Do you enter your house through the front door?

[JBJones]

Never. We have neighbors from hell and only use the back door. But we can easily see if there is a notice on the front door.

[dsmith]

Back door, which leads to the driveway. We do check the mail in the front of the house every delivery day.

[Miss Tick]

My crazy house has 7 exterior doors. The garage is attached, so I use that one. Guests use the front door. Some, like the one into my off-white carpeted bedroom, are never used.

[whitestavern]

No, and I've never even gone through it. We have two side doors--one goes out to a patio and driveway, the other out to a patio and our pool area. The front door goes into a hall with a front staircase, which we never use either. Sounds weird as I'm typing it...

[Lady Florida.]

Garage door. Even if I'm driving the car that we don't park in the garage (only one fits even though it's supposedly a two-car garage) I still come in through the garage. We keep the door from the garage to the house unlocked  in the daytime and we keep the front door locked day and night, so it's just easier to hit the garage door opener then come in a door without needing to get my key out. (I don't keep a house key on the car key chain - it's a separate key chain.)

[Ellie]

Do you usually enter your house through the front door or a side/garage door? We do use the front door when checking mail but not when we are leaving the house. Usually we go through the garage.

 

Just curious. We have been under a boil water advisory the last couple days and were notified via a flyer on the front door. Fortunately I had also heard about the advisory via FB otherwise I wouldn't have known for a few hours. I texted the people I knew to give them a heads up just in case they hadn't heard. I have noticed today that many of my neighbors still have flyers on their doors and are possibly unaware of the advisory. We can see the door from our driveway so I probably would have noticed a flyer but also probably would have assumed it was an ad for lawncare or something.

 

I park my car in the garage, so generally, I come in through that door. However, Mr. Ellie parks in the driveway and so he comes in through the front door. Any other time we want to leave or enter the house, it's through the front door. The back door is, well, in the back.  

[Plagefille]

Rarely. The garage door is much more convenient.

[PuddleJumper1]

Never. Our actual front door is nowhere near where we park (attached, covered carport added to the house). We always use the side door which opens up under the covered area. We're used to it but it is strange for visitors. The door opens right into our laundry area. 

 

The front door has only ever been used for moving furniture in and out of the house. 

Edited October 19, 2017 by PuddleJumper1

[BarbecueMom]

Garage door. It sounds bad, but generally only service people and kids selling stuff use our front door. It's kind of difficult to use, and our white board easel often has to be moved to open it (not too heavy to block it in case of fire).

 

Funny story about doors and "service entrances". I used to work at a large police department, transcribing police reports. A guy in a wealthy (but not like CEO/celebrity wealthy) neighborhood had his mailbox run over. The officer knocked on his front door to take the report, and when the homeowner answered, he looked at her and said, "Oh. The servant entrance is on the other side, through the garden." And shut the door in her face!

 

I can't remember how that ended up. Probably a lot less exciting than I would have wanted.

[skimomma]

We use ours most of the time.  We have a detached garage way behind the house and we still hoof it all the way around to the front door because the back door requires going up a lot of deck steps that we do not clear of snow from Nov-May.  Most people around here use their front doors because that is usually where our boot porches are.  These serve as airlocks and a place to shed and stow snowy boots.  Very old houses (ours is 130+ years old), no or detached garage are the norm.  Back/side doors are usually reserved for summer months when it is not muddy....which is about never.  "Deck Opening" parties are the highlight of May when we can finally chip the ice off of decks and drink a beer while shivering and pretending it is warm.

[freesia]

front door

 

 

[Rachel]

Garage door. It sounds bad, but generally only service people and kids selling stuff use our front door. It's kind of difficult to use, and our white board easel often has to be moved to open it (not too heavy to block it in case of fire).

 

Funny story about doors and "service entrances". I used to work at a large police department, transcribing police reports. A guy in a wealthy (but not like CEO/celebrity wealthy) neighborhood had his mailbox run over. The officer knocked on his front door to take the report, and when the homeowner answered, he looked at her and said, "Oh. The servant entrance is on the other side, through the garden." And shut the door in her face!

 

I can't remember how that ended up. Probably a lot less exciting than I would have wanted.

Wow! I wonder how the officer handled that? I mean really.

[Elfknitter.#]

In this house, the front door. The garage is detached. 

[J-rap]

We enter through the front in the fall, spring, and summer, when we park out on the street.  In the winter, we park in the garage, which is an old garage, separate from the house (both over 100 years old) that we access through an alley.  Then we enter through the backdoor.  

 

 

[Rosika]

Do you usually enter your house through the front door or a side/garage door? We do use the front door when checking mail but not when we are leaving the house. Usually we go through the garage.

