europe. When it comes to the energy-saving part, brick houses (at least here in Europe) are built in a way so that they retain heat during winter (you don't have to heat them as often) but remain cool in the summer. That's why many places in Europe don't have AC. In my family's house, we have a wood stove on both floors and during winter we save some extra money on heating by burning wood in the stove. The heat from a few hours of burning wood can last us 3-4 days until we have to burn wood again.

[@ChiaraVet]

As an Italian, I have to strongly disagree about the earthquakes part. Sure, we don´t have them as often as Japan, but Italy is one of the highest earthquake-risk regions in the world nonetheless. and yet our old houses and buildings(someone said medieval castles?) lasted for centuries, while the cheaper, badly built buildings of the 70s and 80s, before the new building rules came into force, come down like paper castles whenever there´s a slightly stronger earthquake. The technology to build earthquake-safe buildings doesn´t allow for cheap, low quality buildings, that´s it.

[@HisuiOgawa]

@@ChiaraVet Your country has the unfortunate honor of having been ramed into Europe so hard it made one heck of a mountain range (I never get tired of how the Alps dwarf everything when you get near lol), so I don't think you can qualify for that "stable tectonic plate" part of their comment. 😂 I'm always amazed your historical buildings don't take more damage than they do, to be honest. We get a few eathquakes here in France, but nothing to the level of what you guys get.

[@tomvladik]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1755_Lisbon_earthquake

[@haroina391]

@@tomvladik yeas in portugal we are also at risk of having very strong earthquakes but it doesn't happen since 1755 the ones that happen are very very soft and somehow I'm never able to feel it it has to be my mother calling and saying 'did you felt the earthquake' and I'm like 'what are you talking about' and then I see the news and indeed there was 1 earthquake but I think that it was estimated that it has a high probability of a very strong earthquake happening in the next 50 years if Im not wrong

[@tjguzik]

Macedonia, Italia, border od Slovakia and Austria - earthquakes more than 4 Richter scale - that is only in last year... be educated, not shitbag..

[@LordStradh]

Here in Sweden and Finland wood is abundant, and used to build houses. But unlike the US you can't walk through the inner walls... Even with wood we build sturdy and lasting, we simply have harder building code. Our interior walls are thicker than the standard us exterior wall, and the exterior ones much thicker, and well insulated, and yes we insulate internal walls as well, so sound is dampened. If your home is from the 1920:s it is likely of higher quality and building than what is represented in this video.

[@lillm6874]

And Norway👍😊

[@solar0wind]

Here in Germany, wooden houses aren't completely uncommon either. In fact, my parents live in one, and in last summer's heatwave it was 10 degrees cooler inside than outside at times. No need for AC.

[@flower_power]

The wooden houses in Europe are build of a better quality of wood. The walls are mode of sollid wood in stead of a framework

[@fabiosoares7660]

Here in Portugal (Southern Europe) is very rare to find wood houses and stone houses you will just find them in rural areas or in countryside. Also When I was studying, my English teachers all said the same thing, that American houses are made of wood because of earthquakes, wood is a lighter material compared to brick and stone, so the chance for people to survive to the earthquake is bigger.

[@Lylantares]

Yep. Wood is a very good insulator if you use it correctly. German pre-built wooden houses have thick walls. They can still be framework, but the framework is both on the interior and exterior walls and it is filled with isolation. And every interior wall had double planks.

[@chrischi510]

I find it fascinating. I’m from Germany and the oldest wall in my house is from 1180 and the newer parts are from the 1580. It’s fun to live in a old house with tons of history in my city. I learned a lot from my city’s history just to be interested in my house. But it’s has big wood beans in it like in the old Fachwerkhäuser in Germany.

[@operatorchakkoty4257]

There is this renovated water tower in Stralsund that I really wanted to live in, but the rent is astronomical. Imagine living in a 2-story apartment in a tower! Can't get more eccentric than that.

[@23GreyFox]

@@operatorchakkoty4257 There is one, the Eiffel Tower. Eiffel had a personal room on top.

[@operatorchakkoty4257]

@@23GreyFox had?

[@astyandelacroix8001]

@@operatorchakkoty4257 I mean, he can't legally own anything, anymore...

[@hanssama1954]

Das zeigt sehr schön, dass nicht das Holz das Problem ist, sondern die Konstruktionsweise. Ich habe auch schon in einigen Historischen Häusern gearbeitet. Die Qualität der Holzkonstruktion ist auch nach Jahrhunderten immer noch beindruckend.

[@Rnd227]

Some towns were built (out stone) in the middle-ages. There was no shortage of wood at the time. So the quantity of available wood was no factor.

[@taranvainas]

I always laugh when in American movies people protect themselves from danger in their homes with a little chain on the door. It is not necessary to enter through the door in an American home, it is enough to kick any wall!

[@TheProkonover]

Or just fire one of their guns from outside. CHances are that you will hit somebody. Or use a flamethrower/molotov, place goes up in smoke withing an hour.

[@mr.fringeminority5426]

Please, come demonstrate your mighty foot on the side of my house. I'm interested to see the results.

[@theunhappygamer1744]

Obviously you are just joking but it is a lot harder to go through a wall than you might think. While dry wall on its own is easy enough to break through it becomes stronger when braced against wooden studs, you end up putting smaller sized holes in the wall instead of breaking through the entire sheet. And that's if you don't hit a stud, it once got a boxer break hitting a wall stud hard enough to break bone.

[@taranvainas]

@@theunhappygamer1744 No, no, I'm not kidding. I have seen enough images of how houses are built in the USA and I assure you that in five minutes I can enter any of them. I mean, of course, those that are built with wood and drywall. It's not hard to tell where the studs are. And I don't even tell you if instead of kicking I decide to use the car... In a minute I go through the whole house. It's unbelievable that even in Tornado Alley people who lose their homes build their homes the same way. It's crazy. With how easy it is to make bricks! Do you lack clay in the USA? And stone?

[@danwasson1930]

@@taranvainas Of course you would be shot for trying.

[@tronotrond]

As a Scandinavian now living in Texas it's definitively not the wood, but this video resonated a lot. Houses are generally constructed very cheaply here, that's for sure. And many just doesn't seem interested in taking care and maintaining their homes either. There are definitively less regulations in place to ensure a properly built houses, and there are less safety mechanisms built in to avoid things like a bathroom leak causing major flood damage. Overall you can see the windows, doors, and materials are of the cheapest types, with gaps and inaccuracies everywhere. I'm sure it varies a bit, but one other major difference is the use of drywall which cracks and breaks as the house matures. My house was constructed in the late 2000s but the design and material choices makes it seem so much older. Not to mention it came with a gray, generic carpet in every room. I thought carpets went out of fashion in the 70s! You can visibly see many places how the ceiling or walls are crooked. It's "hidden" by applying "orange peel" texture absolutely everywhere. In Scandinavia, people want hardwood floors and flat, straight surfaces - which naturally takes more time to get right. The roof has shingles that lasts 10-15 years, vs roof stones that lasts 30-40 years in Europe. Naturally many things are also different due to different climates and other things.

