The more bumps, roof lines etc the more expensive. The cheapest to build is a box, so the closer to a box your footprint is the cheapest, therefore I would say the farmhouse would be more to build. I noticed the laundry was upstairs in the farmhouse also, will this be a home you live in when you are older? If so you may want main floor laundry. I do like that the dining room is part of the kitchen, never had any use for a seperate formal dining room myself.

In #56 the master bath seems odd for some reason, and a long way to walk to get a quick change of clothes, I would probably put a sliding door to one of the closets from the bedroom. Laundry does seem ackward here because its not a straight shot or even semi straight from your bedroom to it, where all your clothes and towels will originate. I love the front porch and overall look of the house though.

The William one has some good things, the sun/kitchen nook is large enough to be a dining area on its own, allowing you to re-purpose the official dining area and use it as a library/den, etc. You could even make the kitchen larger: taking away space from that dining room, and use the smaller new room as a office/workout room etc If you added 4 extra feet to the bottom of the kitchen, the remaining "dining" room would still be more than large enough for office/workout space. That is still larger than bedrooms I have seen in smaller houses! It has lots of storage and a great porch. And everything you need as you get older is all located on the main floor.

You don't mention kids so I haven't really taken them into consideration much, but he farmhouse does have a nice activity/playroom on the 2nd floor, and the William one has the bedrooms spaced a little apart which could potentially avoid some sibliling conflicts, plus that huge future room as they get older and want friends over or a media room.

For me I would narrow it further to the farmouse or William. And probably lean more toward the william one because its squareish, seems to have more useable space, and potential with just a few changes.

Thank you for your feedback. I'm looking at these houses with us getting older in mind. I have always preferred sleeping upstairs, but am finally getting it through my head that we should have the master downstairs. At this point in time, I prefer that the laundry be upstairs, but realize it would eventually need to be downstairs.

Our youngest 3 are all teenagers right now, so we will still have the youngest here for another 6 years full time and then several more part time through college. We also have 3 older children who have their own families, so I'm pretty sure we will be using the upstairs bedrooms for a long time to come whether they are for our youngest kids now or later on as guest bedrooms.

I agree with you on the master bath and closet on the #56 plan. That would have been reworked if we had gone with that plan. Not sure how, but I was think of moving the laundry room over to the smaller master closet (we don't need two) and then using the laundry room as a mudroom. Not sure how I would do it, but I would definitely rework the whole master bath. We would want to take out the tub and would just want a large walk in shower.

re: William Poole - I didn't think about going into the dining room on the summer hill, but that is a good idea. I don't have to have a dining room either. As long as I have a large kitchen to accommodate big dinners and a gathering area to accommodate our large family (18 total), I will be happy. My biggest concern with that one was the big footprint that it has compared to the other two floor plans. I just never knew which would be more expensive, bigger foundation or more bump outs. We really do love large porches though. I would just have to figure out how to make the outside look more like a farmhouse.

i have had a long narrow (15 ft wide) living room/ great room before and found it difficult to arrange furniture in and awkward to entertain in that would remove the farmhouse plan for me

having the great room next to the living room with three teenagers still in the home would negate that plan leaving summerhill as my favorite of the three however, that kitchen is pretty small

i think i'd continue the search if i were you

What is it you want in a house? Also where are you located? When you think of home, what is it you think of?

For example, when we started designing our house, we decided we wanted to have an indoor/outdoor feel where we could entertain within and without. With that in mind, I created a U shaped house where all the main rooms also empty onto a courtyard. This also brought me back to the time years ago when I lived in Mexico.

So what is important to you?

The thing that stands out is that none of the houses have any relationship with the site upon which it will potentially sit.

If I had to choose, I would pick the apple. No wait, the coconut, definitely the coconut . . . or maybe the peach. Do you have banana?

I like the first one. I do not like the last two. But, I dislike towering ceilings and powder rooms that are not private.