This house would live a lot smaller than the square footage shows, and isn't very suitable for a family with small children. Try arranging furniture in the living room, while leaving walkways to the front door, bedrooms, and stairs. The jigs and jogs all add expense, and that stairway takes up a ton of space for a smaller home. Will you have a 5-yr-old upstairs alone, or will the children share a room until one of them wants to move upstairs? Plan for them to play in the living room for a few years. As they get older, they may hang out in the loft, but the noise of every video game will come down the stairs. A big stovetop in the middle of an island is very expensive to vent, and certainly not very safe in a household with small children.

I don't make these comments so that you can make changes to this plan to make it work for you - I don't think it can.

You are going to get a lot of folks here suggesting you hire an architect. You may be thinking that you can't afford it - but the experience of many, many people here indicates that an architect can design a home for you that will suit your needs now and in the future, take advantage of the properties of your land and views, and safe you money by providing a house with good flow, functional rooms, and minimal wasted space.

Good luck!

Thank you so much for your input! Do you have any suggestions on open coastal type farm house plans to check out with a nice flow for families and not too expensive to build? What overall square footage and room size should we aim for? What features are ideal?

Thank you so much! Those are great tips!! Congrats on your growing family too!

One of the biggest challenges with both plans is that all of the family and visitor circulation enters the house through the front door, bringing mud, snow, rain and all the lovely outdoor elements directly into the main part of the house.

One of the plans has a garage/carport and one turns that space into a guest cottage and has no garage.

In both plans there are only two bedrooms on the first level, and you are a family of four.

One of the plans has a large rear screened porch, while the other turns that space into a huge "dining room" which seems illogical at best.

Are you sure, really sure, you want an open plan with two small children under 5? Toys, noise, mess and crying that's heard and seen throughout all of the public areas of the house? Better zoning and planning means a better life for all...

Keep looking--you can do better for your family's needs. These plans are really for empty-nesters with visitors. Better yet, consult your local architect for something which truly meets your family needs and wants.

Good luck on your project.

I love the look of the Farmdale too. James Farmer (whose home is shown on the SL site) made quite a few modifications to it, but it definitely is not kid-friendly. I agree with the other posters that it's for empty nesters.

Since you mentioned budget friendly (which the Farmdale is not) and Coastal/Farm styles, I wonder if you have seen The Cottages in Brunswick, NC? The developers of the neighborhoods are very happy to share info about the plans for people who are out of the area. Here's a link...the floorplans are on the right hand side and they have a nice photo gallery too.

The Cottages

You might also take a look at plans by Allison Ramsey and Moser Design Group.

Thank you all for these wonderful tips! It's giving us a lot to consider. Based on your feedback, would the below plans be more functional and flow for a family while still being affordable to build?

May Isle Cottage - http://houseplans.southernliving.com/plans/SL1905

New Round Hill - http://houseplans.southernliving.com/plans/SL069

Ultimately, I think we will consult a builder/design team, but I'd love to have a close idea of what we want and what will realistically work for a young family all the way through when the children leave. I also really want a plan with plenty of windows/natural light and easy access to the outside so we can build outdoor living, gardens etc as we continue to live there.

How comfortable are you for having two children under 5 sleeping (and playing) on the second floor by themselves?

As for "forever" homes, they are the desire of lots of young families, but the facts are that family life changes so much over time that there's really no such thing as a "forever" design. One has to make some compromises living in the same house for a long period. For example, having young children on a second level may not be desirable, but when they are teenagers that's exactly where they will want to be--as far from their parents and as private as possible.

Good luck on your project.

That's a great point about the house adapting and needs changing. Although we are building in the middle of family land so more than likely we won't be leaving or selling if at all possible. Which is another aspect of the house plan, should we consider plans that are easier to add or change if needed?

That is a very expensive house for the living space you get out of it!