[@asjaosaline5987]

In Europe there is Plenty of Earthqyicks and Tornades, thought still less than other places in World. Why you dont hear about them is reason,that they do not make quick work of our civilization, Houses here are sturdy. Last time Tornado made harm here was that it destoyed farmhouse and raked some other buildings lightly, but as it reached a Town it Died out. I Felt a Earthquik few year back, If Force was 8,3 and was actually suprised by its Force, but i made public damage only by 6000 euros.problematic thing here is Floods they weaken the Earth itself and dosent matter how quality house is made it will do alot of damage. So people usually also Thing where they want to build they home considering Topological and Weather impacts. In Estoniamy Home country most used building material is Stone, It is followed by Log Buildings Then comes Brick and then comes Wood.

[@asjaosaline5987]

In Estonia we have over 50% of territory covered with Forests and its enought to build whole citys of Wood, thought we also have Harsh Regulations what regulate how many m3 Forest can be Cut is Year to keep it sustainable and also protect Nature Mating and Nesting period.WOod is usually used here For Furniture, Heating and extracting Chemicals like cellulose

[@fabiosoares7660]

Here in Portugal (Southern Europe) is very rare to find wood houses and stone houses you will just find them in rural areas or in countryside. Also When I was studying, my English teachers all said the same thing, that American houses are made of wood because of earthquakes, wood is a lighter material compared to brick and stone, so the chance for people to survive to the earthquake is bigger. Here in Portugal, about 5 years ago, prefabricated houses started to be made, but in my point of view and in the point of view of many people, prefabricated houses are more expensive than buying land and building your own house made of brick.

[@TheBrazilRules]

@@fabiosoares7660 It may look cheaper because you can buy it for many years, literally laying one brick at a time. You are just spreading the cost through the years. Also helps that you don't pay other people to build it for you.

[@ananovak1468]

@@asjaosaline5987 8,3 earthquake in Europe?? When?where?

[@Alek4275]

the insulation thing is true. My grandma house is very old (over 300 years as far as I know) and back then people used to build really thick brick walls with small windows in order to insulate the inside from the outside. Inside her house there's almost always the same temperature (around 15-20° C both during summer and winter), no matter how hot or cold it is outside. She tells us that back when she was a kid it was actually really cold during winter, as windows were made of wood and didn't keep the cold air outside, but now, with modern windows frames, she almost doesn't need the heating. I need to add that the structure is over 300 years old and still standing, with the last renovation of the roof made in 1917. I seriosly doubt that a wooden structure would be able to last even half of this time.

[@peterjackson4763]

There is a wooden house from the 13th century near me, It was extended in the 17th and occupied until the 1950s. The extension is brick. Part of my parents house was Victorian. The exterior (and formerly exterior) walls were 2' thick and solid. The windows were quite large, but after they were replaced by double glazed ones that part of the house would stay warm with little heating,. If left to cool down it would take a long time to heat up though.

[@Trashbd]

A friend of mine moved to US (New Hampshire) to work at Boyd's and the first thing he did was buying a house and then insulate it properly (to Swedish standard), his energy consumption shrunk to less than half the projected consumption, his point was that insulation don't only keep warmth in, it also keeps it out when it's hot...

[@MaticTheProto]

That’s how insulation works yes

[@sk-sm9sh]

It's so weird to me that people don't insulate their homes because insulation material like rockwool isn't even expensive. And it's amazing material to wrap your house with. Not only does it insulate from cold in winter and from hot in summer it also dampens sound, helps prevent mold, it blocks fire, and it will prevent infestation of bugs/mice/etc.

[@MaticTheProto]

@@sk-sm9sh yeah im in canada rn and you can literally hear the neighbors through the wall sometimes when they have a window open

[@sk-sm9sh]

@@jensv874 10k for all the benefit it comes with is really not that much. How much for the construction of the entire house ? If money is issue then usually there are some other aspects to cut on for instance build a smaller house.

[@haroina391]

@@jensv874 maybe if it was 15 years ago probably all the money that you didn't pay for cooling and heating already covers way more than 10k imagining you would pay 1k each year for cooling and heating (so 83€ per month) you would have already have more 5k than if you choose to not insulate

[@fabiancarre2417]

The house of my grand parents is more than 600 years old and it will certainly stand 600 more years. The walls are made of stones and are almost 1 meter thick...

[@baramuth71]

you have never seen a house made of wood that is 600 years old, because it rots away under your butt. good for the earth becomes fertilizer again, but never for generations in the long run.

[@zapster252]

@@baramuth71 Or it will be eaten by termites.😂

[@tangfors]

@@baramuth71 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirkjub%C3%B8argar%C3%B0ur

[@herrbonk3635]

@@baramuth71 I prefer stone materials in most kinds of buildings, but in Sweden we still got many houses from the 1600s and 1700s that were made out of timber (and some planks too, of course).

[@kodilodinoza]

So ypu are living in the castle aren't you?

[@danhodson7187]

I'm in the UK and have only moved once. My parents house was about 150 years old and was still in fantastic condition. I'm sure i'll move again as I don't view this as a 'forever home' but I'm sure this house will still be here long after I'm gone. As Al Murray says, we don't get tornadoes and earthquakes here because we don't deserve them 😆

[@vikinnorway6725]

UK houses are wierd looking too me. To many small rooms and tiny small houses.

[@definitelynotatroll246]

@@vikinnorway6725yeah on average our houses are some of the smallest in Europe, I think it’s down to being a tiny island with a massive population, land is really expensive here

[@aw3s0me12]

@@definitelynotatroll246 Yes!

[@aw3s0me12]

No... the UK is the country with the most tornadoes per unit area in the world: around 40 to 50 tornadoes occur there each year, but most of them are weak. Southern England forms the western part of a European "tornado alley" with the highest number of such events. While on the other hand in total: *Germany* had the most T's in Europe. *Also >>* Peterson (1992) notes that during the *early twentieth century there was actually more interest in tornado research in Europe than in the United States.* ;)

[@redshirt49]

@@aw3s0me12 Yeah, we do get some tornados in Germany. Only in the North though. Our houses are concrete though, so uh just stay inside and don't stand near any trees. They have a habit of smashing people and cars standing under them during storm season.

[@anoitecerempobrecido]

Brick and concrete houses also take much longer to build, which further adds to construction price. The oldest house I lived in was from the 12th century. Walls were made of 50 cm (~20 inch) thick granite stones. I couldn't get phone signal inside the house.

[@DanielixKlimax]

Only fifty? That's thin...

[@j59of2]

Mine`s has 60 to90 cm walls tick. An old farmhouse in est France.

[@DanielixKlimax]

@@j59of2 That's better. Still thinner then walls in my houses. One has about 2m (empirically measured during installation of heat pumps) and the other about meter (funnily old farm house too and likely quite bit older than the first one).

[@Deserthacker]

@@DanielixKlimax You sure you didn't accidentally buy a bunker instead of a house? :D Out of curiosity: Which country?

[@DanielixKlimax]

@@Deserthacker Czech Republic...

[@gggdebeste5515]

A lot of houses in europe are build or remade in the 1950s not because of storms or earthquicks but because between 1910 and 1945 we had a big problem with high explosives

[@brunojean-baptiste6197]

😁😁

[@10Tabris01]

I don't know what your problem is, it was just raining a little

[@itsa1v1n]

That highly depends on where you live in europe

[@juliegale3863]

Ryan - a bit of history. In Europe we built wood frame houses and used up all our wood, particularly oak. In my country of England we are famous for our black and white oak beamed house. We also used up our wood for ships. They gradually filled int the spaces with bricks as brick making was cheap. Eventually houses became all brick. My own house though is built with concrete blocks 40 years ago, new when I moved in. Roof is timber frame and has had some outside bits renewed but on the whole is solid. It is warm in winter, cool in summer and quite cheap to run. But will admit it is tiny. Now north of the border in Scotland they built of stone and their houses are still standing despite awful weather.

