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Comment by BadBadJellyBean | Hacker News Reader

As a German I always found North American houses and their drywall and wood constructions incredibly odd. It always felt flimsy to me. From my experience we just started using drywall for some interior walls on some newly built homes. But throughout my life I was used to very massive walls.

I recently saw some house building videos and it is somehow fascinating how different the building materials and methodologies are. North America obviously made it work, but still very odd to me.

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I think it's just what you get used to. Every method has ups and downs. And different regions are going to gravitate to different materials based on availability (for example, my Indian coworkers just cannot fathom why we would ever build houses from trees instead of reinforced concrete; doesn't it rot?!!).

I don't think of the walls as especially flimsy, though. Built correctly, they are totally fine. Yes you can punch a hole in one if you are sufficiently motivated (and you better miss the stud...), but the only times I've ever punched any hole in drywall it was because the door stop was removed for whatever reason and a dumb teenager threw the door open with no regard for propriety. At least drywall is trivial to fix.

> Yes you can punch a hole in one if you are sufficiently motivated

This is what I meant with "flimsy". If I hit my wall my hand breaks. But as I said It seems to work. I am just used to the massive nature of our houses and I admit a part of me prefers it that way but I don't think it's the one true way.

> why we would ever build houses from trees instead of reinforced concrete

Earthquakes are a factor where we are, but also, if NZ can find a way to do something cheaper, we will always do it. Quality be damned.

I seriously doubt you get sufficiently more earthquakes than, say, Tokio, which is mostly concrete

Christchurch would give it a run for its money. It’s down to every few days now but it was almost by the minute for a while there.

Have a look at that second link, and skip to 22.2.2011. At an about 12.51 it goes wild, and it lasted for years. It’s still shaking now.

https://earthquakelist.org/new-zealand/canterbury/christchur...

https://www.christchurchquakemap.co.nz/february

Stick frame buildings are prone to dry rot, very susceptible to molding, and the addition of drywalls* make them objectively inferior for any building that's expected to last more than ~40-50 years. It used to be, 100 years ago, that the big cities like NYC, Chicago, Cincinnati, etc... were so dynamic that entire neighbourhoods were expected to be rebuilt every ~50 years or so. That's no longer the case.

Over a lifespan of 100+ years that's very well expected in the US given that cities aren't growing much any more and infill has been made almost illegal in most places, using long-lasting materials and techniques like in Germany becomes a lot cheaper, and more convenient. It always surprises my US colleagues when I told them that in 20 years living in the house I grew up in, the only thing that ever broke were once the roof gutters due to very heavy rain. Otherwise, houses are expected to just go on and maybe need repairs every 50-60 years.

* drywalls are inherently sensitive to humidity, which makes it necessary to cover them with wall paint which is essentially a waterproof layer of plastic, which makes it not breathable and thus drywalls develop mold rather easily (even worse, it's often invisible mold). In contrast, walls made of stone, cement or brick (or a mix thereof) and covered in stucco are breathable and much more resilient to humidity and mold issues.

Thank you for including southeast Asia (and other humid places) in the discussion :)

I'm not familiar with life in SE Asia. All I know is I've been to Malaysia, Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong and the levels of humidity were gruesome. I once wanted to bring a leather bag as a gift to a friend in Taiwan and he asked not to bother because it will likely get moldy.

I may be biased, because I live in a city filled with houses over 100 years old, and we get incessant rain. They seem to hold up fine. Not sure how long they’ll last but there hasn’t been any push to replace them.

Have you ever done a mold spore count in your house ? There's a hypothesis that, due to living in stick frame houses, a large part of the American population might be suffering from a low dose chronic mold intoxication which shows up as a heightened state of inflammation.

> I may be biased, because I live in a city filled with houses over 100 years old, and we get incessant rain. They seem to hold up fine

I wouldn't be so sure.

In places like Boston there are many 100+ years old stick frame houses. They hold up just fine. Properly built wooden houses don't get any mold.

Very few are properly built, especially in the last decades. Asymptotically to zero.

I have many friends who own houses built in the last 10 to 30 years ago. None of them have any issues with mold.

> None of them have any issues with mold.

... or so you think. Mold contamination is most of the times invisible and triggers long-term chronic intoxication. People only realise there's a problem if the mold starts growing on the walls, at which point it's too late.

Even growing on the walls most people ignore it…

I have family like this.

Prolific recent media example: JK Rowling.

Hold up ≠ remain a healthy place to breathe.

ChangeTheAirFoundation.org

It's funny that people born here don't know about it and I, an European buying a house and asking the workers that came for some initial renovations, found out. The wall guy said he often finds small amounts of mold when he's called to replace drywalls, but owners don't like to be told about it.

