Here is how to work out which way a property faces, and what each orientation really means once you are living in it.
Most of us check the same things at a viewing: floor area, layout, the state of the kitchen. Orientation comes last, if it comes up at all. It shouldn’t. Which way a flat faces decides how much daylight you get, how warm the rooms are in August and how much you spend keeping the place comfortable.
Get it right and you gain natural light and a lower energy bill. Get it wrong and no amount of refurbishment will fix it, because you cannot move the building.
So the question is a fair one: how do you work out which way a property faces? At Klic Arquitectos, our architecture practice in Málaga, we do it three ways.
How to work out which way a property faces
Use a compass
The old method, and still the quickest. A compass points to magnetic north, so stand square to the façade and read off the bearing. The phone in your pocket will do: the small gap between magnetic north and true north makes no practical difference at a viewing.
Note where the needle actually falls. It often won’t land neatly on one of the four cardinal points, and that is normal. Most buildings sit somewhere in between, which is how you end up with north-west, south-east and the rest. Those intermediate orientations matter more than people expect, because the property then behaves like a blend of two aspects rather than one.
Check the catastro
The catastro is Spain’s property cadastre: an administrative inventory in which every building and plot, rural or urban, has to be recorded. It is not the Land Registry (Registro de la Propiedad), which deals with who owns what — the catastro deals with the physical thing, its surface area and its footprint. Anyone can consult it online at the Sede Electrónica del Catastro.
There you will find a plan of the flat or house you are interested in. To read the orientation off it, take the top of the sheet as north. Everything follows from that reference: the wall at the bottom faces south, the one on the right faces east, and so on.
If a wall runs diagonally between east and north on the plan, the rooms behind it face one of the intermediate points. It is a two-minute check and it costs nothing.
Check it on Google Maps
From a computer, type in the exact address. Google Maps can be locked to north, so a glance at the roof and the line of the street tells you where the façade looks — useful while you are still browsing listings from home.
The pros and cons of each orientation
Now that you know how to work out which way a property faces, there is a second question worth just as much: which orientation actually suits you? On the Costa del Sol the answer is often not the one British buyers arrive with.
North-facing
Rarely anyone’s first choice, because the sun never enters directly. In a warm climate that is precisely the point, and north-facing rooms here are more liveable than their reputation suggests. In a colder country it is a genuine drawback: the heating works harder and the bill shows it.
What you do get, all day and all year, is even, unchanging light. That is why a north-facing living room in Málaga can end up being the most comfortable room in the flat.
South-facing
Usually the favourite, particularly when choosing a flat in an apartment block. The reason is simple: direct light for most of the day, most of the year, and in cold places sun that heats the rooms for free.
That adds up to a real saving, because you use far less artificial lighting and heating. The caveat on this coast is shade. The same sun that is a bonus in Manchester needs controlling in Málaga, and a south-facing flat with no overhang, no shutter and no depth to the terrace gets uncomfortable from May onwards.
East-facing
Direct sun from first light until midday. The property warms through the morning and the heat drains away over the afternoon. On the Costa del Sol that is close to ideal: you get the sun at the hour it is pleasant and lose it at the hour it isn’t.
West-facing
If the compass tells you the property looks west, be aware this is one of the least requested aspects among buyers.
The sun arrives at midday and stays until dusk — the hottest hours of the day. A drawback in a warm region, an advantage in a cold one. This is also where buyers tend to get caught out: a west-facing terrace is lovely at seven in the evening in April and unusable at the same hour in July.
Orientation is one of the cheapest things to check before you make an offer and one of the most expensive to get wrong, because it is the one feature of a property you can never change. If you are weighing up a purchase on the Costa del Sol, it is among the first things we look at — long before the paperwork.
