for more than 25 years, my perpetual hobby was studying house plans ..and we'd never really considered building until 2 years ago...
our house was never without the newest editions of house plan books....
i didn't have a bunch of plan saved up to choose from, but when the time came,
it didn't take us 5 minutes to chose a plan and we never looked back
when the time comes there will be no doubt in your mind which one you want...

I totally understand. We are also a few years away, living on the property in the existing, destined to be torn down house. Saying yes to one thing often means saying no to another, and there are many conflicting things that I find appealing.

What I am doing is making an imaginary "firm" decision, and living with it for awhile. Then..do I feel regret when I see a house of that "other" style...do I miss the view out the window that this plan doesn't have...etc.

Or price things out. Sometimes that has a way of making up your mind.

What worked for me when making a decision was to imagine that we found this house already built on our land in our price range. Would any of the concessions or "imperfections" bum me out? Probably not, because I'd be so thrilled to find a house our style that works for us and is in our price range in a place we love. It really takes the pressure off to get it "perfect," which is almost impossible because our lives change and evolve and what is perfect for us in 2014 may not be in 2024.

Kiwi - thank you for that thought - we're about to sign the build contract and, while I'm not second guessing our plan choice, I do feel a little anxiety and worry that there's something a little better out there for our family. But, when I imagined just what you said, I got chills - this is it!
Thank you!

NLW2SBD- that's great! How exciting!

It's pretty hard (and probably pointless) to try to design the "perfect" house without having identified the land on which it will be build and without having done a thorough site analysis.

And it's probably a wasted effort to try to design the "forever" house if it won't be built for more than five years, since our needs, wants and priorities may change substantially every five years or so.

That said, it's always a fun effort to try to design the "perfect" and the "forever" house, regardless of lack of information and uncertainty about one's needs, wants and priorities. Just don't hang you hat on such efforts.

I can definitely relate and we're not even close to pulling the trigger yet! We closed on our lot last spring and had our first meeting with an architect last month. So far I am really pleased with both. Our budget took a blow in our first meeting with our architect. That was not entirely unexpected and the order of magnitude was less than we feared -- rough figuring he thinks we need to budget about 20% more. We can deal with that (plus contingency), but we are really trying to look hard at our "must haves." I've already become comfortable with losing a few and I won't be at all surprised that we lose a few more in the preliminary design phase. Odd how your perspective changes when it starts to get real and we're still 3 years (and 1,000 miles) away. The one thing we won't have to compromise on is location and I'd *almost* live in a tent for that! (While some of the happiest times in my life were spent in a tent on a creek, it might get a bit cold when the snow starts to fly).

We probably had about 200 floor plans before we created the right one. We had a list of must haves that was about 80 items long. The final plan met 98% of them. The exterior the architect designed for it was just beautiful. Those final 2 conditions were not met with any other plan. We knew it was the one.

Sort of like falling in love...you know it when it's right.

I do believe we'll be happy with whichever plan we end up choosing. Like I said, I feel 100% sure that we could be happy with at least two plans we've "fiddled with" in the last year or so. I do think excessive time is allowing me to come up with MORE VERSIONS of plans that'd work well for us.

I really like the idea of imagining this house already built on my lot -- what details would be acceptable /not acceptable? That idea speaks to me.

Oh, I have the land -- 45 acres of lovely farmland currently making me a little bit of money, while we're waiting for our daughter to graduate this June. We've picked the spot and have done some work on prepping the area . . . so we're not quite at Hypothetical Square 1.

And I'm not sad that we started planning so far in advance. I've learned a ton of things that I didn't know before: Things about aging in place, in particular.

What I'm not particularly worried about is budget (yes, feel free to laugh at me in the future, if you wish), but here's the thing: We currently live in a large, paid-for very sell-able house in a prime-prime location . . . we are building a modest-sized house, essentially a starter-sized house with "pumped up" bathrooms and storage . . . we are moving to an area with a lower cost of living. We're going to be solid on budget.

Yikes, I just counted up the things on our "must haves" list . . . and I have well over 200. Of course, in all fairness, some of mine are repetitive: for example, "natural light" appears on just about every room's must-haves. And some are more like ideas for decorations: for example, I have a great Pinterest picture of how I'd like to paint /decopage the dresser that'll end up moving into our guest bedroom. And others are just general concepts like, Avoid trendy items that will "date" the house like vessel sinks.

This post was edited by MrsPete on Wed, Oct 8, 14 at 18:57

Congrats on getting close to moving forward, or pulling the trigger :)

I hope you are very happy with your plan, after all the research you've done...and different ideas we've all talked about, over the years!

Did you see the little lake house plan I posted, on the other thread? Of course, now that I'm not planning to build (or remodel) I find a really cute plan. Go figure! LOL

I think this is subliminal self-protection!

If your floorplan were finalized, you would likely be chomping at the bit and going crazy with the wait.

Will you wait to begin construction until your daughter graduates, or will you begin sooner in order to move in asap? Either way, it's not too far off, but for now bask in the planning stages and keep your mind open to change.

Judging from your responses to others' posts, you seem to be able to visualize easily, so blur your eyes and picture yourself moving through and living in your home. Don't expect things to be finalized until they need to be.

Where's the little lake house plan? I'd like to see it, but I can't find it.

I AM chomping at the bit to start our build and move out of our current house, but it's a matter of priorities: Our daughter's needs come first right now. She'll graduate next June, and then she will probably stay at home another year and begin at community college. I don't want to admit that it might be two years in community college, but it just depends upon how soon she feels ready to go away to a university. She's a timid kid, and the worst thing we could do for her would be to push her to go too soon.

My ONLY reason not to want to build /move right now is that we'll be some distance from my work . . . but that'll be acceptable, especially once my youngest is out on her own.

Mrs Pete - my heart went pitter patter pitter patter thinking you posted your 'trigger plan' and then thud.......not yet. ;) So excited for you. You have excellent reasons but I'm not sure I can wait 2 years or so for you to build! :D

Gosh even after framing I hmmm, coulda, not necessary it's fine but coulda done this or that. I still love looking at floor plans and I think like you said there are definitely more than one that can fit your life and your land just fine.