I am doing this my memory, so hopefully I have this correct. I welcome any corrections or contrary opinions. I am not personally rating aesthetics, just more functional aspects.

1. Whiterun
Pros: Alchemy table. Central location on main map. Excellent storage locations. All 4 smithing items are located next door. Home is very close to front gate.
Cons: No enchanter's table in house, and a long walk to Dragonreach to access one. Money vendors nearby are just ok.

2. Windhelm
Pros: Alchemy table and Enchanter's table in home. Adequate storage locations. All 4 smithing items are in the city.
Cons: Money vendors are just ok. Location on main map is between Riften and Winterhold, but usually out of your way. A bit of a walk to reach your home inside the city. You are not that close to the smith and must contend with 2 NPC that want to use the same devices. Must join Stormcloaks to get home.

3. Markarth
Pros: Alchemy table and Enchanter's table in home. All 4 smithing items are in the city.
Cons: Few money vendors in town to sell goods. Location on main map is awful. Home is very far from smithing items in the city. A long walk to reach your home in the city.

4. Solitude
Pros: Alchemy table and Enchanter's table in home. Lots of money vendors to sell goods.
Cons: City does not have a smelter. Location on main map is decent. Poor location for storage devices. Long walk to home from front gate.

5. Riften:
Pros: Alchemy table and Enchanter's table in home. If you complete Thieves' Guild quests, you have the most options for selling your goods. Outside exit/entrance to house allows Stage 4 vampires to enter city without being attacked. Home is also near front gate.
Cons: City does not have a smelter. Location on main map is awful.

The absence of a smelter causes me to rate some of the towns much lower. I would probably rate Solitude the best if the town had a smelter. For me personally, the central location of Whiterun makes it the best. I am also not sure about the storage location of Markarth or Riften, as I did not use those homes much.

1) Windhelm. It just has everything you need, the location isn't bad, and it's in the coolest city.

2) Solitude.

3) Whiterun

4) Riften

5) Markarth - Whoever would want to live there is beyond me. Don't care if it looks cool, anywhere in Markarth is an automatic fail.

I see no need to move from Breezehome in Whiterun. Everything is right there. I fast-travel to Dragonsreach from my front door to get to the arcane enchanter. A minor annoyance.

Now if any single house had every smithing element in it, that would be tops.

1. Honeyside/Riften: Its got a way in/out from skyrim, and is close to the front gate. Its got a garden with decent stuff in it. Its cozy, and is the only house in the game that has any extra crafting stations besides cooking, alchemy,and enchanting.(tanning rack on your waterfront porch). Pleny of storage close togather.Plenty of display options.It would be a perfect home for me if it was a little bigger,or out of the city.

2.Proudspire/Solitude: Its fancy, and has a grand view from the porch.It has lots of space, and plenty of room.The only problem is, not enough storage, or display options. For all I payed for the house, you'd think there would be more of those. There's texture problems in the basemant. The house is super bright 24/7, kinda annoys me( the loft upstairs stays daylight 24/7, and the resy of the house turns blue. I dont know about yall, but my house does not turn blue at night).The housecarl's quarters svck. I dont know if this is a glitch or what, but they should change when you become thane. I like the feel of this house, but it has a lot of problems.

3. Herjim(sp?)/ windhelm: The house has a cool layout, and the hidden room is nice, but I feel it has a lot of empty space. It has a lot of display options, and a good bit of storage, but most of the storage is sacks, which I dont realy care for. This house, an d the quest to get it, is bugged like crazy. Patch 1.4 is fixing it, but as it is right now, its a pain in the ass to get this house.

4.Breezehome/whiterun: Very good location, right next to the gate. I like the hearth, very cozy. No enchanting table hurts it for me though. Its prity small, which some like, but I dont. Lydia allways sits in my room and stairs at me while I sleep, even if Im geting the lovers comfort bonus with my wife.Creepy.The walls to the rooms sometimes vanish. I dont like the holes in the roof.Thats just me though.

5. Venderel Hall/ Markarth: The house has somethin goinn for it, but its not my fav.And its not enough to make up for the fact that markarth is a crappy place. I would never, EVER live there.

These homes are all kinda lackluster to me, but Ill make do with honeyside for now.I miss battlehorn castle from oblivion, and hope they do stuff like that for skyrim.I dont like living in cities, and besides, the dragonborn deserves better.Hope I get a castle.

I like Markarth the best. It's setup is the coolest. And there are places to store things everywhere. Including a satchel in the alchemy room along with barrels and sacks. And who cares about location. Just fast travel. It's not like you're getting penalized for time spent.

Solitude has what? One barrel in the whole basemant where the enchanting and alchemy areas are. And like one cupboard near the fireplace? I hate this house.

Breezehome is too small and Lydia is annoying with her up and down loop. Doesn't she have her own room to hang out in? And you always seem to get stuck right at the top of the stairs. It is the best location for building up smithing though. Very convenient.

Honeyside is about the same as Breezehome for me. But at least Iona cooks! lol Not much storage in the basemant though.

The house in Windhelm is cool but too glitchy. I'm always aftraid I'm going to lose stuff in there. But it's huge. The armory and display cases are cool.

Whiterun: Earliest proper house many players are going to get due to price. Nice cozy feel to it.

Riftfen: More like an upgrade to breezehome, Might as well save your money, unless of course you want to live in Riftfen specifically.

