My architect said he always gets asked for this and folks never use it. He also said he had one at his last house and never used it. My parents have lived in their house for 35 years and have opened the door to their patio exactly once. I guess there are folks who would, but we decided we wouldn't, which allowed us much more freedom in window and bedroom placement.

The only utility of it that I can think of is if you are a smoker who doesn't smoke in the house or maybe if you have a coffee station or kitchenette in your master bedroom.

We will have one in our new home but I don't think we will ever use it! DH insisted we have it. Unless you have pool and want to go straight into the bedroom. Or a coffee station in your master.

Otherwise go for windows-it will be alot cheaper.

I cant say yet if we will use it, but we have included a slider to the back porch. And we also have 5 sliders on the lower level, 2 of which are bedrooms.

Probably overkill I know... but I figure if I dont want to use them as a door and need to stick a couch in front of it, I can still do that and consider it a window. I am kind of backwards thinking I guess. I thought it gave me more options ha. I thought I could use the door as a window, but it would be harder to use the window as a door.... although in my younger days.... lol that is another thread.

I went with sliders so I wouldnt have to worry about the door opening in on furniture. They had a slight tint, but we went ahead and added more tint. I wanted the view and not necessarily the uv rays :-)

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We are considering putting one in our new build. We have two small dogs and it would be nice to let them out first thing in the moring right from out bedroom. Also, when going to bed, we can let them out from the main living space, get ready for bed then just let them right in to our room (they sleep with us).

Can you tell we don't have kids? :)

If you are a dog owner and the dog sleeps in the master bedroom, then it is easier to let the dog out that door rather than walking through the house. This can be especially true if the dog is ill or is an older dog that needs to go outside more often.

If you dont have a door, you will have to have the required sized window as an egress. Putting one in right now on a home where they turned the patio into a room addition. The patio doors leading from the bedroom into what was the patio is no longer an egress, so in a window goes!

We are building and our master will have a full lite door to the covered porch on one wall, and a full lite atrium door on the opposite wall to an open deck. This is probably overkill too, but it's in the middle of a farm and I wanted my DH to have access without coming thru the house. We also have an aging yorkie that sleeps in our room, so it will be nice just letting her out without walking thru the house. Our current house has a slider to a screened porch and we use it pretty often.

Just a thought....a door will add some unwanted temperature issues....lots of glass and some minute air leakage, but in a room you spend 8 hours a day in, you might notice it. Also, better chance of insect entry.

We have a door in our master bedroom that opens onto a covered porch with a fireplace. We haven't been in our new home long but I can tell already we will use the porch often.

Great question - we evaluated the same thing at a meeting with our landscape architect, designer, and architect. All three agreed that in their experience, people rarely use them - but I thought that the rationale mentioned by some of the posts above were good.

We ultimately decided against putting in a door leading to the outside in our master, both for security reasons and because we did not want dogs or kids going from pool, to back yard, to master bedroom. We are not coffee drinkers, so we will not have a coffee maker in the room; our dog sleeps in a crate, so he is not in the bedroom.

The one thing that we thought about very carefully was fire safety; we wondered whether it would be good to have a door in case of fire. But, thinking it through, if there were a fire we would be focused on getting the kids out, and would probably not be thinking about getting ourselves out of the master bedroom outside door.

We have a slider in our bedroom and leave it open, at night, during summer....don't go in or out all that often, but it does get used as a door as well as a window..:)

We're planning a slider to a verandah, so we can sit outside and watch the sunrise.

BTW ... what are those "diving board" things on the 3-story house?

Have a french door from master to back patio, and while it is not used a lot, I do use it and would not want it any other way.

There is going to be a pond out back, thus the diving board things :-) haha

Actually, those are for the stairs and access points to the porches below, but the kids were really hoping to have a zip line from the top to across the pond :-)

I wasnt crazy about the stairs there but I remember we talked and talked and talked about where to put them on that side so they were closer to the pool, and that is where they needed to go for some reason.

We are building a new house in Katy, Texas, and our master bedroom comes with a door access to the patio. I'm not a outside person and I doubt we will be using it. So I am opting for the builder to take out the door. I'm a bit paranoid too, so I think without a door, it's be less entry point to worry about :)

I know a willful thief will brace through walls etc, nothing can stop them.