North facing deck - any sun?

[sora]

Hi,
I'm thinking of moving into a townhouse with a back yard deck facing north. There is no lawn and the whole thing is wooden deck. The house faces south but only have one window facing south in the kitchen and the rest is carport.

The living room has a sliding door to the deck. So the main sources of natural light in this house are sliding doors to North. I'm concerned that it will be always dark all day long.

If the deck is facing north, will I not get any sun at any time? I would like to have sun at least some part of the day. There is another townhouse unit facing the deck. Anyone who has experience please let me know. Thanks.

[chel]

I've lived in several apartments with lighting issues and agree it's something to take serious!

I just moved from an apartment with only windows on the south and north side. I rarely got any direct sunlight from the north windows, maybe a ray here and there, but the parking lot in front got plenty of light. What kinda of neighbours do you have west of you? Would they block what little light you might get directly on the deck?

I would be concerned more with how cold rooms will feel. my dd's north facing bedroom was always freezing. Nice in summer, but that's only about 2 months long where I live and can only think it's shorter for you. So I would rather have too much sun for the short summer, than no sun for a long winter.

[Delicateflower]

No, it won't get any sun at all. Maybe at sunrise/sunset around midsummer. Was there a north facing room in the house you grew up in? Think of that room being your whole house. Yuk!

[sora]

Too bad...Everything else seems to be right. It is big and very close to a beautiful park.
I would like to hear from more moms about living in this kind of place.
Thanks!

[sacredmama]

Does the south facing window in the kitchen have any space for containers? I'm just thinking in terms of being able to grow some food, because you won't be able to on the back porch. We have north and east facing windows. We get morning sun and then its cool in the afternoon because there's no direct sunlight, but still enough light to not have to turn on lights during the day, so thats a bonus. You'll get the sun in the am in the kitchen which would be nice.

[ParisApril]

I would stay away. We have three south facing windows upstairs and two in the basement in our house and they let in enough light all year so that we never have to turn lights on during the day.

If you buy that place you utility bills would be higher for sure.

[rainyday]

Especially since you live in BC, I wouldn't do it will probably get some light on the deck in high summer when the sun is pretty far north, but you won't get any direct light in through those deck doors.

For us, the nice thing about having a deck is being able to USE it. We love to sit out and have dinner out there on summer evenings. But here in the northwest, the temperature drops as soon as the sun sets - so if the sun never hits your deck (or only hits it rarely), it won't be nice enough to eat out there nearly as often, even in summer.

Also, the lack of light really affects me psychologically. I live in a rainy climate, and unless you're in Kamloops or someplace else in the interior, you do too. I've found that I'm much happier day to day in a place with lots of natural light versus being in a house or apartment that doesn't let much natural light in. This makes an even bigger difference to my mood on dark, grey days, probably because those are the days when I really crave more light!

[soccermama]

Our house faces North, therefore, our flower beds against the house don't get much sun, but the grass seems to and the silver leaf maple in our front yard does, too. The beds get morning sun and late afternoon/early evening sun. It's hard to find nice things to grow.

[ChetMC]

North South

We used to live in a north-south oriented townhouse. The north side got no sun at all, and the south side cooked.

The rooms with north windows were dark, but the rooms with south windows were warm and bright. The balance was fine. The north side stayed cool in the summer. It would have been really unpleasant though if most of the windows had faced north.

You can do a lot with artificial lighting if your options are limited and everything else about this place is good, but if you can, I'd hold out for something with better light.

[Czen:)]

Were in the Okanagan and I would love to have my living room north facing! Our south facing living room is almost unbearably hot & bright all summer. I guess it depends where in BC you are. Our deck is north facing and we really appreciate it. Otherwise it would be just too hot to use all summer. As it is there are still many evenings we can't handle the heat out there.