Planing on building a house, is one of the biggest steps/ investments in a persons live, and it is supposed to present their personality.
Knowing that is is cruchial to choose a good home designer or a builder that has his own design service.
Usually people start with buying a lot or acreage. After that, they look for a house designer or a builder that has a collection of floor plan to choose from. Let's go with the assumption that our customer wants a custom home design from a professional. There are different thing to look for as following.
The floor plan must meet different criteria like size of the lot, local codes and requirements and of course the customers needs.
The customer usually has some kind of an idea as to what his dream house would look like, so he provides the designer with pictures, or even with floor plans that he saw some where, and explains what he wants to be different or improved.
Having this info, the designer start collecting information about the customers specific needs like i.e. :
-Number of inhabitants
-The ages and gender of children
-Future plans to add onto the dwelling
-A list of general family activities or hobby's
-Entertainment habits
-Desired number of bedrooms
-Kitchen appliances desired
-Planned length of stay in the residence
-Live- in guests or requirement for people with disabilities
The budget for the home
The style of the home
Neighborhood, conditions and restrictions
a.s.o.
It is very helpful to know, what the customer expects like minimum room size, how to furnish the rooms a.s.o. It is better to have the customer agree on a minimum bedroom size, than on a request of i.e. 3 big bedrooms. Because with that information the designer has specific numbers to work with and the risk of wasting hours on going into the wrong direction, is lower. So the designer can give a more accurate price estimate for his work, and it is guarantied, that if the customer and the designer are working hand in hand that everybody will be satisfied, and happy with the service. It sure takes a good designer, to create the dream plan for a client, but the client himself can do a big part by cooperating and providing the information necessary.
It is also very good to have a wish list from the customer for items he or she wants to be in the house.
Once all this information is collected, the real design work can begin. With different floor plan options, whether you want a split level design, a bungalow or a two story home and exterior designs where there is a tremendous amount of different stiles out there. Which will be presented to you in different articles in our blog.
Konrad Braun
Original source: http://www.articlesbase.com/interior-design-articles/house-floor-plans-things-you-should-know-when-planning-a-house-365214.html
