Some Poles have fine houses

I must admit that my not unusual, family-size house just outside Warsaw is bigger than that of most people I know in England, though not all. But in England they need substantially more money than I have to achieve that.

In my wife's farming village in the back of beyond all the new houses (post 1990) are large. Brits come here hoping to find misery, yet find luxury - they want to be better than someone, rather like "pow-white trash" in the Deep South.

One of my friends here seriously outdoes me though.

Have a look: janowekdwor.pl

I'll be going for a garden party there next month - looking forward to it!

Houses are generally bigger and the flats infinetly smaller.

When i first came here i advised everybody i knew to buy two bed (three room) apartments of 65m2 and above - preferably 80m2, how wrong could i have been. They dont sell or rent no where near as well as the little 35m2 jobbies.

Large and fine houses are for the nouveu rich, who in general must show their wealth. The concept of a charming cottage is as alien to them as tasteful jewelry or elegant clothing.

Didn't you buy a f*cking massive palace WB? Thats awesome :)

I find most houses in Poland are just badly layed out. Also the concept of having a living room (one that you don't sleep in) and a dining room are almost unheard of. and what is it with Polish kitchens? they seem to comprise of random bits of furniture which has been rescued from skips.

I have been in some truly awesome flats in the old inner city building of Poznan, If only people looked after them they would actually be amazing.

I love the Polish village tradition of having a bed in the kitchen. We often congregate there as a family and watch while the women cook. Cosy. Also a convenient place to lay your head when you've hit the vodka and can't make it upstairs.

Just come on up to Olsztyn, the building craze is going nuts up here. One day there's a field, a month later there's a housing estate.

Is it true? It don't smell?


I am really confused, unheard of? Honestly I yet live in anywhere without them.

Around where I live, last couple of years built at least 60 houses, in 3 different projects.

What they really do that? Thats disgusting.

All older village houses have a daytime bed/layabout sofa in the kitchen.

They mostly have a large reception room doubling as a dining/sitting room. Essentially it has to be large enough to host the first circle of the extended family - say 20 people - for Christmas/Easter/traditional Sunday **** up and natter.

They will have a sofa bed in the living room, but only for occasional use. Only the poor city dwellers would sleep there regularly though.

There's also the village houses with the big tiled stoves in the kitchen which can be used for keeping food warm or for sleeping on.

Can't beat a good old British Rayburn/Aga IMO

Not do, did. V is talking about old country homes. If you had ever lived in a house before central heating in a cold climate as Poland use to be, you would know why your bed was as near as the stove as practicaly possible.

I can see you also have never seen a modern studio apartment either.

Yep. I have a friend called Agnieszka, and when she called herself Aga, she wondered why I laughed. Wonder what she'd have said if I called her an old boiler.

Aga as a girl is pronounced "Agger"

I wasnt going to mention it but:

I did, I bought two houses, the first was a Polish Pałace which im sat in right now and is obscenely huge with loads of land around 20 hectares and the second was a town house investment property in Wroclaw.

I couldnt dream of such properties in the UK. Even when i rented my first apartment here back in early 2006, my friends that came over where astonished at the amount of living space.

Everything comes into perspective when you take the Stansted express from Stansted airport to central London as to how small houses are in the UK.

Poland: 1 England: 0

not true.

Living room in polish is called salon. I have salon in my home.

I find English houses to be small, old and outated. Just like old-school houses in Poland, but still a bit bigger. :)


You don't think that every Pole owns a house looking like that, right? :)

You dont think that every english person lives in a house like that do you ? :)
But lol,it does make me laugh when I see houses down south that are going for close on £1million,around here those pokey terrece houses and didy little flats would be social housing or bedsits full of immigrants and students :)

No, I don't. :) And I have never been in England! LOL! But that's what I see on tv. You guys gotta do something about that image. :)

Dont worry, I was scared you'd somehow seen my house :)
Yeah,the image,I'll tell them to stop filming in all those picturesque locations ,medievil villages and stuff like that,focus more on new build estates and footballers vulgar mansions instead :)


lol,dont tell me,Eastenders on BBC prime? :)
BTW, I do agree,if you mean the sort of houses you see in London,they are a joke,if my house was in London it would be "worth" easily 6 or 7 times as much ....

No sh*t what'd you think Poles live in clay huts? Many people in the country have large well made houses, most were build after 1980, only really poor people got those one level 2 bedroom houses.

Well made?

I beg to differ - many of them are thrown up and built from cheap materials. The vast majority of post-1990 residential construction has been of appalling quality.

Well I wasnt going to bring up those breeze block monstrosities I saw being thrown up between Krakow/Zakopane a few years back......

Yea well made indeed.In comparison with American houses built with 2x4's and plywood Polish houses are freaking bunkers.

a brick or cinder block house, with tile or metal roofing is well made unless the builder f'ed it up. Compare to American wood framing, vinyl siding, and shingle roofing it's 5x better. Building products are so expensive here only rich can build a house like that.

Maybe the three little pigs is a purely european childrens tale eh?

Amazing how many heavy pictures the wall can hold, tough. ;)

What does it mean? I think they are 100% fine. A brick is a brick.

True enough,but it only counts as to how they are put together.

I prefer Polish housing over English simply because of the nature. I would love to have a nice old large villa in some Polish farm/forest or in their mountains right dab in the middle of the famous European nature. Either there or Bavaria, French valleys, or Swiss alps. My family owns property in Italy and Greece but it's too damn crammed everywhere in Italy and Greece is too hot and I don't like the whole beach culture there. Also I don't understand all the modern day minimalist modernist crap in the cities where people pay tons of money for. Here in Chicago you could pay tons more for a small apartment with some over rated view in a crammed populated area than you would for a super-mansion in winnetka (the rich suburb of illinois).