amberm, we faced the same rules regarding facing our home to a side street-must face it to the address street. fortunately our plan was equally suited to facing to the address street. we live about as far south as you can get in southeast texas, so facing the house at an angle to the street which also happened to be due north was a good thing. the house has 12 ft wide back porch which faces south and southeast, garage is to the west, shading the west side of the house. 10 ft wide front porch extends almost the width of the house facing a lake the great room is almost all windows towards the south, but covered by the screened porch so heat gain is not bad (solar screens were installed on the wrap porch today and i was so happy to see they hardly cut down on the light in the house at all) porch overlooks 25 large live oaks and looking under them - while seated on the back porch, you see only rolling fields as far as you can see master bedroom and bath have windows to the south and east so we have nice morning sunlight also one of my favorite things prevailing southeasterly breezes so sitting on the back porch is wonderful we chose our plans almost 18 years ago and were so happy to find a site so suited to them (didn't purchase them until after we bought the land)

If you want to become self employed, I suggest you think long and hard about what would you want to do even if you didn't get paid. I know hundreds of people who liked making things, including my wife and me. So we made some crafts and went to a local craft show. We made $20 and I was hooked. We did more shows and learned more and made more. Within 6 months we did a show where we made $1,000 in one day! That was over 30 years ago. We now do shows with professional full time craftsmen and many years we made over 6 figures. Yeah, doing "craft shows". Beats working for somebody else every day! This may not be for you, but I am one of the few in America today that can honestly say "I love what I do for a living!" And it all started by wanting to "work from home".

A few more ideas: 1) consider flipping the kitchen and the dining room, this would enable you to better coordinate pantry, laundry, and utility spaces (what is that space next to the washer/dryer)? And would also help concentrate plumbing. In addition, it would give you a "clean" wall in your dining area, where I would put a bench (against the wall), w/ a rectangle farm table. This would give you enough seating for company, but leave you with plenty of space everyday. 2) I would also improve the layout of the master bath and closet, I think a better use of space is to have one well planned closet (versus 2), and, if possible, include a pass thru to the laundry area. 3) since space is tight, I would use pocket doors throughout the interior (except for bedroom entrances) 4) that back bedroom is really small ,,, I would consider having the front and back bedrooms the same size and (without knowing your ceiling height), I would include built in storage on top of the closets, which I'd keep at minimum depth. I'd also widen that section a bit and shoot for slightly bigger rooms. I'd re-work that hall area, seems like there is wasted space and I'd consider angled doorways (be sure it's not so tight that you can't move in furniture). 5) The second bath can be laid out more efficiently to give some space to the bedrooms. I'd just have a bath/shower combo, a stool, and vanity/sink. I would omit a linen closet and instead include built-in's ,,, both in the shower (for shampoo etc.) and around the room e.g. medicine cabinets and storage cubbies. In terms of layout, I'd have the door open up across from the sink/vanity, with the tub turned, and the stool on the outside wall (that's a classic bath layout, and it's classic for a reason). 6) With cement floors, I'd consider radiant floor heating. 7) I would have the left and right sides of the house 13.5 feet wide and then the middle section would be 18 ft. I'd also consider lining up the entrances to the bedroom areas on each side of the house across from one another. I'd also consider a built-in opposite the bar where one side is a book shelf (opening to the living area) and the other side is a buffet/server/china cabinet opening to the dining area. I like symmetry. 8) although I like the front door in the middle from an exterior perspective, it would not work for me from an interior perspective. Slide it down off-set to the french doors in the back of the house. I would then add two windows to the living room. Along with symmetry, I like windows. I strongly recommend that you finalize a detailed house plan, BEFORE you start building AND to include in your written contract with the builder. Good luck.

The yellow renderings are the alternate driveway idea without an addition (changing entrance to the driveway to the left side vs the back which it is today). I wanted you to see what the house looks like and will look like as that left front area is currently a covered porch but will be converted to a room. It does not show the addition as that would be to the left of the front left room on the 3d. i'm just trying to provide a good amount of perspective without a new 3d. I do not think we would add retractable screen as we are putting in an addition in back and it will have lots of windows.. do you see the 3d and the long driveway? that is limited yard space and we get more yard space if we do the addition as it moves the entrance to the garage to the front of the house. That is why we are trying to get the garage entry more towards the front. We explored entering under that top left room (and having second garage in existing under room next to it) but there is a fireplace behind the wall for that front room and would require a lot of structural changes. my arch thinks the covered terrace is competitive with the main house so I want to rework as needed to see if we can make it more cohesive/integrated. I think if we can, we need to recess it a little and work on the roof to make sure it is not too pronounced. DO you understand what i'm saying?