Yes I have more info but unless someone is interested in Mass I really don't want to cut and paste that much info. I have a ton of info; the owner modified the home for a wheelchair bound spouse and they are moving out of state. I am not a realtor, it is not my home; it belongs to an internet friend on the Wellspouse Association forum.

I didn't want to post a new thread, since there was so much helpful information about handicap accessiblity from forum members on this one. And Red had some great comments! So, my husband is getting much better...although he still uses the walker outside, he is able to use a cane in the house :) New plan...my mom is going to move in with us and that means my farmhouse plan needs to have some really great 'mom space' as well as the other areas. (She even has a stackable washer/dryer we might put in the walk through closet.) And mom has a great dining table, so I put that in the sunroom/back area. Anyway, just a quick sketch from Summerfield's original (very nice) software. Mostly just an update and thanks for all the earlier help and advice! From Lavender Lass farmhouse pictures And small woodstove in kitchen and sunroom would be something like this...only used for power outages and ambience! From Lavender Lass farmhouse pictures

The kind of motorized chairs that are now used in private homes need no more than a 32" door but to accommodate a wider conventional wheelchair offset (hospital type) hinges will add about 1.5" to the clear opening or you can use a 36' door but you will need a bit more room on the swing side. I didn't know how the plumbing will run in the house so I left the shower wall as a chase. It might be better to make the wall of the bathroom a 2x6 stud wall and put the plumbing stack in it behind the toilet. I also don't know if the climate is warm enough for pipes in an outside wall. I would avoid having a second door to the bathroom because one door is usually unintentionally left locked most of the time. I would also delete the window at the shower because the sill would be too high for a seated person to see over and it becomes a maintenance issue if it is too low in a shower.

Have you considered a residential elevator? Might open your options up to other plans as well. Just throwing out ideas here and they are worth what you paid for them ;) What other plans might be available as a starting point. I can see plenty of ways to re-arrange things so it might work better overall. How much freedom do you have with changes since you mentioned semi-custom? Since you won't be using the upstairs it seems like you'd have a massive roof on this as a one story and thus a lot of extra cost to build something you wouldn't use. How wide can the house be? The location of some of the rooms, the choppiness with the room re-arranging and the sizes of rooms seem less than ideal for long term living and may make you feel the house isn't as nice as you wish when you live in it so hence my questions to see if we can help you achieve your goals, save you some money, and have a well thought out house that will work for you and your family as well as your care-giver. Our very good friends and next door neighbors have a handicap accessible house that works really well for our neighbor who is in a wheel chair and ours is built with handicap features as well and he can navigate just fine in our house. I think the way their house is laid out might work well for your needs and be able to create a care-giver's area with 2 extra bedrooms. It is a fairly simple shape, but they do have a detached garage. What are your requirements beyond accessibility? Square footage, garage, max width/depth of house? Here's an idea of how you could re-arrange it a little differently, but still has an addition at the back. I made the laundry the common access point, unless you absolutely want that to be separate. It could be accomplished. By moving the laundry I also made it easier to vent to the outside. It seems to me like if you can arrange your house space a little separate from the care-givers it will flow a little better, be more private for both. Just one wall to make sure noise doesn't travel and the house seems a little more integrated and not spread out so far. A little more like a duplex and the care-givers guests won't need to even walk by your front door to visit and inadvertently ring the wrong door bell. It is more like a duplex type design. This is just an idea to illustrate the concept and the layout could still be better, but just to give you some ideas of what I'm talking about. If you absolutely have to stick with the other design I would consider at least changing the bathroom up to be more like the one I drew in the care-givers area so you can get some more space for the kitchenette and sitting area. The other bathroom wastes a lot of space and since used by only one person for the most part could be simplified and use the space elsewhere.