Before you resign yourself to drafting up small house plans, think innovatively about how you can make a large house work on a small lot.
If you take a stroll through any of the older neighborhoods in your city – older meaning mid-century or earlier – you will notice something about the homes: the lots are all big, but the houses tend to be a bit on the smaller side, with large yards. Fast forward a couple of decades and you’ll notice that houses started to get bigger, much bigger. Lots were still fairly large, so there was still decent yard space, but houses began running over two thousand square feet, even in fairly modest middle-class neighborhoods. Since then, the story has changed yet again. Due to population expansion in many major cities, new homes are being built on smaller and smaller lots. So what does this mean for you when you’re planning on having a home built? Can you only look at small house plans? Or will you be able to somehow manage something a little bigger?
Well, in a way yes, and in a way no. There are still larger lots available in more affluent areas, so if you can afford to live in one of those neighborhoods, you can scrap the small house plans and build something bigger. If you can’t afford the richer areas of your city and are looking in a more standard, middle-class neighborhood, you might not be able to plan a house that appears large or has a high square footage, but you can still build something much bigger and more elaborate than your basic small home. Bungalows might be a popular choice right now, as are split-level homes, which, despite being built upward, still must cover a large surface area, otherwise all those half-floors would simply be too small to be practical. However, on a newer, smaller lot, those might not be options, but before you give up and start drafting up small house plans, consider your other options.
Why not plan for a multi-story home? True, those aren’t done very often anymore, but they can be beautiful, sophisticated, and perfectly modest homes. You will have to be careful when making the plans, though. You want to make sure you really consider where you would like everything to be. It might seem simple to just take small house plans and throw on another floor, but unfortunately it’s not quite so simple. You’ll have to consider whether you want all bedrooms on the upper level, or if you’ll need one or more on the main level. You also have to think about your maximum square footage per floor, and what room placements that will allow for. Also consider how many floors you’re willing to have (why stop at two?), window placement (for privacy), and whether the neighborhood has restrictions on housing styles. In all of these considerations, the size of your family, your propensity for keeping company, your decorative taste, and your physical health will all be considerations.
Despite the work involved in changing your small house plans to multi-storey house plans, it will be worth the effort when you live in the neighborhood of your dreams, without compromising the house of your dreams.