[@robertotarter7839]

Tornadoes are less of a problem in Europe ( we still have them tho) but earthquakes are a HUGE problem in many areas, Italy and the balkans especially!

[@stevenvanhulle7242]

Do tornadoes occur in Europe? In what regions?

[@Crunch2327]

​@@stevenvanhulle7242Britain has more tornados per square mile than the US

[@Robotmudkip99]

@@Crunch2327I mean is that a fair comparison the us is much bigger.

[@stuartfitch7093]

Recently I wanted to mount a wall bracket in my home. To do this I needed to drill numerous holes for screws. The wall I was attaching the bracket to is so hard that I burnt through two proper masonry drill bits before I had drilled two holes deep enough to accommodate a wall plug. This is just how hard and thick house walls are in the UK. Especially in older houses.

[@arjan_speelman]

I suspect the lower availability of wood wasn't as much of an impacting factor as the higher availability of flames in cities where homes are build closer together.

[@LeSarthois]

It's both, really. Wood frame houses have been banned in Paris and London for years yet they were still built, simply because there was little effective enforcement of the laws. The reason you no longer see those houses is because they rotted away, were burns and replaced by stone buildings or were razed. The thing is that many European countries did ran out of wood. France passed legislation and bought large forests as early as the 17th century to ensure a safe supply of wood - for warships. (If you ever visit France and see a sign in/near a forest saying "Forêt Domaniale" that's a State-owned forest). On the other hand European houses used less wood overall because most would use wattle and daub and similar methods of building a frame and fill the frame with different materials. Tho of course this may varies depending on the place.

[@Moribax85]

Well, to be fair London was razed twice by fires, but so was Chicago. The difference is that the brits learned from it.

[@SantaMuerte1813]

@@Moribax85 And to be frank, most European traditional "wooden houses" aren't just coating mounted on frames, but frames filled with clay or similarly subtantial materials. So even those are solid walls.

[@zoebunnyx]

My house was built in 1750 and the large supporting beams in the main downstairs rooms were salvaged from an old Ship so they could be another 50+ years old. This house is built to last and should survive another few hundred years easily 😂 They certainly don't build them like they used to.

[@wafflehussle]

MOVE OUT! i claim this place as my own. I always wanted a pirate fortress! x3

[@tenniskinsella7768]

Zoebunny to be fair lot of new builds get criticised for their workmanship in Britain

[@MarkLangdahl]

On using wood for house building we actually do that a lot in Europe too. The frame is almost always made of wood. But the outer walls are typically bricks in most countries. In places with large amounts of timber close by like the Swedish and Norwegian forests you also still see a lot of wooden houses. When it comes to the energy cost the major difference I think is better insulation of the houses. We still do have some houses with bad insulation here in Denmark. But you can get cheap loans from the banks for fixing that because basically the investment to put in a layer of isolating material like Rockwool is recovered by the energy savings within five years of investment. In the worst cases even less than that. If your energy bills are significantly lower than the $340/month mentioned in the video the insulation could be why. If your house is from the 1920's it's from before balloon framing became widespread. So it's probably just built of thicker wood which leads to better insulation.

[@sortiztube]

In southern Europe there are no wooden houses. Wooden houses are not proper homes, wooden houses are cottages/cabins.

[@MrProthall]

Sure, unless you build a proper house out of logs. There are enough mansions like that.

[@fillehh9328]

I live in Sweden, here 95% of all houses are made of wood.

[@eliasgamper3313]

It’s possible to make Houses out off wood more sturdy then any other material. In the Alps we have Houses, cottages. . . hundreds of years old.

[@antoniodasilva1230]

​@@MrProthall ill take my cement and stone house over your log house any day basically my place is still solid and its seventy five year's old and will still be around for over another hundred our two and yes i hace central heat radian floors ect.ect 😂😂😂

[@erik....]

Wooden houses are not actually made out of only wood. Modern wooden houses often have double layers of drywall on each wall which makes them very stiff, soundproof, fire resistant and the core of the walls is very well insulating. And for the ground floor, of course it has floor heating and is made out of concrete.

[@tomkirkemo5241]

What IS fascinating is, I'm in Norway. On the smal farm I live we still have 4 large buildings built in the 1640's...still standing. And for the 12 years we lived here we haven't had to do one single repair on them. They are made from whole timber though.

[@avmavm777]

I wonder if the climate there helps wood last longer - colder temperatures? Also I think Norway is less densely populated than many other European countries so fires couldn’t spread as quickly, so there was less risk of losing them - especially on a farm

[@Roel_Scoot]

The keyword here is WHOLE timber as in a log cabin.

[@Lubben]

Same with my family house. It's built in 1620 and still standing. The house itself have been expanded a lot since then. But the logs from when it was built is still 100% intact.

[@Lubben]

@@avmavm777 Our capital Oslo was rebuilt every 25 years due to fire.

[@wendymacilree3228]

We have wood framed houses in New Zealand, they just rock in an earthquake. a brick home would be destroyed in an earthquake.

[@thoso1973]

Practically all brick buildings constructed in Northern Europe, have thick insulation between two brick or concrete walls. It keeps the building energy effective especially during the winter. Also, some European nations only allow clean water to enter buildings via the plumbing - 100% drinking water quality whether it comes out of your tap or flushed out in the toilet.

[@not_even_known_yet3167]

Some? I thought it was standard in at least Western Europe?

[@haribo836]

A method used in the German speaking corner (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) is actually just one inner wall of brick or concrete, than a thick padding of insulation on the outside, which is then covered with thick plaster. It gives that characteristic style where the windows are recessed, while they rest on the inner wall, where with a double wall, they are flush with the outer wall.

[@terranaxiomuk]

​@KurtFrederiksen We have water treatment centres. They didn't stop running because of brexit. I'm not too sure what memes you are getting your information from.

[@kalev60]

Northern and eastern Europe uses a lot of wood especially in the countryside even log-houses that have really nice sound blocking capabilities built in, but climate dictates thicker walls , more isolation and more attention to sound isolation, plus less demand for quick construction kind of leads naturally for more quality builds. Also stick-framing has took about 100 years to get insulation materials that can actually deal with how thin the walls are and block sound good.

[@pradrev]

Brick house doesn't need to have airconditioner because the bricks work as a termoregulator. Same in the winter, if you stop heating, the mass of walls keeps the temperature same. Wooden houses overheat in summer and cool quickly in winter.

[@bloxyman22]

I guess you have never been to spain then? Definitely need an AC in summer and heating in winters. They are so awfully leaky that temperatures become freezing when temperature drops towards 10c outside.