100 years is nothing! I mean my local pub, for many years, was built in the 17th century.

This is probably one of the European vs. American divides though.

I am from The Netherlands. Buildings from 19th century and before are incredibly rare. Maybe 1% of the total housing stock. Thanks to bombings in WWII and a rapidly growing population since.

In my current Spanish town I don't know any building older than 1900. Rapid expansion of coastal towns due to European mobility caused that.

It's not really a European vs American divide, it is more country specific than that.

Edit: Ireland apparently has one of the youngest building age in Europe so I guess a 17th century pub is very rare and special there too.

I'm from Italy and buildings from the 19th century are pretty common at the center of the cities. They were rich people's residences and have massively thick walls that make them very comfortable to live in, both because of thermal mass and acoustic isolation. They're mostly used for commercial purpose now, as they're in high demand as office space for lawyers, medical practices. Only rich people can afford living there (in the upper floors).

> cannot fathom why we would ever build houses from trees instead of reinforced concrete

Steel-reinforced ICF (Insulated Concrete Form) has become a much more common frame material for homes in the US, especially in the hurricane-prone southeast.

The deep southeast has the advantage of being one of the few regions in the US without a known major earthquake risk. It makes a lot of sense to use concrete there given the other natural hazards.

The closest major earthquake zone is in South Carolina, which had M7+ earthquakes as recently as the late 19th century.

Given how prevalent strong earthquakes are across most of the US, I always wonder if the few areas on the map without a known seismic hazard means we just haven't discovered it yet.

ICF is more resilient to earthquakes than wood frame is, as far as I understand.

> doesn't it rot?!!

It does indeed.

There’s a portion of our populace who accepts waking up tired with flu-like symptoms daily.

As a German I have to admit we are culturally odd with this. Our houses are way too over constructed and the dry-wall stigma here is just one aspect of it, wood construction stigma is another. It thus is no wonder that Americans have way more affordable housing.

Those stigmas are also odd for most of our heritage-like old towns that are full of still-intact "Fachwerk"-Wooden-Constructions - which basically use the same technique, should give us a hint or two. Also wooden constructions do allow to comply with our ever climbing ecology standards, without complicated venting mechanisms to keep mold out (as you need for stone). Those two stigmas are also odd, given, that drywall and wooden construction sectors are actually huge in Germany. Knauf is one of the worlds largest companies in the wallboard sector.

Stein auf Stein, Brick on Brick. It's what makes the German feel safe. It will last forever. I will break everything but the walls if I hit them. I need heavy machinery to put a screw into the wall. It feels right for the German. Wooden houses are for eccentric people with too much money for a disposable house.

As much as I don't want to be a stereotypical German thick walls feel right to me. But I honestly don't think that our building style is the true one. It is just what I am used to.

I completely agree, I felt the same. It's a cultural thing. But its almost funny once you've broaden your horizon.

> Our houses are way too over constructed

They're not. The long-term reduction in maintenance costs more than make up for it. Tell a German that the "normal" North-American "common sense" is saving 1-2% of the house value every year for repairs and you'll be considered a madman.

> and the dry-wall stigma here is just one aspect of it, wood construction stigma is another

Both stigmas are very well justified.

Which is ofc complete nonsense.

Wooden structures allow for a lot cheaper adjustment later on (you usually have a few beams that are structurally important, often its just the outer walls that bear the load). If you try that with stone you can start with hiring an expert upfront or your house collapses.

Same goes energy efficiency. The isolation needs require thick plastic-covers on the outside (for stone), which are prone to mold, birds nests and lead to moss. Every residential stone building in Germany that is older than 10yrs provides you with a prime view through its plaster of where its plastic blocks are assembled, because of the moss. If you don't then they already paid the extra cost of recoating.

Every mortgage issuer will calculate 2-4% extra repair costs for the exterior alone. And we'Re not even talking about the venting, which officially requires a replacement and cleansing every 2-3 years, but of course nobody ever does it.

I could go on for hours about our German stonerism, but will end with the most funny thing, which is that most "stoners" are adamant about longevity vis-a-vis wood, pay extra for the stone, have to wait 3-5 times as long before they can actually move in (drying of mortar and screed can take up to year here in Germany) – but then the most important thing for longevity, the roof, will be made of wood ;-)

Saving 1% of your home value for repairs is actually the guideline set by the Dutch government. For HOAs there is even a legal mandate that they must set aside 0.5% of the rebuild value every year, but most decide on 1% to 2%.

