For me, the best part of having a separate washer and dryer is that once you transfer the washed clothes to the dryer you can start another load of wash while the first loads dries. So its faster to finish the laundry.
Yup. The separate washer and dryer cycles aren't just faster. I've used combo units while on vacation in rentals and the washing cycle takes a wee bit longer, but the dryer is where you see the biggest difference. You can dry a load of laundry in half the time. The interior of the combos are also considerably smaller, so you can only fit about half of the clothing, bedding etc. in each load. Overall, I much prefer having two separate units. It's well worth having to switch out my laundry.
I have 2 dryers and 1 washing machine because the wash always finishes before the first load has dried. I've also got 2 young kids that produce an ungodly amount of dirty clothes.
As far as outlets go, we teach babies not to touch outlets as soon as they can crawl. Some do test the rule, but the feeling of the shock deters them from doing it again. We also have covers for the outlets while we are teaching the kids.
You need to take the fact that Lawrence left the U.K. over 15 years ago and a lot of the new buildings now have single taps for water there. The washer and dryer in the United States are separate machines but they do a much better job of washing and drying your clothes. The combined machines use less space but they don't remove as much water so it takes much longer to dry your clothes.
@@jaycooper2812we actually do have washing machine/ dyer combination unit , you can buy in the US, no one buys them as they are very small and would take too long to do laundry.
If you are judging the house sizes by the movies, most people don’t live in houses like that. I grew up in a very small ranch house with very small bedrooms, a medium sized living room, and a small kitchen. No family room, one bathroom, no dining room. We weren’t poor, but we’re definitely working class.
yep same hear. my house i grew up in in Nashville, was built in 1949. three bedrooms but smallish-except the "front bedroom facing the street- that was the largest, and my sister slept in there, my mom and dad shared a hide a way bed in the living room, and me and my brother had our own room. small bathroom, living room and kitchen. probably maybe 1000 square feet maybe total. although, people were smaller{?} back then, & the closets were small too. it was fine to grow up in!!! plenty of yard front and back, on a end of the street lot. good times!!
I was already grateful for my home but your videos about UK housing really really reinforces my thankfulness. My husband & I live in the country on 1.5 acres of land with a 4bdrm 2 bath house kitchen living room dining room and built in garage, which is average size. About 2000 sq foot. We have city water but also our own water well, 2 pecan trees, a chicken house and we're about to build a green house. The best part is that it's paid for already. We bought it about 13 years ago when the housing market had taken a downswing. We paid a whooping 81K for the house AND the land and it's beautiful!
There are socket covers to prevent children from "poking" fingers or objects in the holes. Parents typically childproof their homes before babies are born, so the children are protected.
For most new construction, Tamper Resistant outlets are now required. They have little internal shutters that prevent a metal object from being pushed inside.
Ranch houses are absolutely amazing! They’re spread out and you have plenty of privacy. You can have your own space and see your family at your own discretion.
Yup, when I bought mine I went for a midcentury ranch. Solid construction, classic "atomic age" style and because they sprawl in the center, if you have company over for a party or whatever you have room for days. I had walls taken out so the center of mine is a 1,000 square foot flex space for entertaining with the bedrooms, a den and bathrooms on the periphery. I host about 20 or so parties/dinners/bbqs at my house a year though. So I need it.
His stats are a bit off. They include apartments and condos. A single family detached home averages over 2500 sqft. I HATE garbage disposals. They can smell, tear up things that accidentally fall in and block your pipes after a while. I can't imagine living in a home without closets. All of our bedroom closets except 1 are at least 100sqft. That is not included in the size of the house. Americans love our storage. I do have an electric kettle. I have tea at night before bed. My kids use them for ramen and hot chocolate. The teapots on the stove are usually decorative.
@@PhxVanguard While in the Midwest many low middle class ranch homes with one garage and three bedrooms with one bathroom run around 1000 to 1200 square feet built more than 50 years ago. Recently built homes are significantly larger...
To be clear about water faucets: Many, many homes have a faucet with two separate handles for hot and cold, but one tap. There are other, also many, homes with faucets that have one handle for hot and cold, which turns left and right to get the temperature you want. We've pretty much done away with two handles/two taps, but you will occasionally see it, particularly in restoration homes which try to stay true to the era the home was built in.
The biggest difference in housing vocabulary that i keep hearing from europeans is the word garden. We use the word yard to refer to the external portion of our property. A garden is an intentional area of plants, such as a vegetable or flower garden. We don't typically play in a garden. We have public gardens in parks and zoos sometimes. A yard is where you go out in play, send the kids out to run, or place your pets to do their business.
If an American ever were to say he was moving house, he would mean that he is actually picking up the house and moving it to another spot. Companies here can pick up you house and move to almost anywhere for the right amount of money.
My parents did this in the late 60s. Sold the old farm house, and it was moved to the buyer's property, and our new ranch house was built at a lumber yard and moved to our place. Both houses had to travel about 50 miles.
Also with the prevalence of mobile and manufactured homes here, it's very common that people would think you were moving one of those if you used that terminology
@@NannerBrams a single county isn't representative of the country. If I used Newport County in Rhode Island as an example of the average American lifestyle it would give the impression that everyone lived in beach mansions. Less than 18 million Americans out of 340 million live in mobile homes.
