nicest frat house

I strongly agree with looking at houses that are being renovated. Alumni support is one of the most important things to look for (besides the members obviously) when rushing a house.

Another reason that I like the renovated houses is the history they have. The new houses are apartment buildings, literally! National organizations will make these new houses convertible to apartment buildings so if the chapter fails they can rent out the rooms and make money. This makes for nice living arrangements but you don't feel like you are living in a fraternity house.

With the older houses it feels like you are living in a mansion. They tend to be more sturdily built with rooms that are finished with something besides drywall (Wood paneling, exposed brick ect.). Older houses also generally have awesome chapter rooms some of which can be hidden or secret. Not all old houses on campus are nice but the listabove is a good one.

-Sigma Nu was built and in 1932 after moving from the current Kappa Sigma house. The university wanted to get all of the fraternities on Pennsylvania and all of the sororities on Lincoln. The only two that could afford it during the depression, however, was Sigma Nu and ATO.
-Kappa Delta Rho has been on second street since 1928 and is lucky to still be around because of the Six Pack.
-Delta Chi got on campus in the 20's and built their house soon after ariving.
-Psi Upsilon was build in 1924 and was designed by famous architect Benjamin Marshall.

@illini houses, solid comment, great info

The first 10 Fraternities Chartered at Illinois were: (1) Delta Tau Delta (2) Sigma Chi (3) Kappa Sigma (4) Phi Kappa Sigma (5) Phi Delta Theta (6) Alpha Tau Omega (7) Phi Gamma Delta (8) Sigma Alpha Epsilon (9) Beta Theta Pi and (10) Sigma Nu.

These were also the first to build houses. All but 2 of them currently reside in historic fraternity houses built by their alumni or national organizations for their members. Delta Tau Delta resides in what was formerly the Phi Gamma Delta House and Phi Gamma Delta leases their house from Phi Sigma Sigma Sorority (It was orginially built for Delta Kappa Epsilon Fraternity -- no longer at Illinois). The other eight houses are all members of the Society for the Preservation of Greek Housing by virtue of the historical significance of their respective houses and alumni contributions.

Alpha Tau Omega and Sigma Nu were the first fraternities to build houses to modern (steel frame and reinforced concrete) construction. Their houses were Georgian in style to match the buildings on the South Campus which was under construction at the time (1930-33). The President of the University of Illinois, Harry Woodburn Chase was a Sigma Nu and Thomas Arkle Clark, Dean of Men, was an Alpha Tau Omega (Clark Hall is named for him). The plan was a new fraternity row on Pennsylvania Avenue to intersect with Sorority Row on Lincoln. Lincoln Avenue has several historic sororities that were all built in the late 20's.

The only houses that could afford new houses in 32 were SN and ATO?

Maybe because a bunch of houses were already built in the 1920's!
They weren't going to tear down and build another great big house!

LOT'S of self-promotion by SN here! They are an OK house, but relax.

Aggers has a damn nice house

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH AHAHAHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH AHAHAHA

Are you serious? Pike has a nice new house, but it is basically a huge apartment complex, not really "iconic".

Acacia is in Phi Mu's old house, which is large but was one of the less attractive sorority houses.

If Acacia still had their old house, which caught fire and then the chapter had their charter pulled, then they would have by far the nicest house on campus. But they blew it and lost the house. It is now the Library Sciences Building (or some similar name).

Lol they never said that they liked Pike the best, only that is has the general reputation of being the nicest, which it does. furthermore, Acacia is indeed in Phi Mu's old house, but it is not actually a very big house at all: merely a unique courtyard type setup that is popular across campus.