Don't go by us...we were in design phase for 7 years before we started building...so it depends on the patience of your architect...fortunately for us, he was infinitely patient...and of course we kept writing him checks too....

We have found Olioboard very useful. See the link. Below is a jpg of a board we made of our big furniture pieces, radius corners and soft trowel wall, what we like for basic indoor look and how we envision the back yard to be. We are still working on the front look. We lean toward what I believe is modern craftsman for the interior. Have fun with your design and build!\\

Here is a link that might be useful: Olioboard

It's not too soon to at least start looking into architects to make sure you find a good one for you. You could work with an architect now to explore and refine your requirements, or you could just wait. You can pay an architect by the hour to offer insights on feasibility of certain lots for building what you want, before you decide to buy. If you buy the lot early and still have a few years before building, you could start slowly with an architect to work on a concept and test it against your budget. The advantage of doing a little bit at a time is that it gives you a chance to mull things over--you don't have to make all decisions within a short time.

I just advise against developing a specific design before you've bought the land (diagrams, ok--floor plans dimensioned to the inch, not).

Happy new year!

Houzz lets you create "ideabooks" that are basically like collections of bookmarks to photos on their site with your own notes about what you liked in the picture. You can easily share these ideabooks with your design and construction team by email.

Start building your ideabook(s) now. It's never too early to start thinking about design. Since you are a few years out, you have a lot of opportunity with your property. Is natural light important to you? Visit the site at various times of the day. See where the sun comes, what obstacles (trees, etc) there are, where the views are etc. Your home should be designed with the properties of your land in mind.

If you've not bought the site yet be sure to check in the various restrictions on development in the area. In our town you are only allowed to build 6000sqft per acre total, including porches with 3 walls, and only 15000sqft of impervious covered hardscape/house per acre. There are also limits on septic, engineering, etc. Be sure to check out if there are any existing easements. How will this impact/limit your house or landscape plans? You can't build over a utility easement for example. What are the setback rules? Are there height limits? Is there a process by which neighbors can slow/block your development? If they're available, take a look online at your town planning committee minutes to see what obstacles past projects ran into!

A good architect will work with you to help refine and implement your vision for your life on your land. They should listen to you and your desires and bring their experience/wisdom to the table about what works and what doesn't in home design in general and for your specific area. There are too many people around that either don't have local knowledge, don't have enough of an opinion about details, or have too much of an opinion (e.g. they have a "vision" that supercedes yours). Spend the time talking to a few different architects and figure out which one you would be most comfortable working with. For me I was able to find one who shared my love of the type of house we were remodeling, and who was super responsive via email, and so the interaction has gone really well.

In broad strokes, the process for us went something like this - we considered the types of space we wanted, figured out what spaces could be multipurpose, came up with rough dimensions for the spaces etc. then (since we are a remodel) drew the perimeter of the house and arranged them inside the perimeter using colored bubbles in a computer program. From there both the architect and I took several steps at arranging the bubbles into a layout my wife and I liked. You have much more freedom when you are working with 100% new construction, though if you are shooting for a specific historical style you may have more limitations (e.g. a colonial will limit you to a rectangular shape). From there, we proceeded to modeling the space in three dimensions, understanding the elevation, ceiling heights, etc. Plans followed and now we're in early construction and material selections.

Pinterest.com allows you to create multiple collections of pictures, uploaded or linked.