Not sure if Laurence is aware of another particular style, but it is one that was VERY VERY prominent around the turn of the 20th century and that was the Craftsman/Arts and Crafts style. You will see a lot of that style element incorporated into newer houses these days
We have separate washers and dryers for 1 main reason... You wash a load, and put it in the dryer, then start the next load washing, while the first is drying, and so on, until all your laundry is done. It takes you twice as long to do your laundry. The single units are available here now, but not popular.
Strange that Laurence didn't show any US style Victorian houses. They're some of the most beautiful ones out there. To child proof electric sockets parents buy plastic plugs to insert into the sockets. Little kids aren't likely to pry them off
I know a ton of people, myself included, that prefer the electric kettle. First thing to remember in America is we have choices and tons of options here, so don’t think one choice is the only option 😜
was introduced to them when my wife moved in with me, I just like the fact I dont have to worry about leaving a burner on. Sound petty but it's been known to happen.
I have 2 electric kettles. The first electric kettle I had, my sister came over and melted it on the stove, because she'd never had one. I actually cried. But now I have 2, 1 modern one and mid century vintage one.
Just finally got the electric kettle (gift from my niece) and I love it. As an American, I like ice tea (Earl Grey or English Breakfast) and it makes so much easier.
Separate washers and dryers are good for a couple of reasons: one is the size; ours are huge. The other is, you can put one load in the dryer and start a new load while the dryer's going. Easy, peasy.
About 4 years ago, I bought my mother's house that she built custom in 1985. It's a modest 2 bedroom (2600sf) with partial ocean views. We don't turn on the AC because of the ocean breezes. But what she did with the setup was super cool. In the main part of the house, all rooms are open, with vaulted ceilings with skylights; the only walls are from the plant-filled glass atrium in the middle of the house. So you can see the family room, living room, dining room and kitchen all in the same place. She hand-picked all the saltillo tiles because she was looking for tiles with cat and chicken prints on them that happened in the drying process. I love this house because I see my mom's touches and quirkiness on every corner I turn. I was in high school when she built it and was able to give input on certain things.
Never! There's always at least one or two days a year in which the temperatures just soar above normal and people are wishing they had it! SF has that issue too sometimes.
You can't survive the summer without air conditioning in Texas. In fact many cities have laws forcing landlords to fix their air conditioning within a day or two with many rental properties... Far too many suffer heat stroke during the summer months without the air conditioning...
I live in Branson West MO and just purchased land outside Boloslavic where I am building second home. And it is odd to see the reactions of people there to air-conditioning and windows.... but I am greatly impressed with the craftsmanship, the woodworking skill and precision is phenomenal and tile and stone detail is flawless. American builders would do well to visit Poland and see what is possible.
Here is the difference with outlets. In the US almost all of our outlets are 110 volts. You'll feel it if you stick something in there but you'll be okay. The UK outlets are around double the voltage, think it's 220 or 240 volts. That can kill you so it's safer to have a switch on the outlet. Also, my house has a built in vacuum system. There are round spots on the baseboards all over the house. You plug your vacuum hose into them and turn on the big vacuum in the garage. You can sweep all your floors without having to drag or push around a big hoover. It's Florida so it makes it easy to get rid of the sand. All tile floors in most houses here because of all the sand.
At the time Laurence made this video I don't think he'd ever spent much time in the south. There are plenty of all brick houses in the South because the material needed to make bricks was available here. Birmingham Alabama was a big Center of brick-making for many decades and it was shipped all over the southeast. In the past few decades it's become more popular on middle-class housing to have a combination of brick and some kind of wood siding because brick is so expensive, but the majority of the nicer homes in my city, Nashville Tennessee, are all brick with maybe some slate or other stine added as decoration There's lots of limestone here, which makes it easier to get the material and less expensive because it doesn't have to be transported here from a distance. My mom always said she wanted to brick house because they were more safe during storms. I'm not sure if that holds up if you're talkin about a major tornado but it made her feel better. The downside of having so much limestone very close to the topsoil is that in order to build a basement you have to blow with dynamite all that limestone out from under your building site and that's very expensive so the only people that have basements in my area are those whose houses are built on a hill. My house sits on a very level lot, so no basement. But it is made completely of bricks. In New England or parts of the Midwest or areas that are highly forested you might see more houses made from wood products.
@@andimproud Yeah. With sufficient levels of creative idiocy, there are numerous ways to kill yourself with 110V; but they all involve somehow bypassing or compromising the electrical resistance that the skin normally provides. Whereas, 220V is enough to just overpower the resistance and burn right through the skin. 110V will give you an alarmingly unpleasant tingle right through the skin, mind you. It does not feel nice. But it is considerably less dangerous than 220V. (Of course the amount of current also very much matters, but the important difference between the systems on each side of the pond, in this context, is the voltage. The frequency is also different, but that difference is less important to the human body, though older electronics that didn't have switchmode power supplies used to care very deeply about it.)
My daughter, when she was about 3 years old, took a bobby pin, opened it up and stuck one of each of the ends in both of the sockets......needless to say she got zapped, and other than being stunned, she was totally fine! That kid of mine, I swear, I still to this day have no idea how she thought of doing that!