Solitude/Markarth/WIndhelm: In a sense they are all the 'best' house depending on what your looking for, although Markarth (to me) is the least desireable/

Solitude-:Most 'rich' look of all the houses. 'Fairly decent storage' although that room with the bedroll makes no sense... Use of console nessisary to make spouse sleep in your bed :/ .

Markarth: Largest space of all the houses, Dwarven look to it, I hate it, some love it it's up to you.

Hjerim: Agruably the best house, lots of storage, lots of display areas, decent-ish space. Undesirable housecarl.

Breezehome is where I keep all of my Smithing and Alchemy stuff.

Proudspire is where I keep my wife and my Enchanting stuff.

I pretty much have stuff I gather to gradually sell off (as the vendors slowly rebuild their money) spread out everywhere.

Edit: If I have to rate them: Proudspire #1 and Breezehome #2 - the rest are tied for #3.

She sleeps? Mine is always awake somewhere in the house when I arrive (all hours). Maybe mine is a Vampire...I'll have to keep an eye on her.

Eh at like 2 am they usually sleep :/ but in solitude she will sleep in the bedroll...

Markarth may not be the best city, but it is by far the best home. The layout is ideal. It has everything you need. It has plenty of storage. Everything about it is perfect except for the city it resides in. Hjerim takes a close second. Every other home has too many disadvantages.

Would love to see screenies of the Markarth place I can't spell...

Would love to see any screenies of the homes....

I have the house in Riften and the one in Markarth.I love Honeyside with the back porch on the lake.There is plenty of storage and the garden is cute even if it is useless.I just wish I could move the house (and the lake) to Whiterun.That's my favorite town.The house in Markarth is laid out really nice but it's soooooo dark.It feels like a cave and I hate the city.

Hjerim is the best probably. Next is Proudspire manor, then Vindel hall, then Breezehome and finally Honeyside

This isn't a 'best to worst'. This is just the order I experienced them. I play on the 360.

Breezehome: I was able to get it functioning after a half-dozen attempts.
Riften: Crippled with bugs. Endless reloads never fixed.
Markarth: Crippled with bugs. Endless reloads never fixed.
Solitude: Crippled with bugs. Endless reloads never fixed.

After Solitude I gave up in frustration. I haven't even bothered getting any of the other houses. I don't know what they look like.

You don't have to join the Stormcloaks to get the Windhelm house.

i like markarth, i live there all the time, i get the house asap, i recruit eola and i think the view is cool and its real cozy being up inside rock cliff.

I wish there was another house in Dawnstar. I love that town.

edit: I mean, a normal house within the town.

I'd like a house in Morthal actually. Dawnstar would be nice too.

Obviously, we're both introverts. haha

These are towns for people who don't want to be bothered.

Not only that, I'm a hermit. In fact, IRL I live in a town an 80 mile round trip from the nearest decent-sized grocery. There are around 45 families here full-time.... the rest of the place is "second homes" - most of them for sale now due to the economy. It's quiet until summer. Works for me.

Sounds nice. I'm in a populated area, but I don't like it. It used to be quiter, but now it gets on my nerves.

There are zero containers downstairs where all the action is. The only ones remotely close are a couple over head barrels above the staircase; They're even inconvenient to access.Otherwise I would have left Whiterun if it was more worthy.
Aside from living in a filthy town where random thieves cause storms of guards' arrows to unleash and kill its merchants (thanks, Beth) it's not a bad place.

I use the housecarl's room for storage.It's right next to the alchemy and enchanting stations.I leave the nightstand for Iona.

Markarth is my favorite.

It has a large space, both the alchemy and enchanting tables, as well as being very close to the city "zone in" entrance. Some people migh think its not, but you literally walk five feet, then up two flights of stairs.

When you get used to Markarth, its not laid out that poorly. I think the stairs throw people off. Its a short walk to the smithing area, cutting through a space by the temple of talos or something.

I love all the bookcases in my Markarth house, where I stored one copy of every book I could and then piled the rest on the floor in front of the shelves.

I'm on the 360. Once I solved the bug where I could never clear my bounty in Markarth, I got rather used to living there. Windhelm may have not been so bad, but its small and mine never cleaned up (also can't complete blood on the ice, saved just before talking to a falsely accused dude, so hopefully 1.4 will make it so the guy I have to "end" can end (the 1.4 notes say that it does that.)

There are also some vendors nearby, with my wife ysolde in the house. I have the investment perk, as well as the plus 1000 gold perk (disappointed to find it doesn't give "apple cart vendors" more gold.) Endon is nice, after you get him through the thieves guild line (he seems to wander around the front of my house a lot.)

For looks alone, Solitude. Hjerin is useful, but the huge open spaces downstairs are off-putting, and I'd like to see some of the armour/weapon displays downstairs. But mainly it's a pain that it's only avaiable if you do the CW questline for the Stormcloaks. Breezehome is OK, but not enough storage or weapons/armour displays. And again, the fact that you can only get it by doing the MQ past the point of launching the random dragon attacks. Sometimes I don't want the random dragon attacks, as they are only marginally more interesting than Oblivion gates. Honeyside is OK, but again a little crowded and not enough display area. Best is probably the house in Markath.

What I'd like to see is at least one house that wasn't the gift of a Jarl, but could be acquired by some other quest. Once the CK finally lands, one of the main things I will be doing is making changes to the current houses, and adding at least three more.