[@willewiking98]

we have a lot of wooden houses in northern europe too, they are just built VERY differently to american houses

[@AshtonishingJelly]

I remember watching the show where they make over houses for people, and my husband being a carpenter kind of being in shock at how they build it! To us it kind of looks like cardboard walls on a fragile tree sceleton 😂😂😁

[@nickgrazier3373]

We have a lot of 500 / 1500 year old houses and the big difference with the younger and older buildings is the hardness of the timber used! Almost all of the old wooden hearted housing have used Oak timber throughout they have lasted in a way stone and brick buildings have. Also it is quite difficult to get oak houses to burn down quickly giving enough time to quench the fire out and rebuild using the original frame work. The US seams to have used treated soft woods as building materials. This is why Europe has not got anymore forests because they were all mostly Oak forests and these were always used for ship building for NAVAL use, now they are mostly gone!

[@RealConstructor]

In The Netherlands we used to build houses in wood until the city fires which destroyed many houses. Also our houses needed to be built on wooden stilts/piling and foundations (otherwise they would sink in the moor and peat grounds) and the coal mines needed to be reinforced by wooden studs. All the wood that was left in our country was used for piling, window frames, wooden floors and mine studs. What felt short was imported from Scandinavia and the Baltics. On the other hand we had a lot of rivers bringing free clay, so brick was used for foundations and house facades more and more. And after concrete was invented, floors and foundations were made of (reinforced) concrete. With pvc and aluminium window frames, the wood is fading out of new houses. Sometimes the inner wall of the cavity walls are a prefabricated timber frame with window frames and all. The outer wall (facade) is still in brick. So the row houses (the most common form of housing in our country) are, what we call wind and water proof. Which means the finishing works (inner walls, door frames, stucco, tiling, installations, painting) inside are done in climatized conditions. The pitched roof construction is still in wood with ceramic or concrete roof tiles. To make the roof storm resistant, the roof tiles can be screwed (more expensive) instead of loosely laid.

[@ehmzed]

I live in Italy and I've always seen wooden houses in American home-building TV shows and never questioned them, until just a few days ago when I saw a comment on the internet about houses being made of wood, and I was like "wait a damn minute, your houses are made of wood?? Mine sure isn't?? Nor are any houses around me". The only wooden houses I see are the ones in mountainous regions. Edit: I'm stupid, where I live most roofs actually have wooden beams lol. But yeah the rest is made of bricks

[@eliasgamper3313]

In the north of Italy there are many houses built out of wood.

[@lillm6874]

There’s nothing wrong with houses built of wood, it’s more the way they’re built 😊 In Norway most houses are built of wood, and they are much more steady than American homes 👍 You can buy wood houses/log houses from the 17 - 18th century that are better than houses built today😊

[@fabiosoares7660]

Here in Portugal (Southern Europe) is very rare to find wood houses and stone houses you will just find them in rural areas or in countryside. Also When I was studying, my English teachers all said the same thing, that American houses are made of wood because of earthquakes, wood is a lighter material compared to brick and stone, so the chance for people to survive to the earthquake is bigger. Here in Portugal, about 5 years ago, prefabricated houses started to be made, but in my point of view and in the point of view of many people, prefabricated houses are more expensive than buying land and building your own house made of brick.

[@ajc5479]

@@lillm6874 Here in Ireland we have masonry built houses that are crumbling after a few years. Yes it is certainly how they are built. If you go cheap and cut corners, expect bad results.

[@ehmzed]

@@eliasgamper3313 I know, I always see them in South Tyrol, they're so pretty, but I assumed it had more to do with being in the mountains where there's an abundance of wood. Also, I'm stupid, because come to think of it, where I live most roofs actually have wooden beams lol

[@JamesCrichton-m1g]

There are tectonic plates throughout southern Europe. Earthquakes are relatively common although most, not all are at a depth that causes little damage. I live on one of the Spanish Canary Islands (off the coast of west Africa) where between 400-500 earthquakes are registered yearly. I suppose you could call the sea quakes as most are between the islands. In 2021 there was a volcanic eruption on the islands of La Palma. The most active volcano in Italy is Etna

[@lucathenovak]

Dude tree houses in Europe are twice as strong as your house. My father with my grandfather made a tree house for us children and around 10 years down the road when we got older and left he decided to keep it because it was very sturdy with a good size so he transformed it into a smaller regular house with some minimal modifications. BTW there are some crazy storms in the mountain village where they are and that little house never had a problem in about 7-8 years after the transformation.

[@almanoor-bakker5964]

Places like Scandinavia have lots of wood built houses too... They are sturdy built and can be 100s of years old.

[@StevenQ74]

But Scandinavia has no earthquakes and hurricanes

[@theoteddy9665]

skandinavia use logs, USA use planks.. totaly different houses

[@erik....]

@@theoteddy9665 no, we use regular sawn timber, say 220x45 maybe for framing the outer walls, and 70x45 for interior walls. But usually a thicker layer of plywood/OSB and plasterboard on the inside than I've seen used in the US. That makes all the difference for sound transmission and fire resistance.

[@thetoyodacar2264]

We use wood too but we also do not have tornadoes to worry about lol

[@AudunWangen]

​@@StevenQ74 We have a harsh climate, though. Heavy rain and moist, hot summers, winters with snow, ice and cold, and on the coast, strong winds. Most countries don't have to account for a 60-70°C temperature difference when building houses, but we do. We have to build in a way that makes it possible for materials to expand and contract, and that's also a reason why brick and mortar with any significant amount of humidity in it is usually not the best option. Dry, impregnated wood works better, and some old cabins with wood impregnated with tar last for hundreds of years as long as it has a working roof.

[@BlackAcePlays]

My aunts farmhouse here in Austria is ~300 years old, made of wood, except for the basement which has a 4ft natural stone wall, and still is mostly original. They only replaced the windows with energy saving ones and renewed the sealant between the gaps of the woodwork. I am curious how the US cardboard houses look after that time. 😅

[@tapiredanslombre9588]

In France, we have more sort of steamrollers than tornadoes( as in 1999 for the most violent) , although since the beginning of the 2000s the number of tornadoes has been increasing in frequency and strength little by little, for the moment it is still easily manageable nothing comparable with the U.S.A., or japan when it comes to building more in stone than in wood, it was in the Middle Ages and still is, for fire safety issues among others and because stones are more resistant to projectiles launched from catapults and other siege weapons including incendiary projectiles, but also that the wood was used to make frames, boats and siege weapons, summing up greatly

[@kowalskastudio]

In Poland we have lots of woods, it's almost 30% (29,6 in 2021) of the country, and we export wood a lot. However, houses are a mixture of wood, brick and concrete, to make them last as long as they can and be persistent to nature in all forms. Wooden is mostly roof construction, and walls and fundaments are made of bricks, metal, concrete and plaster. More village houses or small town ones used to be made entirely of wood. We consider it regional now. But they were made with logs and half logs, it had to be very persistent as well and stays for decades. Village ones don't last this long, but this is still something like 50-60 years or so (more or less) before they get into complete ruin, depending on whether people live there or not, and if yes it can go way longer. For me, the tale of the houses always reminds me of one of the three little pigs. Regarding forests, it is always in the mind of a Polish person to take care of trees and forests, and when some politicians are trying to lower the safety margin protecting forests against overcutting, or there is a danger of building a road inside of the natural habitat there is always very loud resistance. We care even for single trees, especially when they are very old, we call them the monuments of nature. So this is not a case of getting rid of all the trees we used to have :). It's just stupid to cut down this many trees when you can use literal clay lying in the ground. It's also a difference in the scale of countries' sizes. We think in a smaller scale in Europe, less ground per country to maintain, so you mind it more. Although, unfortunately, some regulations are threatening forests, woods have to be protected against human greed.

