I think it's too small. I think you are going to run into storage issues.

Is there an attic on the second floor? Were you planning on a garage?

It's a terrific little house, but I think you need more space for stuff.

I am pretty certain there is an attic upstairs because there are stairs going up and the roof is quite steep. We don't want to build larger than 1200, we will also have a workshop, barn, root cellar and garage eventually. I think there is enough storage for the stuff we have.

I think it's a great weekend or retirement house, but to raise a family in? I wouldn't.

It may not be many square feet, but with that roof, it's a lot of cubic feet. I'd take advantage of them by moving one of the bedrooms upstairs and converting the one near the kitchen to a real dining room. That would make planned living/dining large enough for 4 people to actually use.

As is, you only have one public space, and the kitchen. It will be adequete while the children are small, but it will practically garuntee that they'll never bring friends over once they hit junior high. Kid's don't always want to entertain in thier rooms, and don't want to be under adult eyes constantly. As a result, you won't know who they spend time with, and won't see much of them.

I'd do an attached garage, and add some space there for a real laundry and a coat room/landing zone for coats, shoes and boots backpacks. These two areas will put you over your desired footprint, but will make it infinetly easier to keep your home tidy and organized.

Looking at the numbers, I think you are well under your 1200 ft goal. There was a time when it would have been considered space enough for a family of 4, but there was a time when a toilet was a luxury and kids didn't need 4 sets sports equipment [and attendent footwear] each and didn't need a pack to bring home all the informational handouts, legal releases and liability waivers.

I don't think it's too small. We built a small house and we love it. The big problem I see with this design would be the lack of a family entry which you already mentioned. It's OK to have guests enter into your living space but for day to day living nothing beats an entry area with spots for shoes, coats and mess! Maybe something in the area of the kitchen and family bathroom would work?

I think the attic could become a neat space for privacy if you finished it too.

That's a cute house, but I don't see much storage room. The closets are small, and the stairs go over them, so only part of the closet is full height. That very steep roof will be expensive to build, both due to increased materials, and being more difficult to work on. Unless it's going to have useable living space upstairs, it's largely a waste (although aesthetically pleasing). Have you considered any plans with a basement, or is it not practical on your land? A basement provides the cheapest additional square footage, where you could have a nice game room for when your children get older. You do have to have room for the stairs, though, which has been giving me fits on my design efforts.

I grew up in a 1,300 sf house in Wisconsin and I think that you can do better than that house for a small house, although you may need to add a little more sf. You already identified the problem with the front entry, but you have similar problems with the back entries--do you really want the only rear entries to be through bedrooms, and do you want your teenagers to have doors that lead from their rooms directly to the outside that make it easy for them to leave or for visitors to sneak in? This house does not have a much storage space. My mother's house lived big because she had lots of storage space. This house is cute, but the fire place is between the living room and the dining room so you can't have it be the focal point of the living room. What is supposed to be upstairs? If you could move one of the bedrooms to the second floor, then you would have room for a nice rear entry and laundry room.

I am all for small houses (and this one IS really cute!), but...

--- this one has no space for kids to hang out.
--- anyone who wants to go out to the back deck has to go through a kid's bedroom.
--- exterior doors to a kid's room does not sit well with me.
--- no coat closet out front.

I would, if possible, move the kid's rooms upstairs with a bath.
Then use one room for the dining room and the other for TV/family room.
The living room area can then be reworked with a coat closet.

The front door opens smack into the dining area, which means you can't have a big or long table, and will have to be very careful not to open the door into someone sitting at that end of the table.

The kitchen island is wasting space and blocking the refrig door. You'd gain cabinet space and improve fridge access by moving the fridge to left side of the presently blank wall and running countertop/cabinet from beside it to around the corner to the sink.

I approve of the closet/drawer space under the stairs; an excellent use of a difficult area. I think that closet area will be near to full height, and it IS located beside a full-height closet.

I agree with others in not wanting exterior doors in either of the children's BR. Doors are a bad idea from both a safety and a privacy viewpoint. Those doors are also space-takers which the small rooms don't have to spare.

I'd eliminate the cute little but useless back deck and put a screened porch extending around the corner to the lee side of the house. Make the screened area large enough for everyone to sit, and a bit more so the kids can play. Shade is countered with skylights. And while I was eliminating, I'd square the rectangle instead of having all those corners, which would make the small bedrooms a better size, greatly improve the LR area, and add enough space so that one can move around the dining table while people are sitting at it.

It is true that those steep roofs are difficult/dangerous to work on, I'd have an engineer ease the angle ~~ which might squinge the attic space.

Other than the lack of an entryway coat closet, I'm not going to worry about storage space; you'll have enough in other outbuildings, although a basement would be a great help. However, I would recommend being careful to use "apartment-sized" or small-scale furniture to prevent the rooms from appearing overwhelmed; and beds with storage cabinets beneath, especially for the children.