While wood houses are common in America, brick houses are fairly common in the state of Georgia. Georgia is well known and famous for the brilliant red bricks made there due to the plentiful clay deposits. Those red bricks have been used for a long time to make factories around the country as well, and were exceptionally paramount in helping the Industrial Revolution fair well in America. The bricks are not only a nice red color that never fades, they are also very strong and very easy to make. Just plop some clay in a mold and bake. As for boiling water, some could do it on the stove. Though most just use a microwave to heat up water. Some people have espresso machines that do that as well, but most still just use a microwave.
There's also log homes (yeah, wood but not wood planks), stucco, adobe, metal and cinderblock. Some use recycled materials like old tires, glass bottles or haybales. There's all sorts of material.
I have one washer dryer combo on my lower floor and we have the normal 2 separate units. What I’ve learned is you can wash and dry so much more laundry in the separate units! We have 6 kids, we are getting rid of the one unit and putting our extra set down stairs 😂
Yes, I'm a tea drinker, not coffee, and I've had an electric kettles for decades. They seem to not realize most Americans are NOT tea drinkers, so THAT is why electric kettles aren't common. But, what's really so hard about using a stove top kettle? My grandma had one and you just turn on the stove and heat up the water... which is what an electric kettle does. Or, I've seen them freak out about using a microwave to heat a cup of water- I can't remember who it was, but they thought that was not sanitary!!! So, the device that is made to heat food, is not sanitary when heating a cup of water??? I really can't understand some of these things, and wonder if Lawrence is just trying to be funny, or if he really believes this stuff, like our "wood houses" having gaps that allow the wind and insects to freely come in...
We live on 3 acres but we have a veggie garden, fruit trees, chickens, and pigs. We are called homesteaders, and our land size is quite small for what we're doing, but it works. I watch your channel because I love learning cultural differences, your slang included.
Houses here can be wood, brick, stone, or even adobe (mud brick) if you're in the Southwest. Yes, washers and dryers are separate here. No idea why, just the way it is. But I think it comes in handy. I usually do a couple loads of laundry every day so clothes can be drying while I wash a second load. We do have electric kettles and have had them for decades. Maybe they aren't used as much as a kettle on the stove, guess it depends on the person. We have a lot of choices here in the US for how to do things.
I was born and raised in Arizona, and, for whatever reason, stucco exteriors are extremely popular on houses. And when writing this, I realized that I actually don't really know what stucco is, so I looked it up: "Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water." Leave it to us Americans to make up new building materials to put on top of the actual building materials. LOL!
Depends on where you live in the US? In NY (Up State), I have a Washer & Dryer combo (One unit. Maybe having two units for older homes? Then again, having separate units is nice for maintenance and less complex regarding repairs.
@@GothicDragonX When he says "one unit" in the U.K., what he means is, the washer and dryer are combined into one unit. You put your clothes in, and then it washes and dries your clothes. They have these in their kitchens. I have never seen or used an all-in-one washer/dryer, but I've had it described to me as "a jack of all trades, and a master of none". Meaning, in that person's opinion, it gets the job done, but separate washer and dryer, whether stacked on top of each other or side by side, do a better job because the machine only has to wash and only has to dry, and not both combined.
My aunt had a combined washer/dryer, the only one I have ever seen. It did not work all that well. Stacked separate washers and dryers are now more the norm for cramped applications.
The first house my husband and I bought had the master bedroom on the first floor. The first couple of nights, I had the windows open, they had screens. Our bed was pretty close to the window and in the middle of the night, I heard a lion roar. I turned over to see a bobcat looking through the window.
I live in the country and own 10 acres. Our house is 2000 sq. ft. I would hate not having a separate washer and dryer. It'd take all day to do laundry. Plus we have large laundry rooms for that purpose. Plus we have 2 large refrigerator/freezers.
We do have electric kettles here in America. A lot of people like their extra countertop kitchen appliances, so I’m sure a lot of people have them. Also I live in a 1000 sq ft 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom apartment and and still feel so cramped. My boyfriend and I have a baby on the way and are looking into moving. Anything under 1000 square feet seems tiny to me.
There is a house in North Carolina called Biltmore (Estate). The house has four acres of floor space and 250 rooms , including 35 bedrooms, 43 bathrooms, 65 fireplaces, and three kitchens. Definitely one of a kind for this country. I have the idea from watching British dramas that there are a lot of country houses in England that might compete with the opulence of Biltmore. Today Biltmore is a tourist attraction but still runs a winery. Are there estates like that dotting the countryside of England?
One of the finest homes in the country I ever toured was Hearst Castle. Private outdoor zoo where animals roam free. Zebras, Giraffe among many, indoor Roman pool with 22k gold in every tile think that's pool used in Lady Gagas GUY video?!?, indoor theater, 6 ceilings from the Renaissance, private air landing field, complete view of San Simeon Bay and Pacific Ocean, 43 bedrooms, 61 bathrooms, Gothic study, Library, 127 acres of gardens Egyptian sculpture from 1500 bce. Olympic size outdoor pool with huge marble statues and fountains. There was even an elephant house. There's three guests houses and one was almost 5900 sq. ft. Think it's 250,000 acres land. Gorgeous!! All the big celebrities from 40s and 50s stayed there.
So the difference between American and British laundry machines (washer/dryers) is the American version is larger and usually in their own room. We have the machines separated for convenience. Back in the 50s and 60s housewives would find it easier to do the laundry on one day of the week for efficiency. So the "drums" were made larger and with the advent of the dryer you could do two loads of wash in the time the first would be done drying and separate out hang dry, machine dry, etc. It turned a task that took several hours over multiple days for an average household of four to a two or three hour task at once, with space in between to load your dishwasher and vacuum the floors or polish the wood block.