The materials used in US house construction are practically restricted by a requirement to survive extreme seismic and wind loading. In the US there are ghost towns where brick and masonry cities were completely obliterated by these hazards. As the US learned how to engineer buildings that mitigated these risks, these learnings were reflected in construction standards.

This led to the highly evolved wood-frame and steel-frame structures used in all construction in the US you see today. There are still a few old brick and masonry buildings from before these building codes, but most of the buildings from those eras collapsed in one disaster or another.

Drywall gets maligned, but it is a pretty remarkable building material. Inexpensive, easy to fix/finish, and very fire-resistant, especially for its weight.

The timber-stud and drywall model also works well for the modern world, where layout preferences and in-wall technology changes often. It was only about 20-25 years ago where having POTS lines/jacks in multiple rooms was cool, and now they're mostly useless.

My home, built in 2011, has 36 ethernet ports throughout the house. Some in closets, some above the trim, some where a TV would be mounted. The TV mount areas also have conduit specifically for HDMI and other cords. And there's speakers and speaker wire going all over the house. All of it terminates in the garage at a single panel.

It's mostly unused. I have PoE wifi access points around the house. And the sound system I hardly use.

I left the building trade in the UK about 20 years ago.

The UK is a damp place! We built one-off- houses. We built exclusively with 'brick and block'. Brick outside (to take the weather), cavity and block inside. Downstairs walls were block. Upstairs walls were studding, unless blocks were required to go up to support roof purlins.

The blocks inside were normally 'dry lined', sheets of 'plasterboard' (what we call drywall) 'dabbed' to the blocks with a plaster-like adhesive. Often these were 'Thermal boards', plasterboard laminated to urethane insulation foam. Plasterboard was always 'skimmed', plastered over with a plaster designed for this. The drying time is much lower than 'wet plastering' on the blocks.

On big spec built sites they were using prefab timber frames instead of blocks for the inner wall. Then they would plasterboard, and just fill the joints (no skimming). This is always considered a lower spec than skimmed walls.

I suspect the prevalence of "flimsy" wood and drywall constructions to be part of the reason why Americans dislike apartment living. They provide little sound insulation, are prone to water damage, have a shorter lifespan than the average person and once they catch fire they burn the entire thing down.

Concrete or brick buildings are much nicer to live in, but expensive, so they are not very common among new constructions.

Actually apartment buildings are mostly concrete. Strip away finishings like cabinets, drywall and flooring from a unit, and what's left is a concrete cell. Sometimes separating walls within a unit are wood based but that's rare too.

I think you and OP just have different definitions for "apartment building".

I've lived in pretty large buildings (eg dozens of units and four floors high) that were largely made of wood in both the northeast of the US and California.

They aren't high-rise buildings but I wouldn't argue they aren't apartment buildings, and they're far from uncommon.

AKA the 5-over-1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5-over-1

Didn't know those had a name but that only applies to half the wood frame buildings I lived in. The other ones had no "1" (I assume the foundation/slab was concrete though).

Yeah I was thinking mainly of condo towers in cities, which I normally associate with apartment buildings. California has different rules due to high earthquake frequency. It's hard to generalize elsewhere.

Basically every apartment building built in the last 25-30 years that is 6 stories or less (which is the vast majority of units constructed) will be a concrete base floor and then stick built apartments on top.

It’s called a 5-over-1 and it’s so much cheaper than doing five stories of metal pan and concrete deck that the economics force the decision. You see these everywhere.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5-over-1

Anything over 6 stories will be concrete and steel, or rarely, engineered wood or timber framed.

Concrete and steel apartment buildings do not have vertical concrete partitions or wood stud walls between the units, they have steel stud walls with two layers of double 5/8” drywall on each side to provide a 4-hour fire rating.

I am a construction professional, FWIW.

Concrete or brick buildings are effectively illegal in much of the US because they aren’t safe. Large parts of the US are prone to earthquakes far more severe than any in Europe, a fact learned the hard way. It destroyed all of the prior masonry and brick buildings in the US so that type of construction is no longer allowed. Your choices are pretty much wood-frame or steel-frame construction.

That said, plenty of steel-framed apartments are effectively sound-proof. I’ve lived in them. You don’t need masonry, just wall mass.

Masonry can be engineered to US seismic standards but it is extremely uneconomical to do so. In my city, my house must be engineered to survive without structural damage an earthquake stronger than any in European recorded history. That’s not over-engineering, large parts of the US just have earthquakes that strong. It limits your material choices.

Similarly, US construction must also be engineered for extreme wind loading. Some of the buildings in my area are designed to withstand 300+ km/hr winds. Because that is a thing that can happen here.

Just about everything about US construction style can be explained by the necessity of engineering to survive extreme seismic and/or wind loading. Which it demonstrably does for the most part.

