I like a simple plan :) First off, who is living here? Kids? Dogs? Which direction does the house face? Looks like you plan to do a lot of work yourself, good for you!

Have you imagined how you will arrange the furniture in the living room? Right now it is for both entering and gathering. Is this also where you will watch TV, do homework, play?

Or will some of that be in the basement? If so, why not open up the stairs so it's more integral to the house?

Where will your "home office" be, you know, where you pay bills and shop online and surf the Garden Web?

Just offhand, the bath on the right: the vanity is too small, and the closet is too big, you won't be able to get into that back corner, and when you finally move in 20 years you'll pull out from the cobwebs the humidifier you knew you had but couldn't for the life of you find. Maybe have a longer vanity, to the wall, and change the closet to cabinets, maybe a combo of cabinets and drawers, with one cabinet opening above the vanity on the right. That could be a handy place for things that need to charge like toothbrush or shaver, or to keep the water pik plugged in but out of sight.

The master bath vanity looks pretty small to accommodate two bowls, and would you be happy with just a couple of drawers in-between? DH needs only one drawer, but I need 3. Again, you could extent the vanity all the way to the wall and incorporate storage above and around. We also have a cabinet above the commode. Like yours, it's hidden from rest of the bathroom and it holds a lot.

The two bedrooms could use a high window, similar to the one in the master bath, high enough to put a furniture under, but provide some nice cross-light or ventilation.

Do you need a pantry?

So glad you're putting the attic access in the hall, I've had it in a bedroom reach-in closet in two houses and that renders it pretty useless.

How about some dimensions?

Thank you for the feedback!

My husband and I will be living there. We are 30 and 31. We have no kids now, but hope to in the near future. No pets either. Not sure if this is in the plans, but I hear kids can be pretty persuasive when it comes to pets. We'll see. :)

The house faces north-northeast.

We do plan to do some work ourselves. We are going to install flooring in the living area and halls and maybe the bathrooms as well. We are also going to install the central vac unit and piping and finish the basement in the future.

I envision a couch on the front wall by the windows, a loveseat or couch floating to split the foyer from the living area, and maybe a chair floating to split the hallway/dining are from the living room. Either that or a bit L-shaped sectional. We have two couches and a loveseat now, so I think we'll see how that looks first. It will primarily be for watching TV, hanging out, and playing with toddlers. However, the plan is to add additional space in the basement later to have a larger play room and TV space in the middle, a home office off to the left of the basement entry doors, and another room at the right rear for a bedroom, plus a full bath, and an unfinished utility/storage area.

I have debated whether the stairs should be more integral or are perfect where they are. The basement in the beginning will probably be a workshop for my husband (metal and wood) until he gets his 40' x 48' detached workshop/garage. In that case the stairs are perfect as they are located right next to the garage entrance. The timing of the detached workshop depends on how quickly and for what amount we sell our current house. (We are going to list it in the spring - March or April I imagine.) However, I can see how the stairs being more integral to the house could be really great for what I think the use of the basement will be in the future. Where would you propose putting them?

I will definitely consider the size of the vanities. I did ensure that both of them are large enough to have multiple drawers (a non-negotiable for me) but know the drawers will not particularly large or very many. Right now my husband and I have three drawers in the master bath between the double bowls and find that sufficient. We actually share the top drawer and the bottom two are used for storage of extra tooth brushes, contact solution, q tips, etc...

We will consider the high windows in the two spare bedrooms. The floor plan only originally had one window in each bedroom and we added the second. I do know that the spare bedroom side of the house is the weather side and that was one plus of no windows on that side of the house.

We have a pantry cabinet in our current house and had a pantry closet in our prior house and have found both to be useful. I do question whether the minimal size of the pantry in this floor plan is worthwhile or if we should just make the front door closet bigger or add a dropzone/charging station where the pantry is located.

I will ask for floor plans with more dimensions.

Thanks so much for the feedback!

The plan seems pretty functional in general but there are a few things about it that for me are negatives.

The only closet that seems really functional as drawn is the one in the utility room. The closet near the front door appears to be too shallow, and the closets in the secondary bedrooms are very deep but the hanging will have to be across the back so there is a lot of floorspace wasted between the door and the hanging space. The doorswing into the master bedroom closet will interfere with the hanging.

Also in a climate like Central PA unless you never ever use the front door, it's nice to have some sense of separation between the front door and the living space. Not necessarily a complete vestibule that can be closed off but an entry hall to block drafts and so guests aren't standing in the corner of your living room in wet shoes and coats.

The closet near the front door is what I would consider a standard depth - 2' inside wall to inside wall. Do you think that is too tight? We did increase the depth of the mudroom closet (to 2' 6") for bulky winter coats. Do you think we should do the same for the front door closet?

After taking a closer look at the secondary bedrooms I agree that those aren't really functional. I thought we would have enough room for hanging on both sides but after more measuring it appears way too tight. I think we are going to change the bathroom to run parallel to the front of the house in between closets for each bedroom. I think we'll be able to get 8' or 9' closets in each room rather than the WICs with the wasted space.

The master WIC is 5' x 8'. Do you think a pocket door may solve the space issue in that closet?

As far as the front door goes, I doubt we will use it much. At our current house that has a side entry garage all of our guests come in through the garage. I don't think it is worth the reconfiguration and extra space for as few of times as I think it will be used. Very valid point though.

Thanks for the feedback!

Nice and simple.

I agree that most of the closets could use help:

Near the front door you have two small closets, but the small one looks too small to be useful at all. I'd make it one larger closet.

