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 Cotton Balls are the Devil
Posts: 1271
  
Location: My own little world! | My husband is a builder and my advise would be:
Walk through as many houses as you can. Houses you think you would like AND not like. See all kinds of different floor plans.
Look at the plans. Plans are hard to visualize, so seeing them on paper and then in real life will help realize what all the details and knooks and kranies will be like from the plans to the real house.
I also suggest an extra "half bath". Exspecially if you have kids. This way there is always a clean bathroom for guests.
Close the door to the bathroom the kids use all the time and have a half bath that is always clean and ready for a drop guest to use at a moments notice. |
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 Works Hard For The Money
Posts: 4469
Location: Memphis, TN | Having 2 young kids and a 3 bedroom house I really wish we had an extra bedroom. I would use it as a playroom for now and a guest room once the kids were older. Our next house will have a mud room no matter what. As it is now I am constantly battling mud and hay in the doorways. I'd also build a closet somewhere for all of my husbands hunting and fishing gear and big enough to put a gun safe in it. |
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Nut Case Expert
Posts: 9305
Location: Tulsa, Ok | What is like most about my house is that it is paid for and has been for lonnnnnnnnggggggggg time. That pretty much offsets all inadequacies in is size or layout. |
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 1100
Location: Southeastern Idaho | We built 5 years ago...my husband just said the other night he wouldn't change a thing. What we did is look at TONS of house plans. Decided on the house plan for a double wide home and modified it. You do not find better use of space that in those homes.
We have a heated mud room (door to outside) with a sink, no nasty items come in the house! Another room in the garage that is heated for storage...I use it as a huge pantry.
Door from the garage leads into the laundry room, also have a 1/2 bath off of the laundry.
Bedrooms are on one end of the home, my husband works off the ranch and its shift work. Needs to be quiet during the day.
Make sure you are active and double check on things as you go. We asked for a wood fireplace and the contractor thought gas fireplace. Took some doing to get that made clear. |
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 Water Weight Barbie
Posts: 6829
Location: Oz, Kansas | First off I would never have built an earth contact. My next house will be a reverse story & 1/2 with the kids rooms down stairs. My bathroom will be much bigger with a seperate shower & tub with 2 vanities. I would have built ins in the closet so I don't have to worry about dressers in the bedrooms. I would have a designated mud room off the garage which would be a 3 car garage. Have heated hard wood floors throughout except in the mud/bath/laundry. One thing I do love is my laundry room is off my master bath & I love having it there, I just wish it were bigger. |
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 Expert
Posts: 1432
Location: Never in one place long | I LOVE our wood floors, look good and easy to clean, multiple bathrooms, nice BIG master bedroom which we need with 5 mutts sleeping in our room with us! walk in closets are nice. Wish we had a wrap around porch or nice desk off the back for company! Garage attached to the house would be awesome as well. |
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 Some Kind of Trouble
Posts: 4430
| My house is tiny but the size doesn't bother me a bit.. now, if I had kids, I might want to get away from them once in a while which would be impossible.  But my biggest peeve's with my house is that it is old and all the rooms are seperated... definetly want an open layout! I rarely even use my dining room or living room which take up over half of the house because they are closed off, it's a waste. Second is don't save space by making small bathrooms! Being that cramped makes everything extremely hard to clean or keep clean and it drives me crazy and face it, that is a room that EVERYONE has to use and spend time in. Other than that, in-floor heating and good windows would be my next picks for being economical. |
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 No Tune in a Bucket
Posts: 2935
Location: Texas | Three 4 Luck - 2013-11-21 7:49 AM RocketPilot - 2013-11-20 10:02 PM Our house is a two story. If I were building again, it would NOT be a two story. As we age, the knees don't handle steps very well. Our house is also a 2 story, but we built it with old age in mind. Everything we need is down stairs, and the kid area is upstairs along with attic storage. So we can basically shut off the second floor when we get old and just live on the main floor.
