Is a roof overhang necessary to protect the facade?

Hey,

we currently have to decide whether we want a roof overhang or not.

Unfortunately, we are not allowed to post the plans online, so here are the most important details:
- New construction
- Two floors (ground floor and upper floor)
- Gable roof
- Dormer with flat roof on one side
- Ridge height: 7.5m
- Eaves height: 4m
- Karlsruhe area, edge of town, next to a field
- Exterior material: normally plastered and painted

The architect does not suggest a roof overhang because it brings no benefit and costs money. Over the past weeks, we have looked at houses without roof overhangs, mainly flat roofs, since we found few gable roofs without overhang, and most had dirty facades where you could see water on the wall and partially inside the wall. I cannot judge how these damages occurred; perhaps the construction was also done carelessly. After the viewings and discussions with family and friends, we tend to go with the standard 70-80 cm overhang.

What do you think is the correct practice (optical preference put aside for now)?

Thanks!

If the optical preference does not matter, I would work with an overhang of at least 50cm (rather 70cm-1m). On the one hand for facade protection, but it is also pleasant to be able to stay reasonably dry around the house when it rains but it is not so windy. It also provides a bit of shading at least when the sun is still high in the sky (of course this can also be seen as a disadvantage, but when it is high, you usually don't want it so much in the living space anyway, due to the already excessive heat and when it is cold it is so low that the roof overhang does not matter.

The architect does not propose an eaves overhang because it brings no benefit and costs money. [...] After inspections and consultations within family and acquaintances, we tend towards the standard 70-80 cm overhang. What do you think is the correct practice (optical preference initially aside)?

If the optical preference (and only that varies with fashion) is set aside, the technically sensible measurement remains constant. The "correct practice" there is 25 cm on the gable sides and 50 cm (as seen in the floor plan, corresponding to 70 cm rafter length at a 45° pitch) overhangs. If it is more than 50 cm (as seen in the floor plan), this is often acceptable only with regard to the distance to the building boundary.

Some architects like houses without roof overhangs. If you are not allowed to put a flat roof in the residential area, at least this way you can express that a special look was intended rather than skillfully achieved.

When I look around, 70-80cm is certainly not the standard, more like 30-50cm. You certainly won't achieve a serious shading effect from the roof overhang at a eaves height of 4m. Protection from normal rain is already achieved with less. With corresponding wind, even 2m won't help.

We have now built without eaves for the 2nd time because we like the look. With the first house, we had no problems at all with a dirty facade (had it repainted after 10 years, the color or the condition of the facade was not the reason for it, the facade still looked good). However, we had also chosen a rather expensive facade paint, while our neighbors with eaves had only chosen colored plaster, and the facade on the weather side looked terrible after 5 years.

Thank you very much for your answers, we will probably take the minimum 25cm/50cm as recommended by some here.

Protection from normal rain is already achieved with less.

What would be the minimum in your opinion?

We have now built without eaves for the 2nd time because we like the look. With the first house, we had no problems with a dirty facade (we had it repainted after 10 years, but the color or condition of the facade was not the reason, the facade still looked good). However, we also chose a not exactly cheap facade paint, while our neighbors with eaves had only colored plaster and their facade on the weather side looked terrible after 5 years.

Was it just the color or what else did you do that made it work without eaves?