I like other peoples houses, so I befriend them and take their key. Then I crash in their house for awhile, taking everything of value and never speaking to them again.
House I like though would be Lakeview, because I can shoot the mage down the bottom of the hill from my porch. Good retirement house, where I can sit and enjoy the lake while blowing the pl*** out of anything that moves.
Good point about non-traditional houses. My current orc Cronach is not a city orc and will not own any property in Skyrim; one day, he'll return to his family's hold in Orsinium. However, he's won acceptance in all the strongholds and can sleep in any for free. Burguk's Longhouse in Dushnikh Yal is a safe location, and you can get a key by making Ghorbash your follower (as an orc, of course Cronach punched him into submission to earn his loyalty). So he has a bed and chest there, and is as close to a "home" that he has.
It's a pretty decent home; plenty of hunting (saber cats for pelts), some sweet nearby dungeons and minor locations, lots of harvestable veggies outside and meat in the basement (although I don't actually know if the hanging animals in the cellar respawn; I assume so, but I've never checked. I took one to test, but never ended up looking again. Good excuse to go home...). There's an alchemist merchant and lab, tanning racks, and a blacksmith merchant with a full forge including smelter. It's also very close to Markarth, a shrine of Dibella, and of course the river, with salmon and river betty.
The only real downside is the Reach is an unforgiving place for a low level character. Teeming with Sabercats, Spriggans and Forsworn, as well as a dragon priest dungeon, a static spawn point with two trolls, and a dwemer ruin infested with falmer if you have Dawnguard. Heck, the last time I went back, to explore the dungeon that ended up having the priest in it, a group of 10 forsworn were camped around the corner from Dushnikh Yal and came down like an avalanche on me. I had to back pedal swinging my hammer, drawing them back to the stronghold, where Burguk and Ghorbash joined in the fight and took some of the heat off me.
Also, no cooking pot. There's never a cooking pot around when you need one.