Thank you all, you make some good points.
oruboris - I have to disagree that the living dining area isn't big enough. Our current house has an eve smaller dining are and I grew up in a smaller house with 2 siblings. We had friends over frequently. I do agree with needing a bigger laundry area and somewhere for coats.
ajpl-it was my thought also to finish off the upper area for storage and accessory space.
flgargoyle- unfortunately I don't think a basement is a good idea at our site. It is almost perfectly flat and you hit hard pan early on. I agree stairs are tough to plan, especially when you have to be stingy with the square footage.
Carolyn - We will be miles from anywhere worth going so I am not too worried about them sneaking out but it would be nice if there was more public access to the porch.

So I guess I need to take what I like from this (mostly the looks of it and the kitchen) and rearrange it to make it better. Luckily I have loads of time to figure this out. With the way things are working out we won't be building for years...

che 1sea--I live out in the country too and remember that kids get driver's licenses. And sometimes the biggest problem is not sneaking out, but who sneaks in. We've lucked out with our boys (so far) but I have friends who live out in the country who have had problems with too easy private, outside access to their kids' bedrooms.

I think the exterior is very cute. Lovely, simple, well-proportioned, nice classic lines.

I do think it's a bit on the small side. The smallest house I've lived in was 900SF. It was my wife's house when we married, and it was just the two of us there for two years. For the two of us, it worked out well.

Like your plan, it was a 3-bedroom home, but we each took a bedroom for an "away room", and that worked well. With two young children, I think I'd want just a bit more space to spread out in -- preferably for the adults to have one space to get away into, even if only to find a quiet corner to read in for a few minutes, or watch a TV show not aimed at children? Or if not that, a space for the kids to go play in so the livingroom can be yours for a time?

I do like that the plan has two full baths. DW's house had only one, and apparently the previous owners had raised at least two children in that space. It's really nice to have at least a bathroom for the adults and one for the kids.

We don't have a real formal dining room here, just a kind of nook off the kitchen. That works fine for us, with one child, as we also very seldom entertain and when we do, we're just not formal enough to care about perching plates on laps and folding chairs. That said, I do think the dining space in that plan is tight if you're going to want a regular sit-down arrangement for four, with the front door and entry into the kitchen where they are. If you widened the entire plan by even just four feet, the spaces here and in the bedrooms might work better?

To keep the overall shape and proportions of the house, I wonder if you could "go longer" on the back side? I'm thinking of stacking the right-hand children's bedroom "on top of" the left-hand bedroom, jettisoning the back deck in the process as well as the exterior doors to those bedrooms. Ditch the doorway on the (now) "bottom" children's bedroom. Let the right-hand side of the back of the house serve as a wide hallway, with both bedrooms opening from it, as well as a kind of rumpus room for the kids, and/or utility room. Move the w(asher)/d(ryer) closet into that same utility / rumpus room.

--Steve

I had to LOL at your comment, "We will be miles from anywhere worth going so I am not too worried about them sneaking out . . ." Obviously your children are still very young and you have not yet experienced their teenage years. There doesn't have to be anywhere worth going for them to want to go there. A friend in a car, a deserted country road, a river bridge - they're all magnets for teenagers (and the criminal element, too, unfortunately).

I wouldn't want an exterior door in my kids' bedrooms.

Several years ago there was a very young child in Canada (?) who snuck out while the parents were sleeping and almost froze to death. It's not a good idea for any age.

I think it's a lovely plan, but I am not sure that it makes sense to make significant changes to such a small plan. Each change has greater ramifications than when you are dealing with a larger plan.

Are the children the same gender?

Solie - I agree, outside doors are not a good thing for small children and weren't ever something I intended on keeping. The children are not the same gender.

I think your plan is great! We used to have a smaller home when the kids were younger and because of this we had to spend more time together : ) We watched TV together, ate together and played games together (especially if someone was watching a show that no one else was interested in LOL). Now our home is larger and we have so much room we rarely spend the time together we used to, except for meals : (
The only thing I would change, if it were my place, is the 2 back bedrooms...........I would make them into one large MBR, with access to the back deck! I'd also make the space across the island and sink the place for the fridge. Then I'd add a door to the outside where the fridge is.......and maybe a porch on that side too.
Definately plan to utilize the upper floor for storage and extra BR/play area!
Good luck and hope you enjoy what ever you choose : )
BTW.....I'm approx 20 min away from the young Canadian girl who froze and survived her ordeal.....sad but a happy ending that could've been tragic.