For what it's worth, garbage disposals are really only meant to catch bits of waste. You should still be scraping the food into the trash. All the disposal does is to prevent the pipes to become clogged over time with large scraps of food build up.
Not true. I have had garbage disposals in my houses since I was a kid and my family has put most food items down them for decades. Some things that don't go down the disposal are chicken bones, pasta, thick rinds, corn cobs and fibrous things likes stalks of celery. It's also not recommended to put coffee grounds down them. That said, my family and I have put large quantities of food down them on a regular basis.
To be honest, the garbage disposal was not designed for use on a municipal sewer system. They were designed for septic systems because the bacteria in septic systems would decompose the food and most houses with garbage disposals had a separate septic tank (known as a grease trap) that was just for the kitchen sink. As long as it was properly sized, it would take the food waste and basically compost it and disperse it into the ground. The companies that manufactured the disposals pushed hard to have cities remove laws that forbade food scraps from being put down the drain so they could start selling disposals to city dwellers. (it took them until 1997 to get New York City to allow it)
Had a plumber tell me that garbage disposals cause a lot of problems to the sewer system because people dump their food down them. He said they are only for the little bit of food that might go down after you scrape your dishes. He hated garbage disposals. I don't like them either.
@@tammierandall864 For city sewer systems that is true because the water has to travel to the water treatment facility and there are lots of places for the food to pile up and clog plumbing. In a septic system with a grease trap on the kitchen sink, the food particles go directly into a septic tank where it gets broken down and eventually distributed into the ground via the drain field. Basically, it gets composted into fertilizer.
Kitchen/bathroom outlets for post mid 80s construction usually have GFCIs (ground fault circuit interuptors) and while they CAN be used as a "switch" it's a mini circuit breaker intended to stop a short if water gets in it. Usually there is a "light switch" by the door in a room that is wired to ONE outlet in a room.
Down south, a lot of us make sun tea. Gallon size glass container with a spigot. Fill with water, and tea bags. Put on the lid and place outside in the sun. In less than an hour in the heat, you have the smoothest tea. Luzianne is smoother than Lipton.
We have a thing called instant hot water. This is basically is a built tea pot which is ready to go on demand. It has a separate faucet for your sink and heats the water to 200 degrees Fahrenheit.
Yeah- I have one! It’s a separate small faucet that just dispenses extra hot water from a tank under your sink. Love it! Dispense into a mug and drop a tea bag in it!
Dude, I'm not sure what "hot and bothered" means in the UK - but it seems VERY different from what it means here in the US! It's an old school term that's used very specifically to mean physically "turned on" here. It was awesome hearing you keep saying you were all hot and bothered! 🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂
Y'all run 220 and we run 110 electric in our houses. We have separate washers and dryers so we can wash another load while the first one is drying. When you have kids you'll understand. Lol We have little plastic inserts for the sockets and we teach the babies not to touch them. I have a little house in the middle of 50 acres. It's only 1200 square feet. I have a couple other little 3 room cabins on the land too for family and friends when they visit if they don't want to stay in the house. A getaway. I'll take land over house size every single day.
Our place was built in the 50s and there's brick in the kitchen which houses an oven that, if it ever dies, cannot be replaced because its dimensions are so kitchy-50s. Appreciate the vids on these slow days, man.
It's my understanding that the dryers in the combo washer/dryer unit take much longer to dry clothes. Someone needs to confirm as I have never owned one.
I live in Texas. Today the heat index is 114F so, yes, I have central air conditioning and heat. My house is one story brick, 2,100 sq Ft, 2 car garage. I have an electric kettle because different teas require water at different temperatures. I have separate washer and dryer. It allows me to get more washing done. I don’t have to wait for one load to finish drying before starting to wash another load. I lived in England several years ago. I loved it there so don’t miss it’s fine points.
1) My house is a brick Cape Cod. My favorite is Craftsman style (lots of wood, lots of built-in custom cabinetry). It was built in 1938. I love old houses, 100 years old or more. My only complaint is that the kitchens are minuscule. 2) Our max temperature this summer where I live in Kentucky 3) Brown recluse spiders prefer cool, dark places. 4) I’ve had both a whistling kettle and an electric kettle. The advantage to the one you put on the stove is that you’re not giving up counter space to your electric kettle.
In addition to row houses in the US, we also have townhouses. The only difference is that row houses all look basically the same, done in the same brick color and are basically just carbon copies of one another all the way down the street. Townhouses are attached on either side, but each house looks different, has a different layout, is a different color, and might even be different heights to one another. You might also hear “brownstone”, which is a specific kind of row house that has a façade made of brownstone, which is a red-brown sandstone. They’re widely associated with NYC, so you might hear them referenced in movies or shows that take place there.
The brick houses are _here_ are really cute. But they're nestled under tall trees and have nice little yards around them. I don't think it's the brick houses that look ugly, it's just they're not surrounded by anything pretty. Hell, look up the brick row houses in places like New York, Boston, Philadelphia. The neighborhoods have been cleaned up and those old houses look really nice now.
