Last Updated on July 30, 2020 by astrologerbydefault

The houses 3rd, 6th, 10th and 11th are called the upchaya (उपचय) houses. Houses of material increase, prosperity and rise.

Now you might wonder that of these, 3rd and 6th are naturally owned by Mercury, the 3rd is a shadowy house, may or not be ‘benefic’ and 6th is an actual dushamsthan. Mercury the juvenile adolescent of astrology. And 10th and 11th houses are both are naturally owned by Saturn. How can the cold, restrictive Saturn actually give any advantage?

But here are the houses where you make the most of the challenges that life throws at you. You use these challenges to prosper and advance in every material way. Vedic philosophy always gives importance to the spiritual prosperity, but our current world is almost completely materialistic so all your clients will have materialistic questions. These upachaya houses will grant growth of material name, fame and prosperity.

The basic premise that benefics give good results holds as usual but these houses can give results with natural malefics too. Sun, Mars, Saturn, Rahu or Ketu placed here under aspects of benefics can grant fortunate results in the material plane. And most often the expansion that bring is very quick acting, often a lucky reversal of fortunes.

The 3rd house is where you find the courage, boldness, ability to work with other people and the discrimination to take risks. On a purely material plane, Desire for anything is first created in the 3rd house (Kama trikon) and also the first action which converts this desire into a process. Using the principle of Bhavat bhavam, it is the second of the 2nd house and eighth from the 8th. It represents the actual quantum of wealth you can actually receive from your family, parents-in-laws, legacies and bequeaths. The 3rd is also the natural partner of the 9th house (counted seventh from the 9th), so it is linked to the help you will get from the agents of the 9th house too.

The 6th is the house of losses, enemies, debts, litigations, theft, service conditions, competitions, corruptions and diseases. The more prominent you are in the society the more enemies will you have, but you will also have the power to vanquish them and thus ascend. Lives of all great men are a series of challenges. Here it’s best to have only one malefic, more than one can shatter the health of the chart and can affect the 5th, 7th and 12th houses adversely. The 6th is the second counted from the 5th, it represents the way you use the creative energies of the 5th and also how the resources of the 5th are stored and made available to you. The 6th is the 12th counted from the 7th so too much imbalance here will hit your business and legal partnerships including the married life. It is 7th counted from the 12th so adverse influences here can cause destruction of the physical manifested stuff etc.

10th is your personal action as an individual in the social and professional arena. The Karma-sthan, the house of actions, here you will perform actions which will lift your life either materially or spiritually. The center of this house is called the mid-heaven/zenith and literally means the heights to which you can rise in power and prestige. This is the last of the Arth trikon, the culmination of all the activities which give your personality and your life a meaning.

And 11th is the house of gains of every sort, fulfilment of all desires. Your desires take birth in the 3rd house, along with the determination and hard work to achieve them. The 3rd is where the Kama trikon is initiated. The 6th house then brings in competitions and victory over obstacles, the 10th is where you act with single focus and discipline so that you finally gain them in the 11th. The 11th is the treasure of the 10th, counted second from here it represents all the wealth that you have hoarded from your actions in the realm of the 10th. The culmination of the kama trikon where you desires are finally fulfilled. Kama does not mean ‘sexual desire’ as commonly understood but it means all the things which make a life worth living. The things which ease you on the physical emotional and spiritual levels. Naturally these will mature with time. Thus the results of this house too improve with age.

If the planets controlling these houses are linked in some way, aspecting each other, or in each other houses etc with a bit of benefic influence it lifts the quality of the horoscope.

There are two conditions which increase the potency of the upachaya houses/their owners to give positive results,

1. The ascendant lord, the lord of the 10th house and the Moon should be strong.
2. There must be some benefic aspect on these planets/houses.

Basically these are linked to your karma. 3rd is where you create your karma by exercising active choice between options. You evaluate and choose, you show your courage in facing upto the load of accumulated karma you have and you choose the actions which might resolve them or create new karma. The 6th is where you realise the quantum of karma you have created for yourself or resolved because of these choices. You then decide to work and serve it out. These two houses are the natural houses of Mercury, the database manager of the zodiac.

The 10th helps you by intelligently and systematically working out the karma of the 6th. And finally the 11th is reflects the gains which you have received from all this process. This is the function of Saturn the strictest and fairest of all the karmic teachers.

Astrology is all about patterns. Certain house seen together in a certain way. Learn to read patterns and to link up the houses. A study of these Upchaya houses will be very rewarding and help you answer 50% of your client’s questions!