  We present the results of a detailed numerical simulation of the
circumstellar environment around three exoplanet-hosting stars. A
state-of-the-art global magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model is considered,
including Alfv\'en wave dissipation as a self-consistent coronal heating
mechanism. This paper contains the description of the numerical set-up,
evaluation procedure, and the simulated coronal structure of each system (HD
1237, HD 22049 and HD 147513). The simulations are driven by surface magnetic
field maps, recovered with the observational technique of Zeeman Doppler
Imaging (ZDI). A detailed comparison of the simulations is performed, where two
different implementations of this mapping routine are used to generate the
surface field distributions. Quantitative and qualitative descriptions of the
coronae of these systems are presented, including synthetic high-energy
emission maps in the Extreme Ultra-Violet (EUV) and Soft X-rays (SXR) ranges.
Using the simulation results, we are able to recover similar trends as in
previous observational studies, including the relation between the magnetic
flux and the coronal X-ray emission. Furthermore, for HD 1237 we estimate the
rotational modulation of the high-energy emission due to the various coronal
features developed in the simulation. We obtain variations, during a single
stellar rotation cycle, up to 15\% for the EUV and SXR ranges. The results
presented here will be used, in a follow-up paper, to self-consistently
simulate the stellar winds and inner astrospheres of these systems.