Separate washer and dryers offer more space than a combo unit and you can get the laundry done faster because while the first load is drying, I can start washing the next load. I had a combo unit in our 5th wheel trailer and didn't like it very much, but that's because it took forever to wash and dry a single load.
What I really love about your videos is that you are so genuine and humble. Great characteristics for a person. When you have enough information about a topic, you have great insights and I love your honesty. It is really refreshing in a world full of ego and competition.
On the electrical sockets, the reason y'all have a switch and are so nervous about the outlet is because you put 240v to every outlet. That can seriously hurt you. A English friend told me about being over at a friend's house as a kid. There was a fireplace with a bare wire in the back to light the logs. His friend was using a poker and touched it to that wire. He went flying across the room and had a badly burnt hand. We have 120v outlets which are less dangerous on the whole. I've touched live 120v wires many times in my life by accident. It's uncomfortable and unpleasant but it doesn't burn you or send you flying.
My girls were of high school age at the time & came running in and asked if I was okay. I said, "Well, I can hear you & if you can hear me, I'm okay!" 😂 My arm was black for quite a while, until new hair grew in.
Most average middle class houses are more like 2000-2500sq ft. Most 2 bedroom apartments would be 1100-1400 sq ft. (on average.) Keep in mind that housing prices are not what they used to be.
Back in the day, the hot and cold water was separate in the USA. In my younger days (I'm 55) I had used many sinks in restrooms that had separate taps, which were in older buildings. My grandparents farmhouse was like that. But in these modern days, they are combined, of course.
Separate washer and dryer pair - makes laundering, especially for a family with lots of kids, much faster because you wash a load, take it out of the washer when the cycle is finished, shake it out and toss it into the separate dryer, set the level of heat to dry that you want and press the button to go. You can then wash a second load in the washer while the first load is drying in the separate dryer. When the dryer is done with its cycle most of them have a BEEP sound to let you know it's finished and you can empty the dryer, wipe out the lint trap, load in the washed clothes from the second load and start it up. Meanwhile, you have load #3 of laundry going in the washer.
Washer-Dryer combos, like most things America is optional. They are more common in appartment living. but for homeownership Its just common to get them separate as they have larger capacity (2-3x larger), repair cost are cheaper for individual units, and replacement is cheaper if you need to replace just one unit rather then a Combo Unit.
@amywells8609 in some parts of the US you can only rent either. Where I live there may be condos you can buy but there are no apartments you can buy. And I've never actually seen a condo you can buy into, just rent.
The farm house can be quite different. Regions of the USA have different style homes along with the more common homes.Here in Wisconsin you will find german styles, swiss styles, dutch colonial , Norwegian and Swedish styles. You might have a sears catalogue home . You could buy the plans and everything you need to build that home . My great grandmother had one of these homes cerca 1916 it still stands and is lived in but the owner took off parts of it and got it sided with vinal siding. So it lost its character. It originally looked like a gingerbread house. Lots of scroll work. 3 season porch. Now it looks very plain.
We have an all in one washer dryer and it takes a lot longer to wash and dry a load than having them seperate. It may be the unit we have and certain fabrics like fleece take forever in the all in one it may be because it's not vented. With that said the downside of larger houses is that it's easy to collect stuff or never get rid of stuff because you have the room. It really becomes a huge job for the kids to clean out the parent's house when either they pass or have to go into assisted living.
The problem with Condos or Condominiums is that they have a HOA or Home Owners Association, which charges an annual or monthly fee for property tax, insurance, garbage pickup, etc.
I have lived in U.S. condos since 1994 and they can be pretty great if you don't want to do yard work and upkeep on the structure of your house. The HOA does everything for you from the monthly fee.
Then you must have an unusually good HOA. Most are not. South Florida just had a group of about 40 condo associations that had several million stolen by a group that contracted to help run the associations. That is more the norm!@@chnalvr
You said: "We're just doing it wrong". Not really, your infrastructure is several hundred years (if not a thousand) older than ours. We have newer houses going up in new developments all the time and the sellers always put the latest gadgets in those new houses to sell them faster! If you know or knew someone living in a newer neighborhood they probably have those gadgets as well. I once knew a couple who lived in a house (they were kind of tiny too) that was a couple of hundred years old. I couldn't believe the size of the doorways! Anyway thanks for making us happy with what we do have. I always enjoy your videos and enthusiasm.
While I know the term "row house" I've never heard anyone using the term. More likely you'll hear them called townhouses or brownstones depending on where they're located. It's not like we can't buy an electric kettle but if someone has a kettle at all, it's probably one used on the stove. Needing hot water like that isn't really necessary when you can just as easily heat a cup of water in the microwave which is what I will do if I want a cup of tea instead of breaking out the stove-top kettle, lol. It's also not like we can't have a two-in-one washer and dryer but it's convenient when you have several loads to wash and dry so you're not stuck waiting with one appliance. Your second load can be washing while your first load is drying so while it may not save on energy, it's a time saver. One thing I hated about having to go to a laundromat to do my laundry when I live in an apartment that had washer/dryer hook up but couldn't afford to buy those was the inconvenience of packing up my laundry in the car and transporting it back and forth. The best thing was with using multiple washers and dryers, I could wash my different loads at the same time and dry them at the same time so there was even less waiting. I I've noticed that if anyone here has a two-in-one washer it's more that they don't have the space for the two separate appliances and/or they're trying to be more energy efficient.
