Most of the Hakka village houses in Yim Tin Tsai were built in the 1950s, but they became empty when the villagers moved away. The majority of these houses are located in the hillside on the southwestern part of the island, in order to avoid flooding due to heavy rain and high tides. The houses face south, with their backs to the hillside to shelter from the cold north winds; the rolling hills in the south surround the wide valley and block typhoons during the summer. Most of the village housesare structured as duplex units, with the kitchen on the left close to the door on the bottom floor and the shower room on the right side of the same floor. Most of the houses have pitched Chinese tiled roof, and usually there are two or three houses framed as a row. The wide yard in front of the house is where the hay goes, and it has various other purposes including sunbathing, resting and socialising. Hakka village houses mainly rely on natural lighting and ventilation, and there are also numerous trees planted outside the house for shade and shelter, reflecting the symbiotic relationship between the villagers and the natural environment in which they reside.