Hi peanut, when we moved here the neighbours had a real martin nest under their eaves. I wanted one too, but its difficult nowadays because its not always muddy at the right times for the birds. So we got a double one put up by our plumber (who had a ladder round cos of the other work he was doing
).
It was four springs ago and they've used it every year, the last two years both sides. It's on the NE facing side (some morning sun is all). We painted (emulsion) the nests outside and back-board before it went up, can't see us getting up a ladder to it.