I just purchased 8.5 acres of land just south of Niagara Falls in New York. It has a little creek and a pond on it and I plan on building a little (little by American standards, about 1,400 square feet) cottage on it to spend my summers. It's just too hot during the summer where I currently live in Cape Coral Florida. The Florida winters and Spring is beautiful, but the cool summers in the Appalachian mountains are amazing and the colorful Fall makes New England states perfect in the Summer and Fall.. so those are the two places i like to live, and will be living... of the places you mentioned, I would've mind living in Canada either, but I would live in Alberta or Bristish Columbia.. the only problem with Canada is the lack of freedom, but those two provinces are Gorgeous!!
The freedoms the Canadian Convoy Truck protesters were fighting for. Freedoms that Pastors and Priest were getting jailed fighting for. Lots of examples out there... Read what the government did in retaliation against the convoy. The Canadian people are getting their freedoms taken away from them. It's sad....
My father-in-law lived in Orlando. We lived in Illinois. The coldest I have ever been was one Christmas in Florida. The low temp was just 32, and it sometimes get well below zero here. Everything was wet. The sheets were wet, and that thing that’s supposed to be a furnace didn’t help at all. Come to think of it we should have bought my father-in-law a dehumidifier for Christmas.
American Outlet safety: Modern American outlets have GFI breakers built in. If something goes wrong it trips the GFI instead of the main breakers. There's two buttons that has to be pushed in deep, "Reset" and "Test". When tripped, you'll have to push Reset to have power back in that outlet. As for the older outlets, there's child proof safety caps that clip in by the ground hole (the mouth 😮)
The nice thing about ranch houses is that you can have a lot of square footage and not have an upstairs. When we got to retirement age, we sold our two-story house for a ranch house.
-You can child-proof outlets. Also, I like that ours are smaller than yours. I had to take a big chunky adapter when I was in the UK. Your plugs are HUGE! -Condos can be similar to apartments but bigger. I know the term row houses but I’ve never called them that. Always condos. -the Projects are also called “Section 8 housing”. And as soon as anything in your neighborhood is classified as that, the value of your house plummets and crime goes up.
Many Americans use electric kettles. I keep hearing that we don’t, but everyone I know has one. Our garbage disposals are part of the regular sink, operated by a switch. And our wooden houses are aren’t like log cabins. They’re wooden framed and typically reinforced with many different materials. My house is cinder block and wood. Built in the 40s.
We called them garbage disposals and they are quite easy to install under your kitchen sink and they last a long time. Our washers and dryers can be bought as stackable or side by sides. I think I had seen an add for a one cube though which sounds awesome. Mailboxes were more common in the front door as a slot in the past but in RI we have a box attached to the house near the front door unless you’re in a neighborhood where the front yard is so big that they have a mailbox near the road so it is easier for the mailman.
I've been watching Laurence for a few years now, and the RU-vid algorithm brought me to your reactions. I was born and raised in Chicago and not all the houses are enormous. The house I grew up in was a converted single-family home that was turned into two apartments. The landlady's father built the house in 1890 and she was born in 1900. For four people, our apartment was quite small, with only 2 bedrooms, a kitchen, living, and dining room and a miniscule bathroom. The house was close enough to our neighbors that even as a little kid I could touch both houses at the same time in the gangway between them. The only reason we had a back yard was because our landlady never owned a car, so she never had a garage built. Also, get this, 82% of Americans live in big cities and urban areas, where smaller houses are far more common than in rural or suburban areas. Also, 36% of all Americans are renting apartments.
Electrician here. So our outlets are tamper resistant, or at least modern day ones usually are. Besides that we have special covers for "baby proofing" them too. Also you guys seem to run a 240volt system, here we run 120volts in a house. Only larger equipment like electrical ranges or dryers run at 240. It's interesting to see what y'all have going on there! Also, some people do have switched receptacles here, but they are literally controlled by a switch on the wall like a light would be! I love to see the differences!!
You'd be surprised the majority of the wall outlets installed in America are Tampa resistant so that you have to push in on both slots at the same time for them to allow anything back into the outlet far enough to get shocked.
US house current at the outlet is half the voltage ofthe UK (110v vs 220v). Also, ths slots in the socket are narrower, so anything much thicker than a paper clip wont fit. And due to the lower voltage, unless you're totally grounded all youll get is a painful tingle. The lower voltage also explains wht electric kettles aren't as popular. It takes twice as long for a North American kettle to boil.
American building is still in it's infancy, compared to Europe. But we were able to steal all the knowledge AND stretch out a bit. I love the history I see in European architecture! PS. I just subscribed, I love your curiosity and genuine enthusiasm.
To explain the electric shock hazard on the power outlets, we have something called GFI outlets. A GFI outlet is a power outlet with it's on breaker switch and usually has other outlets connected to it. A sort of master outlet if you will. If a power short or surge is detected in the circuit connection to the GFI outlet, the breaker will trip and cut power to the master and all outlets on that circuit. Those are the two buttons on the American-style outlet. And we do, in fact, have all-in-one or dual purpose washer/dryer units. They just are not very efficient and use up more power, not only that but they are generally small. See them mostly in studio apartments and RV's (you call them caravans, however the one I have is not a driveable one as it is a trailer and is 40ft long. Need a 1 ton pickup to tow that.)