You say the master closet is 5x8? Clothes on one side will require 24" . . . leaving you a walking space . . . and perhaps the other wall could be used for hanging belts and purses. So you're using the square footage of a walk-in, but you're really only getting the storage of a reach-in. If you add 12-18" width you could have shelves on the other wall; if you add 24" you'd double your storage space.

The kids' closets are deep . . . but they appear to be only slightly wider than the door -- meaning probably 36-40" wide. So they're going to have wasted walk-in space . . . and one small hanging bar across the back. You'd do better to give the kids a nice WIDE reach-in closet . . . and make the hall bath DEEP in between the two closets; this would also allow you a window into the bathroom.

The hall bathroom closet isn't deep enough or accessible.

Switching to the subject of bathrooms:

I agree that your master vanity isn't big enough to support two sinks. Unless they're tiny-tiny sinks, or unless you're giving up drawer storage. Test it: Go to the store and look at sinks the width you're considering. Note, too, that your bathroom is very minimal -- where will you place a hamper? a trash can? where will towels hang?

Utility room:

This style powder room is okay, but hardly ideal because it's so narrow. The real question is, WHY do you need a powder room? The hall bath is accessible to guests. You're not working with a large house here; I'd skip the powder room.

Skipping the powder room would allow you to move the washer/dryer to the outside wall. This is a positive because you'd be able to vent the dryer directly to the outside -- an easier, cheaper, safer option. And it would move the noisy machines farther from your bedroom.

It would also allow you a little more space to include a folding area . . . and storage underneath for baskets of clothes waiting for the wash. Right now you have no space at all for anything except the machines. If you leave this room "as is", I'd sacrafice a bit of that large closet for laundry purposes.

The kitchen looks functional -- an L-shape plus island is always a good choice. However, I'd like to see a pantry somewhere.

Your dining area is modest but workable. With a door on one side and a walkway on the other side, you are limited on the size table you can have.

Consider your entry areas: In both spaces you have closets for coats, but in neither space do you have a spot to set down keys, purses, sunglasses, umbrellas.

Think intentionally about your front door swing.

Are you sure you want all guests who come to your front door (or solicitors) to have the ability to see all of your living area of your home? Or, would it suit you better to reverse the door swing of just the front door?

Only you can answer that question, but I think you do have the room to the left of the door (as you are entering) that it won't feel closed in to reverse the swing.

Here is a link that might be useful: ETA: linked floorplan

This post was edited by kirkhall on Sun, Jan 25, 15 at 1:23

This is all great feedback. We are reconsidering closets, vanities, and other storage. We definitely are changing the spare bedroom side of the house to have a bathroom and reach-in closets for each bedroom rather than walk-ins. We will also add a window in the bathroom and be able to get a larger vanity with more drawer storage.

We are also considering adding a foot or two to the back of the master bedroom portion of the house to make the walk in closet more functional. I think we will remove the closet in the master bathroom and extend the vanity to the wall to add drawer space and be able to better accommodate the double bowl sink.

We also want to find a place for a drop zone/charging station. If we remove the baby pantry at the end of the front door closet and extend the front door closet to fill that space we might be able to do a built in cubbie to serve as a drop zone/charging station...purses, keys, mail, cell phones/tablets, etc.. The pic is something like what I'm talking about. Do you think it would function well for us? Would it take too much space from the front door closet?

We are also looking at the hampers, garbage cans, scales, and towel bar placement in the master, as well as the swing of the front door.

We are meeting with the builder again on Wednesday and will discuss the changes then. Hopefully we will have a revised floor plan by the end of the week.

Keep the suggestions coming!

We are also considering removing the powder room. However, I think it would be really handy to have a bathroom right off of the garage rather tracking through the master or to the other side of the house to go to the bathroom when you get home or come inside from working or playing. It is a bit tighter for the laundry than I'd like though. Ideally I wanted a separate room with a door and not laundry in a hallway. Do you think we could make this layout work if we added storage and a countertop like shown in the pic?

Good -- I think the functional items you're looking to tweak are going to be the "make or break" part of your build. In my opinion, you don't build so you can have just the right granite in your kitchen or so you can avoid that color that's so trendy right now; rather, you do it so your house will be FUNCTIONAL. So you'll have outlets at just the right place, a sink next to the toilet instead of ten steps away (yes, I have this), and ample storage that works.

I think your idea to turn that small closet (hadn't realized it was a pantry) into a drop spot is perfect. You don't need a BIG spot for this. I'd leave the bottom open for a trash can (lose the junk mail, Kleenex from your coat pocket, and the kids' juice box trash as you enter the house). Key hangers. Slots for mail up higher. Outlet for charging. And up top you could have a closed cabinet for storage.

However, I'd still like to see a pantry somewhere.

The washer/dryer picture you showed is attractive and would provide storage for detergent . . . but it still doesn't give you anywhere for baskets or folding. You could resign yourself to toting the baskets to the bedroom to fold, but I think we ALL have baskets of dirties hanging around waiting their turn in the machine . . . pretty much all the time. Have you seen pictures of the machines "hopped up" on a sturdy shelf that allows you to store baskets underneath the washer and dryer?

I think the doors would work well -- if you moved the washer/dryer to the end in the current powder room spot -- but I'd like to have natural light in what could otherwise be a dark hallway. I'd vote for having a windows over the washer and dryer . . . and if you install the doors, go with a door with an opaque glass.

Alternately, use a pocket door on the door into the house . . . and skip the door over the washer/dryer.