We did not build our house, but it is sort of like that. There are 2 rooms upstairs that end up as basicly storage for like Christmas stuff. My sewing machine and ironing board are up there, but heaven knows they don't get used often. There is a computer and tv upstairs for the grandkids when they come over and a hugh desk that they previous owners left because they put it there before they finished the stairwell and could not get it down.
The house was built in two parts and there is a step down to the stair and a 2 step down to two bedrooms. Some mornings my knees don't like those 2 steps.
Oh, and to the OP. Make the master bedroom as large as possible. The master is my least favorite room in my house. Too small and not enough closet space.
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Location: Philly | lookout hill - 2013-11-21 9:35 AM
First off I would never have built an earth contact. My next house will be a reverse story & 1/2 with the kids rooms down stairs. My bathroom will be much bigger with a seperate shower & tub with 2 vanities. I would have built ins in the closet so I don't have to worry about dressers in the bedrooms. I would have a designated mud room off the garage which would be a 3 car garage. Have heated hard wood floors throughout except in the mud/bath/laundry. One thing I do love is my laundry room is off my master bath & I love having it there, I just wish it were bigger.
laundry room with a backdoor to the MBR closet. only downside is if that is your only laundry room, mud everywhere. pretty easy to have an extra washer/dryer in a mud room for everything that you dont want to haul through the house to clean / wash with everyone else's clothes |
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 989
| One thing I will always look for in a house is a bathroom (sink/toilet) right inside a door to the outside for easy access and not having to track dirt across the house to use the washroom and go back outside again.. too many people are too lazy to take their shoes off!
One thing I do not like about my house is the fact the woodstove is upstairs and not downstairs, we will be changing that.
I like vaulted ceilings.. but do not like the angles roof in the rooms as the roof comes down.
I love the pine slatted ceiling.
I love open concept with partial walls for room privacy in say the tv area so hubby can watch tv and I can read a book in a different room and not feel like I am getting yelled at by the tv. |
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 To the Left
Posts: 1865
Location: Florida | I built mine (with help from my family and friends). Since we nailed every nail, and wired every switch, I could make changes as I went along. I have changed some things since then (30 years). Took out the sliding glass door and put in windows, added a bay window in the dining/kitchen area, changed doors and bathtubs, etc. Since we built it we know exactly what can change without a problem, kinda like getting a new house whenever I feel like it. I would highly recommend building your own, or at least keeping really hands on with the contractors.
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 Regular
Posts: 67
| Do's- Open Concept, more cabinets and counter tops than you think in your kitchen, mudroom with at least 1/2 bathroom...NO CARPET, vaulted ceelings, celing fans everywhere
Don'ts- waste to much room in master and utlity rooms...also we have cathedral celings..I HATE THEM!!! I love vaulted ceilings but our are ridiculous....In the Texas summer you can forget about your living room being nice and cool and it costs a fortune to heat and cool that one room..
When we finally get to build again we are putting in seperate A/C units for living and sleeping spaces |
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 Keep those crap slapping tails away!
Posts: 8871
Location: Around here somewhere... | Thank you so much everyone! I have written down all of your suggestions. We will at least be vry hands on, if not actually building it ourselves. |
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Keep those crap slapping tails away!
Posts: 8871
Location: Around here somewhere... | What is an "earth contact"? |
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 Texas Tenderheart
Posts: 6715
Location: Red Raiderland | We are in the process of finishing up on our new house and it looks like we should start moving in in mid January so I won't know just yet what I love and what I hate about this house but I will totally agree with Canchasr1 that if you live in a tornado prone area invest in a storm/safe room. Ours is just big enough to get me, my husband,two weiner dogs and Doberman in but when a tornado is barreling down on you it's not going to matter how comfy you are just safe. 
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 saferoom.jpg (43KB - 331 downloads)
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  Extreme Veteran
Posts: 494
Location: La Frontera | We have built a house and now we are remodeling another house. Here's what I've learned.
In floor heating is the BEST!
I prefer my laundry area close to the kitchen. Let's face it, you spend most of your time in the kitchen and when the laundry is on the other side of the house and the washer or dryer stops you have to walk all the way across the house to get it. It's annoying and I prefer it closer. The only other way I would have it is if it's next to the bedrooms.