[@huldradraco]

Most of the houses in Norway are made of wood. They're sturdy and built to last, many are hundreds of years old

[@GoranXII]

New Zealand uses a similar method of construction to the USA, but there's some solid reasons behind it. For one, earthquakes are a thing down here, and anyone who thinks building in stone is a good idea would be welcome to look at what happened to the Christchurch Cathedral back in 2011. I'm writing this, sitting in a brick-and-tile, wooden-framed home which my parents brought from new, going on 50 years ago.

[@helgewitt2837]

as they say, wood is NOT necessarily a bad construction method. I am carpenter and civil engineer. The use of wood does not make a house flimsy. I live in a combination of both methods. The inner load carrying structure of my house is wood framing as well. Only the outer shell is made of bricks to withstand the influence of water (rain) and wind much better. BUT we use much thicker inner frame walls with bigger sections and with much more insulation. My house e.g. has 260mm insulation in the walls and even 300mm in the roof. The windows are made of Triple insulation glazing. yes, 3 glass panels with air inbetween. I can literally heat my home with some candles.😂 The outer walls are nearly 50cm thick overall. in comparison, many walls of american homes are about 10cm (4inch) in thickness and very often only single glazing is used. THAT makes them flimsy in my opinion.

[@ElwoodEBlues]

The thin walls and single-pane windows are probably the cause of the high energy consumption of American homes. To my knowledge, an American home uses about 11,000 kilowatt hours yearly, while German single-family houses uses between 4 and 5,000. One reason it's probably the intense use of air conditioning which would be much more effective if the houses were insulated better.

[@xristoskoumpourlis1614]

@@ElwoodEBlues yeahh, the difference good insulation does is huuuuge

[@Dukenukem]

you need geological features to make a tornado, thats why the region is called tornado "walley". Same goes for earthquakes, you need tectonic plate interaction. We do have very limited earthquakes as the plate itself is pretty large and the most violent earthquakes are on the southers edge (greece, turkey, ect...). Tornadoes are starting to appear due to more temperature swings, with more energy the wind does not need so specific features to form.

[@xristoskoumpourlis1614]

i have seen mini tornadoes in greece but it was away of land at sea and very small ones

[@haravassiloglou5679]

Turkey is not in Europe, try Italy. next time

[@Sway22]

@@haravassiloglou5679 it is tho.

[@SideWalkAstronomyNetherlands]

American houses are called termite food... and any Dutch winter storm would take down a plywood house.

[@korrigan6698]

Hello, I live in a region in France known for its half-timbered houses. There are still many, especially in the city where I live. But entire neighborhoods have been replaced over the centuries by stone or brick houses, and the reason is quite simple: the fires that reduced entire neighborhoods to ashes in a very short time and with many victims. Today the town center still existing in half-timbering is very closely monitored and the teams and especially the means of the firefighters are always ready...

[@matteopascoli]

Toulouse?

[@korrigan6698]

@@matteopascoli Rouen

[@chrissampson6861]

One factor not covered is selection effect: The thousand year old buildings all over Europe are those buildings built to last a thousand years - whatever the material stone, brick, timber and plaster infill, cobb/adobe - there might have been 10 flimsy wood houses on that plot before but once someone build a really solid house, it's there for centuries. Walk through the main streets of somewhere like Winchester and it's a gallery of the best put together buildings from about the last 1200 years and when we see a 200 year old stone building next to a 400 year old timber and plaster one we don't stop to ask what happened to whatever was there before the 200 year old one - assumedly something was because that's prime land in the middle of of a prosperous town.

[@peterjackson4763]

The oldest building near me (not counting the ruins of the castle) was probably not built to last a thousand years. It was a cruick built longhouse. Dozens of such houses from before 1600 survive. The one near me is from before 1300. It was occupied and maintained until the 1950s, having been extended in the 17th century.

[@chrissampson6861]

​Clearly it was built to last 700 years (even if not intentionally) because it did. I'm not under any delusion that whoever built the cob (clay, dung, straw) house down the road from where I grew up planned for it to last 500 years, but due to luck and the fact they did a good job, it has. The selection effect still applies you see the dozens of surviving longhouses, but not all the ones that didn't.

[@Ollerecovery]

Living in Sweden, we do build wood framed houses with drywall, but it is normal to repaint it whenever small cracks in the paint are about to show up. this way the water won't destroy the houses, there are like nothing but trees over here. And Insulation in my house is 50 cm (1 inch is 2.54 cm) houses last for over 100 years, it is more that one don't like the looks of the old house that make people tear it down. Oh yea, geothermal heatpumps has been used here for about 45 years, just about everyone has been using them for the last 30 years. Good sales people is the reason i bet.

[@vevet4463]

I live in Portugal, here about all the houses are made out of brick, stone or cement. Only in the last decades pre fabricatdd wood houses have appeared . I can say that even when we had a forest fire that burned out some village houses, the walls remained standing. Here we listened to the story of the 3 little pigs😅😅. Joking aside Portugal is a country that has a lot of stone and even today people buy houses oved a 100 yrs old and just restore the inside.

[@XofHope]

Yep! My parents remodeled my grandparents' house some 20 years ago, from the outside it looks like a modern house. Only the walls were left standing, 80 cm thick walls, like those of our castles, everything inside was modernized. I'm sure it'll still be here long after I'm gone.

[@missharry5727]

I grew up in one of a row of Victorian weavers' cottages, built in the local stone of West Yorkshire. They were built around 1840 and are still perfectly habitable.

[@quelithe]

In my country (Slovakia) wooden houses were part of folk history and it´s comming back in modern design. It´s just made very good and you can´t just punch hole into a wall... Btw earthquakes are very common in Italy for example.

[@solaccursio]

I like to watch "Love it or list it" on Tv, they renovate homes in a couple of weeks and it's always funny to my european eyes to see internal walls made of wood laths, outer walls made of wood... they seem like playhouses to me, and the renovation looks quicker and cheaper... but when I hear "Oh this house is oooooold, it was built in the sixties!!" I fall out of my chair... here in Italy I don't think I ever heard "old" about a house built less than a century ago.

[@Gontrz]

My family farm manor was built in 1738 and still standing strong 💪

[@RustyDust101]

It's always, for many centuries at least, the case that people tended to use the most abundant building material of their local area. In the Alps, granite, slate, limestone were common, topped off with roofs supported by wooden beams, but then again covered in shingles of the appropriate material. The further north you go in Germany fired red brick becomes much more predominant as clay was abundant. Roofing was either red roof tiles, or in some areas straw or other grasses or reeds. For all of the relatively heavy weight atop the roofs you needed some sturdy walls. With forests often being directly owned by some aristocrats or kings you simply couldn't go logging. The territory of Europe was already owned by people of the same military and technology level not so easily displaced as native Americans. So just shoving out some indigenous people to grab their resources wasn't as easy as in North America. So you were forced to build with what you had on hand in abundance.

