I built all three houses, but I only live in one. Windstad Manor is my crafting/armory house, Heljarchen Hall is pretty much my wizard's tower, but Lakeview Manor is built to be lived in. It's also the only one that's 100% complete. It has the bedrooms, the kitchen, and the storage room. And I'm pretty sure Mehrunes' Razor is lost somewhere in it...

Well, I actually build Heljarchen and Lakeview Manor with kids bedrooms. Heljarchen has the bedrooms kitchen and a storage room, Lakeview has the armory, storage room and bedrooms, because I wanted a wrap-around porch. I moved my family there, since it has a milder climate and my kids complained how cold it was in the Pale LOL

Windstad is my personal retreat, when I need a break from killing, kids and married life LOL It has the Alchemy and Enchanters tower, as well as the Library. I do all my smithing work here as well.

All 3 houses are 100% complete though

I will build all three, I think, or at least two, but with different characters. Under my Parallel Hero rule, no two of my characters can enlist the same follower, marry the same spouse, build or purchase the same house, or adopt the same child(ren).

They CAN do the same questline, for leveling purposes, but they have to identify with different ones for RP purposes.

Anyway, if my Khajiit builds a home, he will probably choose Lakeview Manor.
My Nord only has one thanehood (and almost died getting it), so she'll go with Windstad.
My Imperial is likely to relocate from Riften, ending up in Heljarchen Hall.
And my Dunmer is happy with Proudspire Manor.

My Imperial Character just got Proudspire Manor in Solitude (my 4th or 5th character lol). Of course, being a proper Imperial and married to Marcurio, they will certainly reside in the city.

Solitude offers all the shopping conveniences Diana Artorius needs and they can attend official functions at the Blue Palace. Build a house in the middle of no-where? You must be out of your mind, my good fellow. (Imagine Marcurio's voice, when you try to traded him something hahaha)

It has a beautiful Children's room, too! I just wish I could fix up the housecarl room in the basemant.

Heljarchen turned out to be my main home. I loved Lakeview, but felt the garden wasn't big enough and it was a little closed in by cliff and forest. But Heljarchen has a lot more land space and the views over the open plains are awesome.

Lakeview Manor for sure, I love the Falkreath hold. I spend a lot of time there hunting and admiring the scenery.

Lakeview as family home,Heljarchen i dont really like so use for greenhouse and armoury and Windstad as a retreat with all 3 towers but too cold for the family!

My home is where my dog is.

I built all 3 houses, but Lakeview and Winstad are homes to the NPCs (Iona and Valdimar in Winstad, and Rayya and Erik in Lakeview). Heljarchen is where I craft and cook. I also store all the stuff I've accumulated as the Dragonborn there, including a museum's worth of Tamriel's artifacts.

But my dog lives in Honeyside, so now that Iona has moved out, and all my other junk is no longer cluttering up the place, I am really liking just having a couple of important items and one cupboard full of all the stuff I need to replenish when adventuring - ebony arrows, potions, poisons, empty black soul gems, and prepared elsweyr fondue for Marcurio. I also removed all of my decorating and now only have a lunar moth in a jar and a plain silver sword above the bed as decoration. A simple, minimalist lifestyle - and a dog - suits me best.

lakeview is my family home equipped with bedroom, kitchen and storeroom as I feel it's the nicest area of the 3 plot locations. Heljarchen is my trophy house and windstad is my wizards retreat

Windstad is my fully furnished live in family home. My only regret is building a kitchen instead of an armory. Being that it was the first house that I built, I didn't know you couldn't do more. I "may" move them to Heljarchen due to its location between Windhelm and Whiterun but the idea of being right next to a giant camp and nothing in the area otherwise for the kids... Thats the thing I like about Windstad is the view of Solitude, fishing and its quiet out of the way location.

Lakeview is my fellowship hall. Using a follower mod "My home is your home" I have set a lot of followers to call that place home. However I may move them all to Heljarchen if I don't move the family there.

Right now Illia my steward has almost finished Heljarchen but other then moving my followers or family there, I don't plan to do much with it right now.

I will probably just keep Windstad my home. 95% of all my junk and treasures are there

I like Heljarchen Hall the best, and it is home to my family. It's got the bedroom wing, kitchen, and alchemy tower minus the alchemy table which I located in the main hall. I wanted the tower strictly for the superb views. It's close to Whiterun and Riverwood, and I love that. I have the full smithy in the cellar, garden, animal pen and stable.

Everybody talks about the giant camps, but Lakeview (with my other character) has seen more bandits and other random attacks for me than HH, and Winstad is situated between a major ruin, a minor one, and near a large vamp den! I have the small house there that I am expanding some, but will never move my family there. Two dead draugr in the yard isn't nice either. Love the fish hatchery though, and that it's close to Solitude. It will be my personal retreat and trophy type house.

Lakeview is under constant attack. I have no cow, chickens or horse left. Between wolves, bandits, giants... I think I'm moving my fellowship hall to Heljarchen.

The two dead draugr got dragged down to the ice and placed into the water. They have since floated away and never returned.

I reanimated the draugr, walked them out some distance and then killed them, they are ash now. With my current character, I don't know that I will ever build Lakeview, I own the land but haven't done anything with it. Regardless, I won't have any cows or chickens anywhere but HH, too hard to keep alive! I get random attacks at HH too, but not nearly a many, and I can see them coming. I have plenty of room to fight when needed.

Lakeview...but it doesn't have my prized possessions because they were lost in Breezehome which I can't get into.

My favourite place is Lakeview Manor in Falkreath.

I have yet to buy the one you get from Morthal because the swamp area is just not my tastes. I tried both the house on the Pale/Whiterun border and the Lakeview home. I liked them both but I decided to choose the lakeview one as my current characters place. I just liked the view there more (other than the necromancer down the hill) and the being in the trees. it was a bit too open around the house in the Pale. Nice view when it's not snowing but the house needed more trees in the yard.

It's not actually too swampy. It's a bit more of a rocky coastline, with a shipwreck on the horizon.

and a great view of Solitude.

After doing a lot of experimenting with Hearthfire where I built all 3 houses and played with all the "wings", I decided to go back to an old "level 9" save...build one perfect house...and play my game with it as my one base of operations...

I chose Windstad.

1. Only wing is bedroom. I don't like clutter, unused space, unnecessary rooms, etc.

2. View from balcony. (Do the "Lights Out" quest to add a cool-looking shipwreck to your view.)

3. Fish farm.

I'm going to turn Windstad into an alchemist's paradise, complete with fish farm, greenhouse, alchemy tower, and probably a garden and some chickens too. I don't really need the bedroom wing, since it'll just be my Nord, Marcurio, their assigned housecarl, and little Sofie (they kind of have to adopt her, since all my other characters are either Imperial soldiers or Khajiit vampires). But it won't have the shipwreck, since I don't do Lights Out... luring an innocent ship's crew to their deaths just doesn't sit well with me.

Yeah Windstad is where I have salmon and histcarp swimming around, and I have jazbay graqes growing in my garden. I know everybody says that you can't harvest roe from the hatchery salmon, but you just have to kill them first. I just FUS at them and collect the floaters.