Garage thoughts, mostly based upon having cared for my grandmother, who died weeks short of turning 100: I suggest you go with ONE large garage door instead of two smaller ones. As someone else said, it's likely that by the time you and your spouse are elderly, you'll have dropped down to one car anyway . . . and with one door you can park in the middle of the garage, allowing for a very wide berth as you exit the car. With a walker or with a family member helping you out, that extra space could be useful. Actually, my husband and I plan to downsize to one car shortly after we retire. We were a one-car family for the first 3-4 years of our marriage, and when circumstances forced us to add a second car, it was a blow to our budget! Sure, we can easily afford it now, but a second car in retirement won't be a necessity, and I can find better uses for that money! I know that this board tends to lean towards "garage on the side of the house" . . . but I think my grandmother's front-facing garage was better for her as she aged. Our county has a small bus that'll come around to pick up the elderly and take them to the Walmart shopping complex, the doctor, and probably other places -- you just have to call and schedule a day ahead of time. She was ashamed of how slow she was leaving the house . . . but if she knew her ride was coming at 10:00, she could take her time getting out of the house and into the garage, lock the door, and sit down in her garage chair to wait. When the driver pulled up, he'd see her waiting in the garage, help her (and her walker) board the bus, and then she'd close the door with her garage clicker, which she'd have in her tote bag. This made her feel more "in control" in front of the driver and other passengers on the bus. Yes, as she grew older, my grandmother started keeping her trash and recycling inside her garage. She walked well on flat surfaces, but she had difficulty negotiating uneven terrain. Once she passed 90 (she lived alone), my mother called the trash people and explained that she simply couldn't get the cans to the curb . . . and the trash people were very accommodating: My grandmother made sure that the garage door was raised on trash day, and the trash people came in /wheeled her can to the curb /returned it to the garage. Avoiding steps in the garage should be a major priority. I'd be willing to install extra drains /slope the garage a bit /whatever else to make this happen. My grandmother had one step up from her garage to her house, and she had a vertical assist bar right next to the back door. I can't tell you how much good that bar did her. She also had TWO walkers. One was her "indoor walker". It had smaller wheels and was a little nicer. Then she had her "outdoor walker", which had larger wheels and could manage outdoor terrain a bit better -- and it lived in the garage. She never had to fight with getting the walker in /out of the house; rather, when she went into the garage, she'd start using the outside walker. Woe to the great grandchild who moved the outdoor walker away from the door; it had to sit RIGHT THERE, even though it was in everyone else's way. When she went somewhere in the car, one of us was always along anyway, and we wrestled the walker into the trunk.

I live in the Pacific NW so plenty of rain and an occasional snow. I've had solid red oak hardwood floors with a medium stain in 2 homes here for 17 yrs and never had any problems with any discoloration from water. I have a rug in the entry and have a covered porch outside where really snowy boots are left, or I shake them off before bringing them in (most of the time, but there's likely been some occasional water from kids things--nothing major). We also have the same wood in the entry from the garage into the house and no problems there--that entry sees more traffic than the front door. I've always had an entry rug and people use it routinely (if the rug's background is dark, I've found they'll use it even if it's oriental--when I had a light one, they did like Lindac said.). If kids were running in and out a lot dropping water or snow all over, I don't think I'd leave big puddles or piles of snow on the floor, but that's just me. I wouldn't leave that on tile either. I'd never want a little patch of tile in the entry personally. I have tile in my laundry room and when the shedding of snow clothes happens, I send them all in there to put things in the dryer or to hang things up to dry. When we had medium/dark engineered hardwood throughout another house in a drier climate--it didn't seem to be a problem either, but again, I used entry rugs. I can't recall the brand or thickness, but know we were told they could be sanded and refinished about 3-4 times if needed. I happen to love wood floors--can you tell?

Ksc36 - I disagree with you about the composite door jambs. Do you actually have a door with them? I drank the marketing Kool-aid when I ordered my new door, and chose the composite door jambs that replaced the 25-year-old wood door jambs. I am wondering if you did same. The wood jambs are heavier, feel solid. The composite door jambs feel light, and not solid. I should have realized that the composite door thing is a way for door companies to charge more for something that is much cheaper for them to manufacture, and so they made up a bunch of hooey to make people buy them. Sounds great in the brochures though. The owner of the door contracting company told me he has begun steering his customers away from the composite jambs now that he's had some experience with them.

Your roof should overhang your porch floor. From personal experience, unless you are pouring a concrete/cement porch floor, you really do want treated deck boards (thicker 1x6 w/rounded edges) used for your porch floor. You will want the ends of each board against your house and the other end at the front edge of the porch. You do not want board flooring running parallel to and beginning against the house because rain will, inevitably, blow onto the porch. Leaving a tiny bit of space between the boards of the floor (and having the ground beneath the floor sloped away from the house) will enable water to drain off a level porch floor more quickly not only making the porch last longer but also decreasing the slip/fall hazard of a wet porch. .If you are using wood boards, pay attention to which way any board may be trying to cup as water that lands on a deck and/or blows onto a porch can end up standing in a board if it is lower in the middle than on each side. That also makes it more difficult to clean. Using 8' deck boards usually being more space for dollar cost effective (less labor than cutting a twelve foot board in half) is only one reason why a porch should have an 8' floor. The more important reason is that if you really want your family to be able to sit on the porch and enjoy doing so, you need room for people to be able to easily walk the full length of the porch with chairs on it and you don't want everyone sitting in a chair with its back against the wall awkwardly lined up like a shooting gallery. Some people will want to create conversation areas and that will require chairs be across from one another with room to walk between them --unless you intend for your porch rail to be a bench seat. If you've already definitely decided on a only 6' porch, one thing you might consider is creating a "gazebo" at the corner -- an octagon shaped conversation area where you can create a circle conversation area or even set a table with chairs for outdoor dining or table top games. https://www.google.com/search?q=images+gazebo+as+corner+of+wrap+around+front/side+porch&tbm=isch&source=hp&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjJx5yCj5rkAhVhkeAKHVr6CQcQsAR6BAgBEAE&biw=1344&bih=620#imgrc=bNrMN32ZP6Xj0M:&spf=1566601944817 https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fi.pinimg.com%2Foriginals%2Fd7%2Fe1%2F89%2Fd7e189a1e49f02e5f6362f34d1a30889.jpg&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinterest.com%2Fpin%2F129337820521972296%2F&docid=N5qHqDYvfwD4HM&tbnid=bNrMN32ZP6Xj0M%3A&vet=10ahUKEwiT0emDj5rkAhUpwVkKHelwCJwQMwhPKAkwCQ..i&w=516&h=387&bih=620&biw=1344&q=images%20gazebo%20as%20corner%20of%20wrap%20around%20front%2Fside%20porch&ved=0ahUKEwiT0emDj5rkAhUpwVkKHelwCJwQMwhPKAkwCQ&iact=mrc&uact=8#spf=1566601972684