You can't have enough kitchen cabinets. No pantry is ever too big.
You can't have enough closet space. His and hers closets in the master bedroom is nice.
An extra 1/2 bath for guests is nice (but only if you can keep your hubby from using it .....).
If you can swing it, a wrap around porch is fantastic. It's an extension of your house for dirty boots, cleaning tack, etc.
Make sure you have ample eletrical outlets for a room. Also if you're building and know how you're going to layout furniture in a room, put in-ground electrical outlets where you may need them.
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Water Weight Barbie
Posts: 6829
Location: Oz, Kansas | thomas paine - 2013-11-21 8:53 AM lookout hill - 2013-11-21 9:35 AM First off I would never have built an earth contact. My next house will be a reverse story & 1/2 with the kids rooms down stairs. My bathroom will be much bigger with a seperate shower & tub with 2 vanities. I would have built ins in the closet so I don't have to worry about dressers in the bedrooms. I would have a designated mud room off the garage which would be a 3 car garage. Have heated hard wood floors throughout except in the mud/bath/laundry. One thing I do love is my laundry room is off my master bath & I love having it there, I just wish it were bigger. laundry room with a backdoor to the MBR closet. only downside is if that is your only laundry room, mud everywhere. pretty easy to have an extra washer/dryer in a mud room for everything that you dont want to haul through the house to clean / wash with everyone else's clothes
Next house will have a laundry in the mud room & a kitchenette in the garage so my hubby can do his canning out there. I love an open floor plan with lots of windows.
But make sure you really think about the layout of the house & which direction it will be facing. If you plan on having a nice back deck for entertaining make sure it doesn't face west or you'll never use it in the Summer. |
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Texas Tenderheart
Posts: 6715
Location: Red Raiderland | jlazyc - 2013-11-21 11:23 AM We have built a house and now we are remodeling another house. Here's what I've learned.
In floor heating is the BEST!
I prefer my laundry area close to the kitchen. Let's face it, you spend most of your time in the kitchen and when the laundry is on the other side of the house and the washer or dryer stops you have to walk all the way across the house to get it. It's annoying and I prefer it closer. The only other way I would have it is if it's next to the bedrooms.
You can't have enough kitchen cabinets. No pantry is ever too big.
You can't have enough closet space. His and hers closets in the master bedroom is nice.
An extra 1/2 bath for guests is nice (but only if you can keep your hubby from using it .....).
If you can swing it, a wrap around porch is fantastic. It's an extension of your house for dirty boots, cleaning tack, etc.
Make sure you have ample eletrical outlets for a room. Also if you're building and know how you're going to layout furniture in a room, put in-ground electrical outlets where you may need them.
SO MUCH THIS!!! They are having to go back and break concrete to put floor outlets in the living room and run under floor in the media room upstairs. The builder should have thought of this not us! |
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 Angel in a Sorrel Coat
Posts: 16030
Location: In a happy place | Put electrical outlets in closets so you can plug in vacuums, etc. that need charging instead of having to have them sitting out in your rooms charging. |
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Texas Tenderheart
Posts: 6715
Location: Red Raiderland | rodeomom3 - 2013-11-21 6:13 AM We are meeing with an architect next week. I like to see out so lots of windows, lots of closets, big back deck for entertaining with another fireplace, grill. This is what I have drawn up for him: 3/3, open floor plan, one living/dining area, floor to ceiling windows across the back wall, windows instead of upper cabinets in kitchen. I tis just down to my husnband and me, I want what will be hte guest bathroom tohave freestanding bath tub and furniture. I want a mud room seperate from my laundry room, office for my husband and a weight room you can access from the master bath and the hall way. BIG maters closet with built ins. I have also hired a kitchen designer and a friend of mine who is an interior designer to be sure we get his house right as hopefully it will be our last. These pictures are from a website houzz.com. Going to copy the living room pretty verbatim and tweak the bathroom just a little.
I'm in love with these two rooms. They look soo cozy. I love the warmth of beiges, browns and wood. These pics look like a beautiful kitchen and bath up in the mountains. |
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