Yeah it's over 100k away and in a location that makes getting to work a bitch...Unless you work in Norfolk, well, not much you can do from there....

The UK is a troublesome one as location is so important, but more vitally, location in regard to vacinity of London. Finding work 50km North of London is damn hard, let alone 100+ hence why finding somewhere cheap in Manchester or York isn't hard. Ultimately I could rant on about the economy, but I won't :-x

Brick is certainly better than wood and plasterboard/drywall. But I'd love to see you try to walk through it.

Its not like you can't get a brick-built house in the US. They exist. They're just not typical any more. The house I live in was built in 1910 and is still very solid - it survived a fire about 5 years ago. Wood built houses are still quite nice. Yes, there are some very crappy houses in the US, but they're even cheaper than the ones I've mentioned.

And again, the reason we're discussing this is that you can actually afford a house in the US. Its nice your house is brick. But I own multiple houses, and I've bought them with my own money. Did you?

I am not from the UK we have wood up our asses. Plasterboard is not really what I count as costfactor its cheap around here too. I am not even sure we used plasterboard much. This house is 450k my parents house just the tiles for the floors were 100k and since the stone is from Italy I bet we got it cheaper.

I was there as a kid when my parents build the house and just the glass for the windows was crazy expensive. And the materials can't be 10 times cheaper in the US. Its like saying yeah gold is 10 times cheaper in the USA. Those are world wide similar prices.

And seriously Hurricane resistant ? I see it on TV how resistant those houses are. If a Hurricane would cross a house around these parts I guess it could damage the rooftop. I would really love to see what a Hurricane could do to my parents house. 

My point is, in 300 years this house will be gone nothing will remain. Ours will still stand. Heck a friend of mine lives in a house thats 500 years old.

Its really pointless to compare houses from rural USA to european stone/brick houses. It takes way longer to build  more work and costs way more. In Europe the stuff is all massive and the materials high quality. That makes it look expensive. We also have the US trend of building Paperhouses for the poor, american style. You can't really judge a book by its cover. Same with houses.

Well, when an Earth quake happens, we'll be sure to remember you after your house collapses on top of you.

Brick and Stone buildings are notorious for collapsing during an earth quake because too much of the vibration is directed through the walls, and brick and stone doesn't flex.

Which is why, in areas where earth quakes happen and high death rates are reported, the majority of those buildings are brick or stone.  That's one of the big concerns with New York City and other major metropolitan areas of the US on the East Coast.  The buildings aren't designed with earth quakes in mind and if one does occur it could be devastating. 

The most destructive force of a hurricane isn't wind.  In fact as a destructive force the wind of a Cat 5 Hurricane isn't even as powerful as an F3 tornado.

The must destructive force of a hurricane is water, and it's not the water that's coming in, which is extremely powerful, it's when the water rolls back out.

http://www.constellation7.org/Randi/Syn.jpg

After hurricane Sandy.  There are lots more pictures like this. 

Once the water gets it, the pressure exerted by the water escaping tears apart the building.  Exterior walls are more likely to be damaged, than say interior or adjoining walls.

Your parent's house likely wouldn't fair all that well if the water can get to it.  If not, the the biggest challenge would be your windows.  It's harder to secure windows on a brick/stone building than it is on a wood/metal one.  But if you secured them, than likely your house would fair just as well as a home in Florida. 

Now the advantage you have with a stone/brick house is that it will survive a volcano.  So, archeologists one day can dig out your home and find your parents huddle in a corner of the house, like they did in Pompey.

Hurricane resistant Windows are standard I think. Atleast we have them. House was build in an Earthquakezone there are regulations to follow. Its steel reinforced and walls are able to swing independently. I am not sure how its called in english but the swinging properties are good enough.

Water well, I am not sure how water would get Inside the house. Its not like we have never Hurricanes here just not nearly as strongand rarely but houses if they are new have to be build after guidelines always with the worst case scenario in mind. 

I really wouldn't feel safe in an american house build with thin walls. Floors are steel concrete nothing will fall on your head. Those things are extremly thick and rest on steel rods. I am not sure how this is more dangerous than staying in a house that can turn into a plane if the wind is strong.

Impact resistant windows would help significantly, especially if they include re-inforced frames.  They aren't a guarantee, however.  Laminated glass can give way with enough force, but they will hold up better than regular windows.  In Florida they're standard.  In Europe, I doubt they would be because of their expense.  Although on lower levels they would help prevent breakins.  Unless there is a regulation in Europe I'm unaware of, impact resistant glass would be extremely expensive for the average use.

My reference was more if a house like your parents was built in Florida or the Gulf Coast of the US.  I'm guessing that the majority of Europe sits high enough that if a hurricane strikes, the incoming tide would do little damage.  However, an area like the Firth of Clyde in Scotland would likely be inundated with an incoming tide.  Most of the coastal cities would have some significant damage.  Ayr, Irvine, Saltcoats, even Glasgow.

Typically, water gets in anyway it wants.  Under doors, through crawl spaces, pushing in windows or doors.  But it doesn't need to get inside to do damage either.  As with the tsunami in Japan, the outflow can either pulls down walls or undermine the foundations.

Generally speaking our houses don't turn into planes with a strong wind.  An F5 tornado is a different story, however in an F5 tornado the only safe places is in a purposed designed tornado shelter.  Regardless of the structure design, in an F5 tornado the 300+ wind speeds would obliterate any building.  Though, if you applied both hurricane and earthquake building codes it might withstand it better. 

You'd be surprised what our houses can withstand.  While we lack 1,000 year old buildings, because we haven't been around for more than 300, we do still have centuries old tinderbox, matchstick houses that somehow stand up. 

It's good to know your parents house is built with reinforced walls, I assumed being in Europe, your country lacked modern building stanards.

would love to move to montreal... if i speak french...

In Europe/modern Europe, double-glazing is standard which tends to be rather resiliant to knocks and bangs. Whether it is as good as a single sheet of impact resistant glass I don't know, but I've seen football(soccer balls) hit them at full force and just bounce right off. 

As for modern building standards in Europe, I think most modern houses are only one brick thick on the inside, and 2 with a cavity inbetween on the outside. Victorian used to be 3+; those houses are fantastic. 

It's not really a secret that Europe's housing is very expensive.

Especially Western Europe. For the price of the house I live in, you could buy mansions in other parts of the world. My house has three bedrooms, one bathroom and a living room/kitchen as well as a yard. That's pretty standard here. 120 square meters, so 1300 square foot I guess. That's big enough for most Europeans. We've lived in smaller homes (compared to the rest of the world excluding East Asia) for thousands of years, because there's no space.

There's been a big discussion already, but it's the absolute truth; what we lack in space we make up in built quality, hence the price.

No amount of normal natural forces except the apocalypse will be able to destroy our houses. They're all built with heavy, high quality materials. My own house has structural, load-bearing walls made of reinforced concrete 30cm (1 foot) thick on top of a reinforced concrete pile foundation! You could built a whole skyscraper with that. Interior walls are highly compressed sandstone for which you need heavy power-tools to make any kind of dent and the exterior walls are all bricks, high quality and very thick insulation with windows of multi-layered glass in hardwood or steel frames.

This is all standard for newer houses in most Western European countries, whether you live in the rural areas or not. Building in heavy stone materials, plaster and cement and even steel has been the tradition since the Romans. They must've done something right, even after numerous earthquakes that hit Rome, most of it still stands two-thousand years later.

When a quarter of my country, parts of Belgium and a good chunk of England was covered in over 20 feet of water in 1953 you didn't see any houses floating by. They all survived.