A lot of our outlets are connected to a switch. But it's on the wall and usually used for the lights plugged into the outlet. But they can be used as a safety feature as well. Also, as another commenter mentioned, we teach our babies as soon as they crawl not to touch those. Also, we have those covers that are difficult for some adults (me 🙋♀) to take off.
It's common for the farthest outlet to be controlled by a switch that is intended for a lamp. Older houses had ceiling lights controlled by that switch.
Our house isn't anything special in our area, but we have a 1200 sq ft footprint with a full basement, so 2400 sq ft of living space. And we're sitting on 9 acres of land, with a 3 car garage, a carport and a 24x40 barn. I definitely feel very lucky to have the ability to have all of this, which we built ourselves ( yes, 2x6 wood stud framing and all!).
Electric kettle not needed, since we often have other options such as microwave ovens (heat the water in the same cup you're going to drink from), keurig brewers (can just heat water and have it go into the cup), and yes, the old style stove top kettle if desired. And yes, I have seen electric kettles in the US, but they're not terribly common.
In our Texas suburb the mail is delivered by car, not on foot. The driver is on the right side of the little car and drives slowly down the streets, stopping at each house to pick up outgoing mail and dropping off incoming letters and packages. Our neighborhood is solidly middle class and the houses are around 1600-2000 sq feet. Ours has 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 2 living rooms and a laundry room. It was built in the 1960s when bedrooms were bigger and kitchens were smaller. We don't have the huge kitchen with an island that so many American houses have. The garden has a huge shed for storage of things like the lawn mower and off season sports equipment. My favorite thing is our back deck which I'm sure you've seen on TV shows. It's about 300 sq ft, with a fireplace and outdoor furniture. Too hot to hang out there now, but we usually spend lots of time out on the deck. Come visit!
One reason why someone might have a regular kettle instead of an electric one is because there's limited space on the countertop and limited number of plugs. If I plugged everything I had in at one time, that would be the air fryer, the Instant Pot, the toaster, the toaster oven, the coffee grinder, the coffee maker, the blender, the mixer, and the electric whisk. Since I also need countertop space to actually cut up and make food, there's no way, in my small one-bedroom apartment, that I can keep everything plugged in. I leave the heaviest stuff on the countertop and store everything else close by. I had an electric kettle, but someone else dropped it and it shattered all over the floor. I would like a new one to join the air fryer, Instant Pot, mixer and blender as appliances I keep on the countertop when I finally do buy one, but that will mean moving the toaster oven somewhere else. Ug, maybe I'll just get a regular kettle and keep it on the stovetop, plenty of room there. LOL
My husband and I have a 2,000 square foot 1890 farmhouse on a small 22 acre (8.9 hectares) in northwest Kansas. We sleep with our windows open during late spring-late autumn, and we heat our house with a wood burning stove in the winter. Our nearest neighbor is 1/2 mile to the east down the dirt road. Yes, we do have separate clothes washer and dryer but in the summer we hang the wet laundry on our clothesline. It's quiet and peaceful.
A combo washer/dryer is fine if you usually only have 1 load, or do your laundry quite frequently. But if you have several loads, you can start a second load while your first one is drying in separate machines.
Ranch style houses are great for the elderly and disabled because there are no stairs since there's no 2nd floor or basement. I live in a split-level house and when you come into the front door there is a small landing and you have to either go upstairs or downstairs. Most little kids stick something into the electric sockets, but they only do it once and then they learn not to do that again. Seriously though, if you have kids you usually buy little plastic caps that go into the sockets to prevent kids from doing that. I'd love to move to Hawaii when I retire. Been there twice and it's so breathtakingly beautiful that you don't want to leave. But, it's way too expensive for a retiree.
The house I grew up in was built by my grandfather's grandfather. He came to America from England. The house was a lot more like British houses as it had no closets and we had to put our clothes in Wardrobes or dressers. I currently live in a wood house. But there are a lot of red and Grey brick houses here. My next door neighbor has a stucco house. The house I grew up in was made of Adobe and slate. Also, the house I currently live in is tiny and cramped. There are three of us living in said house, and it is hard to be alone anywhere. The house in Harry Potter is bigger than my house.
Exactly. Like yard to garden. When you said garden, it took me a couple seconds to figure out what you were talking about, but I did. Not a problem. You be you, my friend.
American electrical housing codes require outlets to be rated for "Tamper Resistance (TR)' so there is a small flap that covers the inside of the slots, so that a fork or small skinny object can't just be randomly jammed into it. On top of that, parents can buy the small babyproofing tabs that plug into outlets, but honestly, TR outlets are safe without them. On top of that, if you somehow successfully jammed a fork into a slot, there is no current running through it unless you somehow jammed the fork into TWO of the slots, not just one. AND one of them has to be the hot side. They're safe.
So, we do have some houses that electrical outlets are tied to a switch that can be turned on and off. But for most homes, if you have young children who might shock themselves we have outlet covers or plugs in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors.
