Ground floor flat or 2nd floor - which one?

GwylimT

mumps wrote: »

I think people feel that it would make them uncomfortable about someone looking in when they were asleep, you know you would feel more vulnerable. I like to sleep with my bedroom window wide open, even in winter, so I can understand that would feel more exposed than in the first floor or higher.

Can someone like that not get a blind or a pair of curtains?

bouicca21

What all this comes down to is that there are many different kinds of blocks of flats and that calculations about ground or upper floors are going to be dependent on local conditions I can happily sleep with my windows open; there is no way anyone could look in but I leave the transoms open not the big windows. I open windows in my living areas too - we are well set back from the road. I live in a low crime area but having been burgled once 30 odd years ago, I don't live anywhere without a burglar alarm.

SailorSam

I've never lived in a flat,the ground floor would appeal 'cos it's easier to move stuff into but everyone would be walking past your frontdoor. And i imagine it's easier to break into somewhere at ground level, so that would push me towards a higher floor. Noise wise from traffic i would think it would be worse at ground level.
I think i'd pick the second floor.

Kynthia

So many flats differ that it can really depend. I lived on a ground floor flat where the front doors weren't by the stairwell, so you didn't get lots of people walking past your door, we had our own private garden which meant no one could walk near our windows as the garden was in between, and although two of the three ground floor flats had a couple of bedroom windows at the front of the building by the car park the middle flat (ours) did not. Tge ground floor flats also had the nearest and widest parking spaces, so that combined with a nice little garden meant the ground floor flats were incredibly popular.

mumps

cjdavies wrote: »

With windows and ground floor, dopes that mean no-one will buy a house?

I only have upstairs windows open when I am in bed and I also have a private garden so people aren't likely to be looking straight in. Obviously not all houses have front gardens and I suppose that is why people have nets?

We have thought about a bungalow as my husband is disabled but we have enough arguments about how wide I like the windows open at night and I can only see that being worse if we were on the ground floor so we are going the stairlift route.

mumps

Kynthia wrote: »

So many flats differ that it can really depend. I lived on a ground floor flat where the front doors weren't by the stairwell, so you didn't get lots of people walking past your door, we had our own private garden which meant no one could walk near our windows as the garden was in between, and although two of the three ground floor flats had a couple of bedroom windows at the front of the building by the car park the middle flat (ours) did not. Tge ground floor flats also had the nearest and widest parking spaces, so that combined with a nice little garden meant the ground floor flats were incredibly popular.

That sounds like a good design. Good tips for anyone thinking of buying a flat, you often don't realise till you live somewhere.