Very interesting perspective, thanks. One of the other comments mentioned that in Tokyo they heavily use concrete blocks. Not sure how accurate that is but how does their approach differ to the US?

It’s mostly about economics and the construction industry. You can make reinforced concrete houses to California standards but >95% of the industry is geared towards stick frame construction and it’ll be quite a bit more expensive. Commercial and large apartment buildings are often made using concrete, because they can amortize the extra costs (and except for 1x4s, the only other option is steel frame).

Once you start moving out of the dense parts of Tokyo, wood construction becomes a lot more prevalent for the same reason: it’s cheaper to build a stick house to code than it is to hire RC specialists.

Not concrete blocks, reinforced concrete. There is a major difference. Tokyo is mostly high rises.

It’s also quite expensive.

Normal Japanese construction has always been wood frame.

Not concrete blocks but steel-reinforced concrete. Just about anything will survive an earthquake with enough steel in it. This becomes expensive when building to an extreme seismic standard due to the amount of materials and labor involved.

Some recent skyscrapers in severe seismic zones don't use conventional reinforced concrete. Their cores are built from welded steel plates, between which they pour concrete. It is much less labor-intensive and purportedly has excellent seismic properties.

Wood isn't flimsy. Drywall is fine, it's cheap and easy to repair. If built correctly can last 100+ years.

For a while in the 90s, a friend from Canada went to Germany and started building NA style houses (wood frame, drywall) in Germany. People loved that it could be finished in 3 months instead of 9-12 and cost 1/3 less, IIRC.

They're happy until the long-term effects hit them, as stick frame houses need repairs a lot more often. Nowadays, European companies have developed many modular building techniques that have reduced the labor considerably, from robots that 3D-print concrete walls, to LEGO-like hollow bricks.

I am sitting here in a 100+ year old stick frame house. The siding and shingles were replaced 10 years ago. There hasn't been any major structural work for at least 40 years.

What is your definition of "often"?

Most houses have asphalt shingles with an expected lifetime of ~15 years after which they start leaking and subject the house to the risk of mold. Contrast with ceramic tile shingles which easily last 75-100 years.

Of course you might say that durable materials exist in North America, but almost nobody chooses them. The likelihood of being able to move somewhere and be able to buy a modern durable house is ~0% in NA, and 30-90% in Europe depending on country and location. So you can do it in NA if you have enough money to rebuild a house. Good luck with that.

Ceramic tiles only last until a worker goes on the roof and breaks one. In the US, contractors routinely require you to release them from liability of any damage to ceramic tile shingles. Pest fumigation becomes much more of a pain.

That being said, if you want them, you can get them (this is how I know the above), and you can get other options. All of this is orthogonal to stick-frame construction. I've seen copper-roofs on stick-framed buildings even.

In a properly designed house there's almost never any need for a contractor to walk on the roof. Attics are fully insulated and are habitable, etc...

> Nowadays, European companies have developed many modular building techniques

It's so fun watching Europeans reinvent the Soviet approach to building that they used to mock and shit on

We shat on it (and still do) because of how badly designed and executed they were. Appalling quite and zero adherence to any norms or standards.

Any source? Because there were definitely norms and standards for buildings in the USSR

> They're happy until the long-term effects hit them, as stick frame houses need repairs a lot more often.

Please explain why you think this is true, I disagree and I work in construction.

Once you get a roof and siding on a building, the framing material doesn’t matter. As long as it’s strong enough for the application, the building will remain standing, provided you maintain the roof and siding. I’m living in a balloon framed stick-built house that is 140 years old right now.

The average quality of construction, due to use of low skill workers, is very bad. That's been my experience living and owning houses in Canada and the US.

Newer houses can have issues with mold if the HVAC is not designed or operated correctly due to the building envelope being wrapped in a vapor barrier, trapping moisture inside. Most of the housing stock is not from this time period, older houses do not have vapor barriers so they breathe a lot better.

All that being said, I’d be skeptical as hell about buying a Lennar or similar tract house built in the last 30 years for the same reasons you stated. I run union electrical work and trust my electricians to do good work, but residential construction is a whole different ballgame, lower skill levels and lots of corner cutting. I will lose money on a job to complete a project correctly, if that’s what it takes. My company has to compete locally and our reputation matters. I don’t trust the people working at home builders to make the same choice, they shit out a bunch of houses and move on, while I have to maintain my reputation and keep customers coming back for a couple decades if I want to keep my job.

Let’s just say if I was having a house built, I’d GC it myself and conduct frequent site visits, probably daily.

