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Gated communities constitute an important component of the contemporary city in many countries, and the adequacy of such communities as a housing option has attracted the attention of researchers and policy makers from various backgrounds. However, it is unclear how gated communities will be perceived and reconsidered following the COVID-19 pandemic and whether this type of community will become more common. Thus, this study aims to investigate housing experience of gated community residents during the pandemic with reference to the urban context of Saudi Arabia. To this end, the residents of a selected gated community were surveyed using a structured questionnaire to identify the urban and architectural design factors that have affected their housing experience during the pandemic compared to that of the residents of non-gated communities. It was concluded that despite the criticism gated communities have received, they offered a safer and more controlled housing environment during the pandemic from the residents’ point of view, which may create additional housing demands for this type of residential community in the future. This requires further investigation for ascertaining how this may affect the housing market dynamics and strategies.

This study discusses housing densification as a sustainable housing strategy. Furthermore, it investigates how housing densification can improve the shading performance of open spaces with respect to row-house typology. The analysis considers a real-time case study of linear courtyards enclosed by row houses. Urban analysis was followed by a numerical shading analysis to examine the impact of housing attachment method (aligned or stepped) on courtyard shading potential. Row houses were found to be an acceptable housing densification solution in Saudi Arabia, with well-integrated open spaces. The stepped-attached housing pattern showed a higher potential for urban shading (by ~55% with an east–west orientation of row houses) than that of the aligned–attached pattern. In addition, the stepped-attached housing pattern improved the visual quality and created a serial visual effect. This study recommends the promotion of compact housing patterns in Saudi Arabia to reduce the rapidly increasing domestic electrical-energy demand and improve urban shading. Housing densification is considered as an effective passive design and planning strategy for this purpose.