I really like the plan, but I would square it off (cheaper to build and gives you more space) and put a mud room in between the back bedrooms, like this:
{{gwi:1507590}}From house stuff

I don't think it would sacrifice the look of the exterior much to loose the little dormer side things. If the attic isn't going to be finished, I'd also skip the staircase and/or widen the whole thing by 2 feet. But it's cute as can be, and I think it doesn't waste much space, plus it has a workable kitchen space. I really like the concept.

check out Don Gardner floor plans;http://www.dongardner.com/plans.aspx?pr=826ec9e6-7201-44fa-a29e-e4ac15ef0bc0&ps=all&ob=TotalSqFt+ASC&pn=1
I see several issues I would fix; first thing is I would put the master at back for privacy and to take advantage of deck; I don't think you want kids to have exterior access for safety and security reasons. If you put both bedrooms in the old master space you will flip the hallway to other side of the stairs and lose the hall through the kitchen; use that space for a washer/dryer behind bifold doors; I don't think you will like the stacked units; they don't hold as much and the drying takes longer. It is more economical to include a garage in the original build and framework of the house. You could have the children's bedrooms upstairs. A built in garage can use some of the space of the old master bedroom space and extend bonus space over garage upstairs off the children's rooms; move one bathroom from downstairs to upstairs; the only bathroom downstairs can be adjacent to the master bedroom and hallway (incorporate two doors; one for public access and one for bedroom access); Don Gardner plans can be modified to fit your requirements

Chelsea, have you looked at Architechural House plans? There are a few there that we really liked and you may too.

http://www.architecturalhouseplans.com/home_plans/137

If you are planning on making bedrooms upstairs eventually, make sure those windows are egress windows now! $$ to change out later. Also, if you are planning to finish the upstairs later, why not make those dormer-type bumpouts two stories instead of one?

I really love some of the architectural house plans, especially this one:
http://www.architecturalhouseplans.com/home_plans/44 but it is a little too big. We also need a pretty simple foot print and want something that will work with passive solar on top of everything else we want...

This is the first time I have visited this forum so I hesitate to jump in but....one thing that jumped out at me is "two small kids, no more planned".....sounds like our family, but.....the VERY unexpected happened and our boys are 17, 8 & 6. My standard line is "it took so long between #1 and #2 that we never imagined there would be 3!"

So, while I am all for building small and love Susanka's Not So Big House books/designs, having a playroom/extra bedroom/office that can be turned into a bedroom if necessity strikes was a Godsend for us. We have been able to stay in our house comfortably with 3 boys. My brother, on the other hand, had the 3rd "unexpected baby" and did not have a decent set up, found a new house, bought it and is now struggling to sell the first house in this tough market.

So, I just caution against designating every square inch when the children are so small -- needs change as families grow and it is nice to have a space designed to grow with you. If you have not seen Susanka's books, I would encourage you to look at them, I think she has some marvelous ideas for "stretching" less square footage. Good luck, your setting sounds divine!

I have seen Susanka's books and they have some good ideas but I did notice that the majority of houses in her books are much larger than I want to build.
Our plan for any surprise children is that children can share rooms and it is always possible to add on to the house and we will keep that in mind when choosing our floorplan. We are planning on some sort of small guest space as well. We also have decided that the only storage will be upstairs because I am starting to have joint problems, possibly arthritis, we shall see.
So I guess we are looking for: 1 story, 3 bed, 1.5-2 bath, possible small craft/guest room, ~100-120 sq ft kitchen, pantry . It should all fit in 1200 but doesn't seem to very easily. We won't build for a few years at least so there is time to search.
The setting is great (except for the rattlesnakes, black widow spiders, poison oak and scorpions) We have a sizable creek running through the property. A nice open field and on one side a few acres of black walnut trees (just babies right now).

It's a very cute house. I like raenjapan's version of it.

I would absolutely want at least 2 doors out of the house rather than just one, and I wouldn't want any of those exit doors in my children's rooms. You could do as others have suggested and move the master bedroom to the back.

The plan is OK. If cost is a consideration, building a 2nd floor rather than a big 1 story would be better. The high roof pitch is expensive, but worth it if you plan to finish with bonus rooms / bedrooms. As stated by another post, four corners on the foundation is more economical - try to square it off. It also becomes easier to side and roof.

We just moved from a country house without a mudroom...doesn't work; mud, boots, and jackets everywhere. You've been given great advice, I'd just second the part about saving a lot of money on the foundation without the in and out corners. I would put dormers on the second floor, you can easily make that a play/craft room and use the lower ceiling height areas for storing out of season clothes, sports gear, etc.
You might like the house a lot better if you put more flow between the dining/kitchen area. We had a pass through there where we put upper cabinets under the counter on the dining side for napkins, candles and serving dishes.
And, if your county law allows it, what's a country house without a wood stove?
One thing I do notice...you have some rooms that let in light from only one direction. That creates glare and an uncomfortable space. The old-fashioned four-square house design puts light from 2 directions into every main room.
Your master bedroom is an important space when you have children.