My main point was a well-constructed stick built house can last a long time if it’s maintained, but determining if a house is well-built is not particularly easy without cutting walls open and so on.

My main point is that modern European houses, if well built, don't need maintenance at all. The expectation if you buy a new house or renovate one, is that you won't have to do any maintenance beyond cleaning the roof gutters, for your lifetime (50 years). No siding to repaint or repair, no roof repairs, no sump pump, if there's a basement (likely not) it's fully built in cement on the sides as well.

And how much more does such a building cost? If it's significantly more than a "stick house", you invest the savings, and in 50 years, tear it down and build another one. Of course, if you had to wait until you're 45 to buy a "good" house, it doesn't matter.

I'm just saying - different people prefer different tradeoffs. My dad was his own GC in W. Germany in the late 60s and built our house. Took him years of working after-hours, etc. Sure, it's still standing. So is the "stick" house built around the same time in Canada that we bought used in the 80s. And the "stick" house I bought in the 00s in CA. Yes, we did the roof back then, and it's probably going to need a new roof soon - probably like 2-3% of the total value of the house. And possibly, putting solar panels on the house reduced it's lifespan. Oh yeah, our neighbors put clay tiles on the roof, which is an option.

> And how much more does such a building cost? If

It costs perhaps 50% more than a stick frame house and preserves its value much better because it's more durable. The house appreciation that people all over North America have been seeing is due to the land, not the building.

> different people prefer different tradeoffs

I don't think that everyone in North America would really prefer stick built, but due to regulations they have no choice and brick is much more expensive than just 50% extra.

Ehhh I don’t know if this is really that true. Beyond painting the exterior it’s not like a stick frame is requiring constant rebuilding.

There are a lot of variables at play and I am not sure the answer is to build stone houses like in parts of Germany.

When it rained into the interior wood frame of the home before they were done building it, did any Germans happen to stop by to explain biology?

Flimsy? No. I mean they won't survive a tornado, but homes aren't usually built with surviving a direct tornado hit in mind.

Sure it's not as strong as brick or concrete blocks, but it's strong enough for normal, every day use.

Where it does pale in comparison is hanging heavy objects on the wall. You do need to secure heavy loads to a stud, instead of just drilling and anchoring anywhere in the wall. However what it lacks there it more than makes up for in ease of routing low-voltage cables in an existing home.

Also, if I really wanted it, I could knock out almost all of my interior walls and completely change the layout of my home. Not something you do on a whim, but you can absolutely do so when renovating a home.

Wood and drywall is how most houses in Sweden are built as well.

Here's a timelapse of a Swedish house being built: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbSm0Zw00Cs

The drywall wall is stronger, heavier thicker stuff and sometimes doubled up. We also often use steel work as the studs (particularly good professionals) as it’s stronger and faster than wood to put up. Then all the wiring is in conduits, and it’s acceptable to put water feeds on the outside of walls in the room for servicing. Then it comes to our bathrooms which are proper wet rooms and usually built to a very high standard to meet insurance needs.

I watch a lot of building videos from the US, it’s eyeopening watching for someone used to better construction methods.

The construction of UK inner walls is even better, it”s often plaster applied on plasterboard/drywall usually by skilled trades. Very strong.

Running conduit for electrical wiring in a house is a huge waste of labor and material. PVC insulation and a nylon jacket is just fine for 2.5mm^2 (#14AWG) conductors, which is what 90% of the wiring in a house will be.

The only place that conduit is mandatory in residences in the US is Chicago.

Hell, most office buildouts in the US use very minimal amounts of conduit, most of the lightning and receptacle branch circuits are metal-clad cable (MC cable).

The way houses are built and what materials are used is very location specific do to climate and economics. North America has oodles of land to grow wood on. When you have cheap nails and screws wood is a FANTASTIC material to make houses out of and not flimsy at all when designed correctly. Europe used to make houses out of wood until they cut down all of their forests. Wood and drywall construction has the advantage of being fast to build and easy to remodel.

I personally like houses that use Insulated Concrete Forms for the exterior walls.

I live in rock and rolling California, and we love our stick framed houses. They’re very resilient to the tremblors that plague us.

Yea, if we’re hit hard enough, the stucco may or drywall may crack, but, big picture, those are cheap cosmetic fixes compared to anything more structural being damaged.

Back during the Northridge quake, my friend was buying a second floor condo in Santa Monica (which was hit pretty hard). It resulted in several drywall cracks, but nothing worse than that. Even better, the closing day was scheduled for the day after the quake.

I have heard (from a German co-worker) that you tend to double-up the drywall. Sheets go on vertically, then a second layer horizontally to double the thickness—improve soundproofing.

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