re: Starting house plans - where to get ideas?

I modified plans from this. Need to make sure you only modify once because they will charge you for every modification once the lambs are “approved”

quote:

---

We arent building anything crazy, house is going to be around 3,200sqft. Hoping to keep it around 150/ft. Able to go up to around 175/ft if needed. Thats for house only.

---

I'm assuming your pricing psf (150-175) is for total under roof square footage. If that's your estimate for heated and cooled psf, that isn't anywhere near the ballpark.

Grassy1 and Magicman54 posts provided very good information. Subtle things like solid doors, 8ft doors (when ceiling heights are above 9ft), larger baseboards (7 1/4) and window casing (4 1/4 versus 3 1/4) are details that should be considered.

Outdoor ceilings, can lights everywhere and making outdoor area as large as you can afford are all excellent recommendations as well. Spend money on windows as opposed to contractor grade. When I shopped for windows and doors it would have been easy to just go with the lowest priced stuff....that is, until I saw the better grade choices.

What I've encountered is that building materials (although priced higher than a few years ago) really didn't drive up the cost of construction. Labor has been a killer....floor installers, bricklayers, concrete guys, plumbers, electricians etc.....those were the eye opening areas for me.

Also, Houzz and Pinterest are great sources for ideas. Take pictures of houses you like and print out pages of things you see online. Bring these to your architect to incorporate into your plan.

Good luck....

quote:

---

Fire the arichetect just buy plans online it’s a better deal arichetects are worthless you will spend 10-15k on that silly stuff when you can get ready plans if you look hard & save 14k

---

Damn, that is one hell of a run on sentence....Full of ignorant information.

You get what you pay for and in this case. Most internet plans are junk and 99% of the time do not work on your lot, or they are flat out unbuildable. You end up spending the same in the long run to fix the plans so they are up to your local building codes as you would have if you had gone the correct route with an Architect or Draftsman the first time. Also, have fun finding an Architect who is willing to stamp a set of plans he did not design nor have any part of.