What Solar Return houses are
A Solar Return is the chart for the moment when the Sun returns to the degree where it stood at the minute of birth. It happens once a year, within a day of the birthday, and describes the year from one birthday to the next. The positions of the planets in the Solar Return don't depend on the place, but the houses depend on it entirely: they are built from the horizon of the place where you spend your birthday.
By “Solar Return houses” books and sites mean two different things, and it helps not to confuse them. The first is the houses of the Solar Return chart itself: which one holds the Solar Return Sun, the Moon, where several planets have gathered. The second is the overlay: which house of the natal chart the Solar Return Ascendant falls into, and after it the other cusps. The overlay is the basis of the method of Alexander Volgin, described in his 1937 book on solar returns; planets in the houses of the year chart itself are analyzed in detail by Mary Shea.
The meanings of the houses are the same as in the natal chart: the 2nd — money, the 7th — partner and agreements, the 10th — work and status. What changes is the timeframe: in the natal chart a house describes an area for a whole life, in the Solar Return — an area that comes to the fore this year. The site calculates Solar Return houses by Placidus, like the natal ones, and beyond the Arctic Circle by Porphyry.
Why Solar Return houses can't be read without a birth time
An error in the natal time passes into the Solar Return moment one to one: 15 minutes of error means 15 minutes of shift. This is checked by our engine's test. And the Solar Return Ascendant moves unevenly in those minutes: in Moscow in 4 minutes from 0.7 to 3 degrees, depending on the sign at the rising point, and an hour of error shifts it up to 44 degrees. A house cusp easily moves into the neighboring sign, and a planet at the edge of a house into the neighboring house.
If the birth time is completely unknown, the Solar Return moment is unknown to within ±12 hours. Then the houses are not defined at all: over a day the horizon goes through a full circle, and the Solar Return Ascendant may land in any sign. Substituting noon is a common mistake of cheap calculators. That's why on the Solar Return page next to the result there is a table: what will change if the birth time is shifted by 15 and 30 minutes in each direction. If a 15-minute shift changes the year's main house, you can't rely on it until the time is clarified.
Which house to start with: three main factors
The order of importance is set explicitly by the Italian astrologer Ciro Discepolo. The first factor — which house of the natal chart the Solar Return Ascendant falls into: this is the year's main area. The second — the Solar Return house where the Solar Return Sun stands: that's where energy and attention go. The third — the house where three or more planets have gathered. Everything else, per Discepolo, is noticeably weaker. If the Solar Return Ascendant and the Sun point to the same area, the emphasis on it is stronger than usual.
Next they look at the sign of the Solar Return Ascendant — the tone of the year, the Solar Return Midheaven in the natal house — the year's goals, the ruler of the Solar Return Ascendant, the Solar Return Moon — where there is the most change and feeling, and planets within 5 degrees of the chart's angles: they are the most noticeable in the year. The reading on our Solar Return page follows this order.
Meaning of Solar Return houses: 1st to 6th
The 1st house — one's own person: body, appearance, personal undertakings. What is usually expected: new personal affairs, changes in looks and well-being, decisions that depend only on you.
The 2nd house — money and one's own resources. Income grows or sags, there are big purchases, a new source of earnings, a review of where the money goes. This is a description of an area, not a forecast of an amount: which way the money will go, the house doesn't say.
The 3rd house — communication, study, nearby trips. Lots of correspondence and conversations, courses, documents, short trips, matters with brothers, sisters and neighbors.
The 4th house — home, family, roots. A move or renovation, changes in the family, matters with parents, real estate.
The 5th house — love, creativity, children, pleasures. Falling in love or a new romance, a creative project, events connected with children, risk for the sake of pleasure.
The 6th house — work as routine, health, duties. New work duties or a change of place, changes in routine, care of the body, pets. A Solar Return doesn't make diagnoses: if health is a concern, that's for a doctor, not for a chart.
Meaning of Solar Return houses: 7th to 12th
The 7th house — couple, partners, agreements. Relationships come to the fore: they begin, are formalized or are put to the test; agreements and partnerships; open disputes.
The 8th house — shared money, debts, crises and renewal. Loans and debts, inheritance, a partner's money, taxes and insurance, a crisis after which something ends and begins anew.
The 9th house — distant trips, study, worldview. Trips abroad or far away, serious study, matters with other countries and lawyers, a change of views.
The 10th house — career, status, goals. A new position or change of job, a noticeable project, recognition — or a test of strength in the profession.
The 11th house — friends, communities, plans. New friends and circles of contact, teamwork, plans coming true, income from earlier efforts.
The 12th house — solitude, the hidden, completion. More time alone with yourself, rest and recovery, matters that aren't spoken of aloud, closed places — from a sanatorium to a hospital, completing the old before a new cycle.
One warning. In Discepolo the 1st, 6th and 12th Solar Return houses are called dangerous, and on this is built the advice to go spend your birthday in another city, to “lead” the Ascendant out of a bad house. This rule has no control group, and one year can't be judged. We don't frighten with houses and don't advise such trips.
Why the Solar Return Sun steps back 2–4 houses every year
This is mechanics, and it's worth knowing before looking for meaning in the change of houses. Between two Solar Returns a tropical year passes — 365 days and almost six hours more. In that time the Earth turns around its axis not a whole number of times but with a remainder of almost a quarter turn. So at the same place the Solar Return Midheaven moves forward by 87 degrees a year on average, and the Sun, which stands at the same degree, ends up in a house numbered two to four less.
We checked this on the site's engine: 60 random dates of birth from 1950–2005, six consecutive Solar Returns each for Moscow. In 95 cases out of 100 the Solar Return Sun stepped back by two, three or four houses in a year, most often by three, in the rest by five; in place or forward — never. After four years it returned to the same house in 55% of cases, and in the rest to the neighboring one (150 dates, no exceptions). Hence a simple conclusion: a “year of the 10th house” for the Sun happens to everyone about once in four years, and in itself it's no exception. The year's main factor — the Solar Return Ascendant in the natal house — has no such simple rhythm: the houses of the natal chart are different for everyone.
How to check Solar Return houses on yourself
First, a check of the calculation — the site itself can fail it. Calculate this year's Solar Return and next year's for the same city. The Solar Return Sun almost always steps back two to four houses: from the 10th to the 8th, 7th or 6th, from the 2nd to the 12th, 11th or 10th. Occasionally by five. If it stayed in the same house, shifted by one or moved forward — in our measurement that never happened, and it's a reason to write to us. The second step is the time table on the Solar Return page: if a 15-minute shift changes the natal house the Solar Return Ascendant falls into, this conclusion is not yet yours but one of the variants of birth time.
Now a check of the interpretation. The main factor in the reading has an outcome in which it did not work. For example, for the 4th house: if nothing noticeable changed at home and in the family over the year — no move, no renovation, no changes with parents — the emphasis did not work. For the 10th: if at work there was no new post, no noticeable project, no change of place. Write down this outcome now, before the year begins, and check it on the next birthday, not when something happens: after the fact almost any event fits an area.
Stricter — blind, with a helper. At the end of the Solar Return year, write down without the chart five or six facts of this year: moves, work, relationships, study, money. The helper copies out without numbers two descriptions from this article — the area of your main house and the area of a house chosen by lot from the other eleven — and decides the order by a coin. You choose which is closer to your notes. One year is a coin: at random you guess half the time, so the conclusion is drawn from the tally over several years. Four hits out of four at random come out in 1 case of 16; if the tally stays around half, on your biography the Solar Return houses are indistinguishable from random ones, and that is a standard outcome of the test. Astrology has no evidence base; the Solar Return here is a language for planning the year, not a prediction.