[@robinsebelova7103]

4:12 There are both earthquakes and tornadoes occurring in Europe. Earthquakes: Most of Europe's massive is really old and thus stable. Only unstable areas are where the African tectonic plate hits the Euroasian one. So the earthquakes are mostly concentrated to the southern Europe (Italy, Greece, Spain) and Alps massive, which is still growing. Earthquakes are also often in volcanic and undermined areas. However most of them are mild, about 2-5 magnitude on logarithmic Richter scale. Some two years back there was earthquake in the middle of Italy with strength near the magnitude 7. Tornadoes: There are some in Europe too. Most whirlwinds don't reach the surface, some do, become tornadoes and create damage. Most tornadoes are relatively mild, but one 2 almost years ago, damaged several villages in the south Moravia region. That tornado was later classified as F4. Some old housed did not survive that, other got structural damage and had to be teared down. But, most houses survived, though often with torn-off roof, that had to be replaced. Basically, brick and concrete building can withstand a lot more pressure and damage. And don't forget, Europe has a lot of wood buildings too, but our wood buildings are mostly log houses, not made of plywood.

[@M4V3RiCkU235]

8.2 Richter - 1802 Romania. 7.4 1940, 7.2 1977 - many buildings collapsed then. Earthquakes like in Italy or Greece are just a walk in the park for us.

[@TwospotzArtAndCraft]

My house has a bricked /concrete base/first floor basement section and then it is wooden framed and also covered on the outside with wood on the upper half. Our roof is a metal roof and works really good. It was built in 1975 and has kept up really well.

[@miniveedub]

Yes, what the interior walls are made from really makes a difference. I spent most of my life in Sydney on Australia’s east coast where the typical modern house has wood or steel framing with brick exterior walls and plasterboard interior walls. Steel framing has been gradually replacing wood framing over the last few decades. The plasterboard interior walls have very little soundproofing effect. When I moved to the west coast I found Perth homes were more likely to be brick walls for both exterior and interior with just the roof joists made of timber or steel. Not only were those houses cooler in summer but quieter inside, noise didn’t travel from one room to another in the same way as in plasterboard walled houses. The difference was quite noticeable.

[@mademoiselledusfonctionell1609]

Using wooden framing and filling the hollow with insulation will do the trick. The insulation being the most important bit.

[@TimberwolfC14]

My wife and I was invited to a lecture at one of the collages in Oxford UK. After the lectures we met up with one of the guest speakers and her husband and we happened to mention we were staying in a two hundred year old hotel, they smiled at that and said their home was built in the year Queen Elizabeth came the throne as we were talking about older houses we were getting some weird looks from the lecturers husband until he realized the problem and he had to clarify they were talking about Queen Elizabeth the First who ruled from 1558 and not Queen Elizabeth Two. It's amazing how those in UK, Europe still use these as living spaces, living in history you might say.

[@12leverkusen]

4:16 You don't hear anything about earthquakes in Europe because the USA is a country that doesn't care what happens outside of it. 2016 Italy, earthquake measuring 6.5 on the richter scale with more than 100 deaths. February 6 of 2023 Turkey and Syria, 7.8 earthquake with 55,190 dead and 129,490 injured

[@gemoftheocean]

That was just Ryan, who is poorly educated or doesn't pay attention to the news. I heard about all those earthquakes you mentioned.

[@nellitheretrogamer8666]

This is so funny, because when I was in the US 30 years ago, one thing that I noticed was that the front doors of houses always seemed terribly flimsy to me. People there are terribly afraid of burglars and intruders and then their doors are so flimsy that anyone can just kick them in. That's also because the doors there always seem to open inwards. Here in Finland, I don't think you can kick a door in from the outside because 1) it is so sturdy that you'll probably just break your foot trying, and 2) front doors always open outward so that if someone kicks it from outside, they are just kicking it against the doorframe. (Doors open outward for fire safety reasons; in case of fire, people need to be able to get out easily and it is easiest when doors open outwards. If the fire department needs to come in through the door, they have tools for it.) As for wood being a flimsy building material, I completely disagree with that. Here in Finland 70% of this country is covered by wood so that it is used for building a lot, both historically and nowadays. Builders have developed building methods so that the fire safety of new wooden buildings is comparable to other materials. Also, the heat insulation is just as good as in other houses. However, it is true that buildings that are 150+ years old tend to be brick or stone. Older wooden buildings that have survived to this day are usually churches and other places that have been specifically protected. As for earthquakes and tornadoes and other natural catastrophes, we don't have any. There's some flooding in coastal areas but the worst that I ever heard of is that someone got a foot of water in their house and their insurance company refused to cover it. There are also storms that cause some material damage (especially to forest owners, if a large swathe of trees gets felled by a storm) but we don't have the sort of natural catastrophes that kill people.

[@nellitheretrogamer8666]

...and before anyone starts nitpicking: *technically* we do have earthquakes here, the institute of seismology measures hundreds of them every year. But since most of them measure less than 2 on the Richter scale, it's not something that people would even notice. So earthquakes here are of interest to only... um... the people at the institute of seismology, I guess. It may be interesting from an academic point of view, but not in any practical sense.

[@ti0039a340]

​@@nellitheretrogamer8666 i agree to the doors in the US being thin, thin as paper in my opinion. as my grandpa once said "American things are cheap" my door is 3" thick / 78mm with steel reinforced core and from the hinges i have bolts going thru the inside of the door to prevent break ins and the door frame is 6" thick with 5" large screws and steel core

[@davis.fourohfour]

It's my opinion that American doors are built to enable police to kick them in. Sadly.

[@blanestevens3229]

Wood was used to build fleets of ships in the 1500/1600 centuries which allowed the European nations to rule the world. Hense no forest's left to build house's out of wood.

[@romanmir01]

I am 46, moved 23 times, this includes moving 5 times between countries and 3 times between continents so far. I travel a bit, last year visited 14 countries including Ukraine. The most impressive buildings that I have seen are in Austria, Vienna and in Hungary, Budapest but also in Manhattan)

[@schneejaeger]

My grandma's house is a 150 year's old and it has outer walls a meter or 3,33 foot thick and it's made of massif granit bricks. It's inner walls are 1 fott thick. That could take a schell from a tank.

[@musicandbooklover-p2o]

My grandparents house was wooden framed with wooden lathes but instead of dry wall on the inside it was plaster and the outside was largely mud built up against the wooden frames. Lots of houses like this still survive and can be seen around, not only in Britain but also in Europe. Oh, and my grandparents house was built in the 1300s and is still standing and inhabited today.

[@JarlGrimmToys]

In the UK 40% of houses were built before WWII. My current house started construction in the 1930’s. But my past 3 houses were all built in the 1800’s. In our climate the type of houses in the US would deteriorate quickly. Our brick houses don’t require much maintenance, they just need to be kept warm. So damp doesn’t set in with cold damp winters, followed by humid summers. Also salt in the atmosphere can travel 60 miles inland from the sea, and there’s nowhere in the UK that’s more that 70 miles from the sea. That can affect things as well. Wooden garden sheds don’t last long. Without regular maintenance, insulation, or heating for that reason.

[@DivinePonies]

Moved 7 times? Feels like in Europe many people move once in life and that's it (if we don't count temporary moving for college). Sometimes a fresh family would stay at parent's home and build on top of it (though this seems to be changing as nowadays people prefer to build their own).

[@BomberFletch31]

I've lived in the same house for 33 years. The house is 48 years old, with a double brick construction (i.e., a brick outer wall, and a brick inner wall, as well as brick internal walls). I'm actually quite surprised at how uncommon it is to have houses made from brick or stone. Double brick is rarer still.

