Wooden houses: advantages and disadvantages

Wood is a renewable material that, controlled through sustainable production, makes it an ecological option . In addition, compared to the usual construction materials and the construction process, it saves a lot of money.

Whether they are prefabricated wooden houses or built on site , the time required to build them is shorter. In the second case, building a wooden house will not take more than 4 or 5 months , and fewer operators are needed.

And what about solidity? Is a wooden house reliable? If we think about the tale of the three little pigs or let ourselves be carried away by the first sensations, it will be easy to think that wooden houses are not as solid as they should be. This is not the case, however, since wood has great mechanical resistance . Its lightness does not prevent it from being a solid material, capable of offering the same protection as brick walls. Let’s not forget that wooden structures are common in houses built in the traditional way, and that the choice of this material is due to its enormous strength.

Added to its solidity is a great durability , much greater than is usually believed. They resist well to wear and tear caused by humidity, wind and the sun and, in short, their durability is practically eternal.

In addition, with the proper treatment of the wood, they do not pose a greater risk than classic houses in case of fire. On the contrary, wood is a fire stable material that burns very slowly when flames attack it , unlike some materials used in today’s architecture that are much more flammable and burn faster. Thanks to treatments with fire retardant substances, combustion is no faster than that of a building made of cement, bricks and concrete. In this aspect, there is also a great lack of knowledge, on the other hand logical, since they are new solutions.

The aesthetics of wooden houses is another of its strengths, both in terms of personal taste and landscape integration. In addition, the possibility of moving them, a possibility when the wooden house is modular and prefabricated, makes them the ideal option to produce the least environmental impact after moving them.

Among the benefits of living in a wooden house , it should also be mentioned that the feeling of living in a house of this type is synonymous with comfort and well-being . In fact, wood is a hygroscopic material. In practice, this translates into a greater ability to regulate indoor air humidity which, together with its insulating power, provides a pleasant feeling of well-being.

When it comes to achieving energy efficiency, in effect, wood is an interesting material to thermally insulate the house and save on the electricity bill or on the use of firewood when it comes to keeping it warm in winter and cool in summer.

We will enhance its thermal insulation if we resort to supplementary insulators that will also help insulate it at an acoustic level, although wood in itself is a good insulator against acoustic pollution, an interesting property that can also be used inside the home.

Finally, we highlight as a positive aspect the possibility of gradually building it . Whether due to a lack of budget or because new needs arise, enlarging a wooden house will be relatively easy.

Although we have seen the advantages of using this material to build houses, there are also problems of wooden houses that should be known before choosing to build or buy them with this material.

In the same way that we can consider controlled wood as a renewable material, cutting trees is unethical . If our sensibilities are in tune with this argument, using wood that implies cutting down trees is not a good idea. Perhaps not so much at a private level, but as a consumer option that involves cutting down trees on a massive scale . In short, its utilitarian use is transcended and the tree is considered a living being that must be respected.

In turn, dedicating vast spaces to the growth of trees that are going to be used as raw material means using resources such as the same land and irrigation water and even fertilizers to accelerate their growth, being able to dedicate themselves to crops for human consumption. That, without counting the enormous loss of trees suffered by the planet, of about 15,000 copies each year.

Compared to other materials, such as stone, it has some weaknesses related to its insulating power, but only in comparative terms and for certain cases, which does not prevent us from affirming that wood is a powerful thermal insulator.

And what about termites, mold, and moisture ? Wooden houses have this problem, but as we have pointed out in the upper lines, it is a problem with a solution.

Its durability is comparable to that of other classic construction materials if it is treated properly. Above all, it is mandatory to do so in certain regions where weather conditions require it. Ideally, this should be done in all cases.

Beautiful and different, this is how many see it, but it is also true that culturally a wooden house is associated with a lower quality house. Most likely, the image of traditional log cabins weighs too much. However, nothing is further from the truth. Wooden houses can be everything luxurious and spectacular that one can imagine.

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