You can buy a combination washer/dryer in the US but people only do that if they have very limited space like an RV. It's most common to have separate appliances. You can wash a load, put it in the dryer and while that load is drying you can be washing another load in the washer and so on. I can't imagine waiting for the dryer to be finished in order to start another load. I think your plugs are a reasonable idea but I can't imagine turning each socket on every time I go to use something. There are so many outlets in houses. If you only had 5 in each room that would be crazy and larger rooms would probably have to have more than that. Turning each one off and on to use them would be so bothersome. I live in a ranch home and it's nice because things are spread out more. No stairs except those leading to the basement. Everyone has their preferences and there are plenty to choose from
In the olden days in Massachusetts, a man would build a “half house”…Cape Cod style. After making his fortune at sea he would return and build the other half. These finished homes were called a “full cape.” If he did not return, the “half cape” would be big enough for a widow.
We have the combo washer dryer option but most have separate machines. I think because you can be washing one while the prior load is drying. So you get more done at the same time.
So I was already incredibly grateful for our home since i grew up really poor (we live on a military post and our house is nice) but watching this makes me feel even more grateful for even the "normal' american things.
Many years ago when my husband and I were still in the military, we were stationed in Germany. We lived off-post in an apartment, but we're able to requisition American appliances from base. I could understand why when I realized that the normal refrigerator wasn't even the size of a dishwasher, and a pizza pan wouldn't even fit in the oven. We ended up getting a refrigerator, stove, and a washing machine. At least it had a hook-up for a washer in the bathroom. No shower, but the landlord had installed the hand-held things, so we managed. We had to have transformers for all of the appliances and our Christmas lights.
Masonry houses in much of the US are unsafe, due to either earthquakes or hurricanes. Unreinforced masonry has very little side strength, so high winds or an earthquake will yield a used brick pile.
@@TexasbyStormIf it was built post WWII, it is almost certainly brick veneer, over a structural wood frame. If your walls are not about a foot thick, the brick is not structural.
Um.. I beg to differ. My house is brick, foot deep walls, and has withstood 50 yrs of SC hurricanes. And we're less than 3 miles from the ocean. My previous house was enforced cinder on a military base, a mile closer to the water & has been there since the 1940s. I'm surrounded by wood and mobile homes that have shattered many times and rebuilt. My home is often the refuge for others then
Having a switch on individual plugs is silly, as most US houses have bedroom or living room sockets mounted rather low on the walls. And it is something to break.
We don't drink tea due to the fallout from the Revolution, so there's very little need for electric kettles. We tend to drink ridiculous amounts of coffee instead. You're very, very kind when comparing the two countries. Both have their amazing upsides and terrible downsides. Thanks for being so awesome. :)
We don’t drink tea *as much* or in the same way. Tea is very much a staple in the Southern states- albeit it’s served cold and is more like tea-flavored super-sweet juice. I keep an electric kettle for my hot tisanes/herbal teas or if I want my pasta water to boil in a shorter amount of time. (It boils faster than having the range eye on high.)
Huh? We drink tons of tea. It may not be as popular as coffee, but we drink tons of tea. I'm from NYC and I drink tea nearly every day. I have 10 different types of tea in my cabinet right now.
@@outrageousaistories That's really nice, but we don't drink anywhere close to the same amount as the Brits do. They consume around 4.25 lbs/capita to our measly 0.5 lbs/capita. That's about 8.5 times more! :O I can't post the link to the source (YT frowns at that), but if you want to find it, it's on Statistica under consumer goods & FMCG, then non-alcoholic beverages.
I love the pavers used in the driveways in the UK as well as the "back gardens". Very eye appealing. We have either gravel, stone or tar(mac) driveways for the most part in the US.
A couple of notes/corrections ...here in the states, our sockets should ideally be like Brits for safety yes, but they do sell those little plastic plugs you can insert to prevent little ones from sticking fingers & things into them. Also, the washer/dryer combo ...ours are separate which is nice you can do more than one load quicker that way & ours are not in the kitchen like in England, but typically in their own little "laundry room". Most homes have closets throughout, bedroom clothing closets, the front entry coat closet, back entry mudroom (usually next to your laundry room), linens closets in bathrooms & hallways, storage closets ...with modern homes having massive walk-in closets in the bedrooms. Oh yes & we do actually have electric kettles here as well.
Silly boy.. if you have small kids in the house you buy plastic inserts which go into the electric sockets which keeps kids from sticking things into them! It’s called “kid proofing the sockets!” You would move to Australia? (More deadly snakes, spiders, a deadly sea snail, and insects than in Miami - at least in Florida you can own any caliber of gun to shoot snakes, spiders, and pesky neighbors). Norway? Too close to the North Pole and one week of summer! Good luck! Canada? (Colder than a witches left knocker and they don’t even speak English in Australia and Canada… where do you think Canadians spend the winter?? Florida! We call them “Snow Birds!” I-75 in the Spring is filled with Ontario license plates on cars headed back north) Good luck with that! America? Buy yourself 20 acres of forest land, build your dream house, home school your kids, and smile! (Contrary to what Canadians and Australians tell you, we do speak English here although you may have to start not dropping your H’s and referring to your mother as “mum” which means shut up and keep quiet here!
Bro your estimates on the prices of American houses are very very low (unless you are willing to live in the middle of nowhere and have to drive an hour to get to the supermarket or the nearest hospital.) In a fairly populous town in a nice area, for a good sized house you're looking at more like $500,000 if not over a million. My house's property tax alone is nearly $20,000 a year.
I'm also in New England but I live about 200 yards from the beach in a county that is formerly the wealthiest county In the US. I'm just a working class schlub though so I am very lucky to have bought the house decades ago when it was only about 150k