[@Aloh-od3ef]

Wood and stone was the traditional material used for construction in the UK. However the British chopped so many of there trees to build all of the wooden ships for the navy. The UK almost ran out of trees to make wood. The British had to start using bricks in the early 17th century. To build homes and other buildings 😊

[@Yandarval]

We did. HMS Victory used 6000 trees to construct. Some of the wars and battles in the Baltic. They was about securing access to good mast timber.

[@attilahalasz835]

We also have some earthquakes here in Europe, they are just much lighter (most of the time) and not so frequent (at least where I live). As for the tornadoes, the US is an ideal place for tornadoes to form geographically since the middle of the continent is a huge and pretty open area where the equatorial and the cold, dry air from north meet in the Tornado Alley.

[@fgh-wy9sg]

I live 8n west Germany and we have tornados yearly, usually not too bad, but every 3 to 7 years they rip forests appart and the cities issues warnings that roof tiles might be falling off. That storm was the same strength that ripped apart whole neighborhoods in the US the year prior. And from research, I can say that our inner walls are way thicker than the typical outer walls in us houses

[@Janski77]

There are no earthquakes in Europe because they only happen on the border of tectonic plates. The nearest other plates are in locations where less/no people live: The altlantic, the meditaranian sea, eastern Russia and the middle east.

[@kikoempis]

Well.... South Europe has earthquakes. Let's remember the great Lisbon eartquake of 1755. Thought to be around a 9 on the Richers scale. One of biggest ever. There are a lot of very small tremors, we can't feel everyday, and every now and then we can feel a minor one. As long as they keep happeining regularly and being weak, that's all right!

[@DSP16569]

Italy has a lot of earth quakes, Turkey has had a big one a few months ago (but in the asian part of turkey at the syrian border). The last big one in Istanbul (half in Europe, haf in Asia) isn't so long ago. The Rhine valley (Switzerland, France , Germany, The Nederlands) is a tectonic active fault line, The vulcanic Eifel is still "active" but sleeping - but creates sometimes little earthquakes. The Alps are created and are still under "construction" by the African plate crushing into Europe.

[@jlfilip]

Europe have longer history then USA, meaning more war/fire/industry/wood-coal and such we were running out of wood so we started building from sturdier materials and without wood. Also today its harder burn up the building since its modern time and Europe in past had hard time with that and we out of wood today to use on such massive scale.

[@seanmc1351]

not really correct, we in the UK have used brick or stone for a 1000 years, it used to be limestone in some areas, as the modern era progressed, bricks were introduced as a modern way to build, isay mondern, but that goes back over 150 years. the house im in is 100 years plus, brick, in great condition, has had very little done, apart from a new roof, which was once in 100 years

[@DenUitvreter]

@@seanmc1351 Bricks were shipped in from Bruges for ages, because the British didn't know how to bake them. Bricks were high tech in Middle Ages.

[@clelia7820]

@@DenUitvreter Ehm... A brand new technique, invented by the Sumerians and perfected at its best by the Romans.

[@TheJHA67]

In Norway we also use wood to build houses.. But 4x2 is only used in internal walls.. 2x6 plus 2x4 is used in external walls, this is done so that there will not be a bridge for cold or heat to penetrate the wall. .and all walls are insulated.. internal walls and external walls with windproofing in external walls.. 30 cm (11 13/16 in) with external panel and internal cladding, such external walls are common today. same with the roofs which are thickly insulated. So the kid can almost play football on the 2nd floor without being heard down to the 1st floor :)

[@trevorcook4439]

Bricks provide insulation. I couldn’t imagine how hot my house would be here in Western Australia if made with small bits of wood and paper! I guess we’d just pay more to the government in electricity for aircon.

[@eucitizen78]

We cut down the trees for ships to discover the world, including America. 😆😉🙃

[@tresenie]

Kinda, but the Romans used most of it for heating villas.

[@salala4412]

One more thing: imagine the European history with wooden houses. After so many wars and revolutions, nothing would have been left of Europe by now.

[@HeyThreshold]

Well a lot was lost because houses were in fact made of wood and even stone houses are not completely immune to fire. The Great Fire of London happened in 1666 not thousands of years ago.

[@styrelsefksu4463]

Here in northern sweden most older houses are made from timber logs and in the 1800s it became popular to paint them red There are a couple of reasons for this The red paint (Falu Röd färg) was a biproduct from the copper mining industy and wealthy farmers wanted their timber houses to resemble mamsions made out of bricks and it was a way to preserve the timber it spread and the red paint with white corners and white window frame became the norm more modern and sometimes a room that was not timbered was added on to the house people also started to put a layer of planks on the outside of the timber to make the houses look the same after they added the room The house I grew up in was bought by my grandfather in the 1950s. The house had two original rooms from the 1850s those where the kitchen and a bedroom chaimber that was the original timber part the chaimber also had a round brick fire place owen thing that would heat up the house really well all night and would still be warm in the morning (kakelugn in swedish) Later on the living room was added and then the hallway/bathroom/staircase was added as well the upper floors roof was raised and made into an apartment in the late 1960s early 1970s while my grandfather lived downstairs me my sister and our parents lived upstairs my parents took over the house when my grandfather passed away in 1977 and the apartment was removed as we did not need an extra kitchen anymore the kitchen and living room was renovated with new windows a new fireplace was built by my uncle to replace the old one but it had the same chimney as the Kakelugn in the chamber the upstairs living room became my older sisters room and the old kitchen became my room and when I moved it became an office/ guestroom one of the other upstairs rooms became a washroom with washing machines and dryer the house was sold in 2015 to a new owner a house can be a good investment but it requires time money and knowledge to keep it in good condition, older generations had much more knowledge about how to build and do things then we have today if my father wanted to build or renovate something he went out to the outhouse and figured it out by himself the same with my uncle who built the firewall he took apart an old timber house by himself, moved the frame and then rebuild it from scratch to make it into a summer house no KZbin and no Google only common sense knowledge passed down from generation to generation

[@Brusselpicker]

My friend from here in the UK made a fortune in the US by building brick storm shelters for houses in the tornado zone. He couldn't understand why you would build what he termed "matchstick houses" in a tornado area. He was an experience builder and reckoned the building codes were bad, inspectors worse and very "financially flexible" and the timber used was usually of the cheapest variety you could get.

[@tfell4782]

You're absolutely right how Europe would probably be using more wood if it hadn't already cut all its forests down. You can see this if you look at architecture from 1600's and backwards when a lot more woodland was abundant in Europe. Houses before 1600 tend to incorporate a lot of timber in their structure and we refer to them as "timber framed houses" and they generally make up a huge component of areas of historical districts in towns, villages and cities. These houses are incredibly popular among tourists and often a large part of what makes an historical area in North-Western Europe be seen as "quaint" or "charming". But yeah then we um, ran out of wood. In comes brick. But you can still see examples of timber framed housing in Britain, France, Germany and some limited areas of Denmark and Poland. In the UK the most concentrated areas to see them are places that got rich and thrived from wool trade in the medieval times like Kent, Essex, Sussex, East Anglia and Shropshire. I've edited this so many times! But just to add. The reason the timber framing has lasted so many centuries in Europe is likely due to the fact that its from Penduculate Oak which is very slow growing and generally rock solid.

