House Plan Blog

Newswire —Feb. 1,2019—You are considering a new home and are stuck trying to figure out what style of living area will best work for you, your family, and the way that you live. Well ponder no further. The House Plan Company has prepared this helpful guide to the three main types of living areas and how they live.

The Vintage Layout: Separated Family and Entertaining Spaces

Formally defined spaces and separation between family and gathering spaces is the traditional approach to arranging the living area of a home. As showcased in the...

The need for your home to grow with you has been a long standing concern with homeowners. Moving is time consuming and expensive so without spending too much on a larger home finding ways to adapt the current space is critical.

Originally the solution for this problem was the bonus room. Smartly maximizing the additional space created by the truss system over the garage, the bonus room provided family’s with the opportunity to spread out as budget and lifestyle allowed.The pitfall with the bonus room is the need for stairs in homes that are otherwise on a single level and being tucked away over the garage can leave the room feeling detached from the rest of the house. For homeowners’ looking for a solution to their growing needs that isn’t as separated as the...

It wasn’t too long ago that the only thing you did in a kitchen was prepare the next meal. Think back a couple decades and you might remember sitting in the living room while someone put the finishing touches on dinner in another part of the house, disconnected from the rest of the family. The distant sounds of pots clanging were all that was noted. And the kitchen was small and box-like in most cases.

Nowadays, the kitchen is more than a kitchen. It’s the social hub of the home, with all the amenities and features needed to entice friends and family to gather around and chat. Yes, a meal is being prepared, but it’s not hidden from sight. It’s happening right in the middle of all the buzzing activity.

“The modern home has an open floor plan,...

Picture this: A homeowner wants to update the kitchen in his or her home, and a contractor is called. Without too much quibbling, the details are finalized and the work begins. But then things start to go wrong.

This scenario doesn’t happen often, but when it does, it often gives contractors a bad reputation when in fact the real issue is that the homeowner didn’t do the homework.

“You can do a Google search for contractors in your area, and you’ll get star ratings and reviews of names and businesses, but that’s just one part of the process,” said Rick McAlexander, CEO of Associated Designs Inc. in Eugene, Ore. “Homeowners have to do a little legwork to really get a feel for who or...