 

 

We have both an attached and a detached garage. My sons and I park in the detached, and enter the house through the side door. My husband parks in the attached but also uses the side door 80% of the time because he checks on his garden before heading inside. 

 

I do use the front door daily. We have a stray cat that I feed on the front patio. 

[mom2scouts]

We use both our front door and garage door equally. We purposefully bought a house that has the garage door open into the entryway because we liked that all coming and going was from one area and coats, shoes, and boots are always by the door whether we're going to the garage or out the front door. Even if I'm going into the garage, I still drive by the front porch and look for any packages or fliers.

[Tap]

We use both.  We often exit through the front door and enter through the garage.  We don't park in the garage, but often use the garage remote to open the door so we don't have to use a key to get into the house. 

[Word Nerd]

Rarely.

[Rachel]

I should have done a poll!

 

Some of you mentioned no front door, do you live in an apartment, condo, boat? I'm trying to figure out what a house looks like with no front door.

[foxbridgeacademy]

I park in the garage and DH parks in the drive but we both enter through the garage/kitchen door.  You can see the front door from the road/drive so it's unlikely we'd miss a notice.

[desertstrawberry5]

Guests use the front door, we use the back. They are maybe ten feet apart. the front door opens into an entry way. The back door opens into THE STOVE. If I'm cooking, I lock the back door so no one hits me with it. 
We have a carport which we use as a play area. We don't have a garage and don't park in the carport. The laundry closet is in the carport, too. 

[lllll]

nm

Edited October 23, 2017 by Catheryn

[Rachel]

Guests use the front door, we use the back. They are maybe ten feet apart. the front door opens into an entry way. The back door opens into THE STOVE. If I'm cooking, I lock the back door so no one hits me with it.

We have a carport which we use as a play area. We don't have a garage and don't park in the carport. The laundry closet is in the carport, too.

Your house sounds very similar to my husband's grandparents. Although their door opens to the stairway to the basement. If you aren't paying attention at the top of the steps you could be knocked backwards.

[Daria]

Front door.

 

Unless we forget the house key. Then one of the kids goes in through the cat door in back.

Do you have a giant cat or a precocious baby?

[JFSinIL]

Front door 100%.  While we do have a garage, it is not only used for storage, it is in the back of the lot and the driveway/gate to it is far too narrow for me to feel comfy using it (house built 1906...lots/houses not planned with attached garages back then).    We all park single file in the narrow driveway or on the street.

 

Some folks here do have side doors by the driveway they can use, not us. Depends on the house. 

 

I grew up in Southern Calif. tract homes and everyone had an attached garage.  We still used the front door most of the time.  I like it here in an older  Midwest area since it is rare to find two houses obviously built at the time by the same builder on any street - every house here is from between 1880s and 1929..then a big gap before a few post-WWll houses crop up. Most houses have front porches, too (many enclosed over the decades though  :sleep:*) Of course we are close to the center of our small city - farther out are the newer cookie cutter tract homes with attached garages in front, etc.

 

*often the top step of the porch is right smack against the new front door, and it is a struggle to unlock and open the door without falling backwards down the step.  No one is allowed per code to do this now, but many older homes are "grandfathered" in with these entryways.  I can see why it was done back then - folks needed the extra living space as some older homes were small by our needs - but I am glad I still have a proper covered porch to stand on out of the rain/snow while I unlock the front door.

Edited October 20, 2017 by JFSinIL

[Carrie12345]

Always.  We don't have a garage.

 

We'll use the back door going in and out when we're "at home", but not when leaving or returning.  It's a slider and we don't have a key.  And it's farther from the driveway.  

[bettyandbob]

No garage. Only front door.

[creekland]

Is anyone else reading this and envisioning types of houses?

 

We usually enter through our side door which is next to our driveway (no attached garage).  This leads into a mud room that is super important when one is coming in from pastures - just a formality when one is coming in from the car.

 

We use our front door to check mail, go on some walks, let the cat in/out, and when visitors other than our neighbors come.  Our neighbors know to use the side door.  We have a back door that never gets used.

 

There have been times something has been left on the front porch or in the front screen door that we've missed for a time period - usually not long - but long enough.  Boiling water would never be an issue here though as we're on well water.

[MaeFlowers]

We use our front door.

 

We can't park in the garage because there is too much stuff in there. We need a shed.

[Rachel]

Is anyone else reading this and envisioning types of houses?

 

Yes!

 

I love visiting different parts of the country and driving through local neighborhoods. Different regions definitely have different types of architecture.

[Lady Florida.]

  You can see the front door from the road/drive so it's unlikely we'd miss a notice.

 

Same here, plus we live on a cul de sac. Any time there's a delivery truck on our street we hear it. Sometimes it takes a day or two to notice things that people walking our street might have put at the door, but those are usually solicitations and we aren't interested.