[@cokeweasel1064]

The whole point of criticizing Americans about their wood houses, is to show you how dumb you are for building like this in a country with multiple natural disasters every year. Are Americans too stupid to understand that hurricanes and tornadoes happen every year, and maybe they should build differently to prevent it from happening again? You guys broadcast your misery everytime it happens, no one feels sorry for you guys because you do fuckall to protect yourselves.

[@Kontrabass66]

I (from Germany) lived a short time outside Los Angeles in a brand new house and I was really shocked about the quality. Strange windows (up and down, what a bad idea..), strange loo, thin walls.. it looked and felt like a Barbie house. We have a trend to built our houses here in Germany out of wood but they are well constructed and built like a tank.. I never had this feeling living in that LA house.

[@IAM-ni6hq]

Weeeeelll.... I live in Sweden (north Europe) and in a wooden house, the frame work is of wood and walls, and its very comon to build whit wood, even the Old town in Stockholm that was build from year 1400 to 1600 (the oldest building is a churh built in 1306) some have framework of wood and brick. In the town I live in the oldest house is from the 1700 and made out of loggs, and most of the old houses built in the late 1800 ant early 1900 are made of wood, and we have very cold vinters around -10c - -20c and in summer between 20c - 30c(up north its even colder). I lived in Us when I was a teenager and I was amazed how thin the walls where and it felt like every thing was made of paper. We get snow and walls have to be sturdier to withstand the weight of the snow.

[@redwater3338]

Wood can be great if you build it to last. It's a question of building it to be able to maintain it, and a question of climate. In Scandinavia we have a lot of wood housing that keep well in our climate. As for fire risk you can make it quite fire safe. Thin wood burn fast, thick wood get a layer of charcoal that insulate it an lets it keep the structural integrity for a long time. Plasterboard and such keep fire from spreading trough walls.

[@SIG442]

Japan is actually innovating in Earthquake technologies to stop houses and big buildings from collapsing. Something else completely ignored is that west-European houses are insanely engineered. The windows, doors, proper isolation and much more. Yes, it would be smaller then a American house, but you won't hear the neighbors so quickly and you should stay a lot warmer in winter and cooler in summer. Also it's way saver vs anyone that tries to get in without the key. And to be fair, wood rots real fast if you don't treat it properly or raise it from the ground so water doesn't rot the bottom of your house so easily.

[@TerryD15]

We did use wood in Europe, for many years, but only oak or elm which are not badly affected by boring insects like woodworm or death watch beetle. The timber would only e used for the framing and the panels would be then in filled with more solid materials such as 'wattle and daub' and later brick. As it was realised that brick and stone gave better insulation, needed less maintenance than that form of building, brick and stone construction became the norm. By the way although it takes longer to build and is more expensive initially, these buildings last for many generations, we do have occasional earthquakes there have been serious ones in Italy and there was a very serious one in Turkey recently, but although we have them they are generally quite mild in the UK. We don't get many tornadoes, but we do have very strong winds, in fact some years ago a world record was set in Scotland with a 192 mph wind, and the one that probably beat it, blew the recording equipment away and destroyed it. American wooden houses would simply be blown away.

[@danielefabbro822]

Here in Italy we have some houses that was made anew something like 50 years ago. Right now they are experiencing flooding, earthquakes, fires, hailstorms and a certain serious thermal shock from summer to winter. Yet, the houses are still there, entire cities are still there. The problem per se was kinda old, Romans addressed it firstly, then all the successor states and nations here do it the same, in their own fashion and accordingly to their chances. Building in wood the houses and public buildings would have resulted always in a lost of the building and probably also some victims meanwhile the process. So in order to avoid that, we started to build houses firstly in rocks, then in bricks and ultimately in concrete. It's the same for every country that experience such phoenomenons. Japan for example had wood-made houses with paper walls up to ww2, but after the napalm bombing occurred during the war, Japanese started thinking that their homes needed to be different in order to survive longer. They now build stuff in solid concrete. For a while their civil engineering was almost the best in the world, surpassed only by that of the Germans. Today they still have great engineering capabilities, but their focus is elsewhere.

[@ellisjakewhite]

Also, we do save more money using brick. Brick provides more insulation in winter keeping the heat inside our homes so we use less heating and in summer we don't use air conditioning.

[@GreyMinerva]

We sacrificed a LOT of forests to build SHIPS, to be honest. ;) So a number of countries ran out of wood suitable for housing so they turned to bricks of various types. It also matters how humid/moist, windy, hot/cold your environment is. Norway primarily builds wood houses (single or duplex, apartment buildings are primarily made of bricks). We have 1000 year old wood churches still standing.

[@wendykelly8551]

My wife text me ... I thought I blocked her 😮😮😮 😂😂😂😂😂

[@seanmc1351]

he on the couch tonight, hope his wood house is warm lol

[@misssissivoss]

Was looking for this comment. He might become on of the exes who'll say "Why did she leave, everything was fine. She's crazy."

[@TomJonesGearGuy]

They keep saying balloon framing but most wood framing is platform framing, when done correctly many of these wood homes ride out hurricanes. What they also forget to talk about is how architectural style has changed and to update a home to make it fit into how people use a home today, then tearing it down starts making sense. Home built 1900, four bedrooms and one bathroom how many people want that today.

[@globalist1990]

In Europe you don't cut trees from protected areas, but there are still trees grown for industry.

[@audechermette7828]

I grew up in France in a farm house that was built over a 100 years ago, and my current house is an old miner's house built in the early 1900's. All thick stone, bricks and wood. Some area of the houses the walls are so thick that there is no phone reception. I am sometimes scared of roof or house damages when there is 60 mph winds so I do not want to imagine how I'd feel in the US

[@Fr4nkju5tFr4nk]

There are earthquakes in Europe, tornados, too. Also heavy earthquakes with devastating effects that destroy cities and kill lots of people. Especially in Italy. It all depends on where on the tectonic plates you live ;) with earthquakes.

[@FloatingWhales]

I have been living in Denmark and Finland, in multiple apartments and row houses, and I recently moved to a different town to study, it was the first time I came across drywall as a divider to the bedroom. As hilarious as I found this, it also gives me a ton of stress, it is so flimsy that I am afraid that I'll break it by accident...

[@Cunning.Stunt7]

4:10 England, actually had a tornado that hit Manchester a few weeks ago... first tornado i can recollect ever in my 42 years... Also approximately 20 years ago we had an earthquake here in southwest England... I slept through it but wondered why my bed was a foot away from the wall and my dressing table covering half of my bedroom doorway, when I woke... wasn't until I got to work that morning, I was told about the earthquake we had in the ea

[@chestbuster1987]

I live in an apartment building made of bricks and I can still hear the neighbors talking, running their taps, their kids running around etc. I think I'd go insane in a house made of thin wooden walls.

[@GnosticAtheist]

We dont have earthquakes worth a damn here in northern Europe, but down in Turkey they had a big one not long ago. Also, we dont have tornadoes. To cold climate or some such. That is also why our wood houses are much more solid than in warmer climates like much of the US; the cold have driven a focus on thicc power.

[@derpapito1391]

I live in a half timbered house that was built in 1875. In Limburg, the town about 5 miles away from where I live, the oldest house dates back to 1289

[@bbdest3082]

What this video doesn't mention is that balloon framing isn't really used that much any more. Most buildings are platform framed.