I believe 2-story homes tend to be less expensive to build, because walls are cheaper than foundations and roofs. A rectangular house is cheaper than one with lots of corners and bump-outs. Efficient use of space is always cheaper - minimal hallways (but flow from one room to another); straight staircases (landings take a lot of space); potential for rooms to serve more than one purpose. Keeping plumbing lines in one area is cheaper than spreading it all over the house.

To meet immediate and future needs (with children), you need a place for them to play now, while they want and need supervision, but you also need a separate living space for kids, so they can have friends over or do their own thing, without being in the same room as the parents. My sons and their friends were crazy about Rock Band for a while - DH and I were grateful that our living room was on a separate floor! That can be a family room, basement, bonus room over the garage, loft, or extra bedroom. The goal here is flexibility.

Walk through a typical day in each of the plans you look at: imagine
coming home with a load of groceries, cooking a meal, relaxing in front
of the TV, washing clothes, enjoying the view,getting everyone out the
door at the same time, watching the kids play outside, attending to a
sick child in the middle of the night, supervising homework (which you
have to imagine, since you aren't there yet).

Design a home for the way you really live, not the way you think you should live. If you do not keep your kitchen tidy now, you maybe don't want an open floor plan, where the kitchen is visible from half the house. If you usually toss in a load of laundry before you go to bed, you don't want the laundry room next to a bedroom. If your family tends to leave a trail of coats, shoes, and stuff across the house, you need to provide convenient, adequate storage near the family entrance. If your climate includes rain and snow you need a place for outerwear for the whole family near the door. If you spend a lot of time outdoors, you'll want a bathroom close enough to an outside door that kids don't track mud through the house to get to it.

Those individual requirements are what makes generic internet plans unsuitable for most families - they try to offer something for everyone, and consequently don't exactly meet the needs of anyone. A talented design professional can help you develop a house plan that meets your needs - and your budget.

I like the Capeside Cottage better. The other one has too many crazy rooflines that look like more money.

The good thing, as I see it, the young kids can room together as little ones and when they want to separate, either one of them or you, can move upstairs.

The bad part is that there is no kids play room where they can have their own TV. On second look, I guess the loft would be a cool hang out area for two kids.

The May Isle cottage is way better because the kids' stuff is all on the second floor. They may be a little young right now - you may want to have your bedroom on the second floor and the kids' together in the other second floor room while they are young. You can use the downstairs master as the playroom. Then, when they are older and don't need you so much at night, you move to the master and the kids get the second floor.

"...Which is another aspect of the house plan, should we consider plans that are easier to add or change if needed?..."

My recommendation is to not go down that path. There are too many other needs and wants with higher priority for your immediate attention.

The reality is that every house can be modified and changed to meet changing needs and priorities. Just watch HGTV!

My experience says design and build the house that meets your needs for the next 5-10 years, and let the chips fall where they may after that. Almost no one can foresee their situation and needs more than 10 years in advance.

Good luck on your project!

Farmdale Cottage:

- It's cute, but it's going to be expensive because of all the jigs-and-jogs around the perimeter. All that lovely exterior detail will drive the price up too, which negates your plan of keep-it-small-and-modest-in-price.

- I don't like the idea of walking straight into the middle of the dining room. Guests would have to walk around the table to reach ... anything. No table for their keys, no place for their coats.

- The master bedroom is smaller than most children's bedrooms, and the master bedroom looks equally small. But the little nook in the master bedroom is cute.

- The living room also looks too small; given that the living room also serves as the hallway to several other rooms, you're going to have to leave at least 3' of walkway around the edges, so you'll have only about 9x9 for furniture placement in the living room ... look at the living room pix closely; it appears to be two love seats and two small chairs placed close together ... no lamps, no coffee table, doesn't look at all inviting.

- The kitchen looks surprisingly nice compared to the rest of the house.

Capeside Cottage:

This is essentially the same house, only it turns the dining room into an exterior porch. Again, this is an expensive-to-build house. The guest house creates a large amount of exterior wall, and that's considerably more expensive than interior walls. Other than that, the above comments all still apply.

Overall, I have to say, I don't go for Southern Living house plans. Loads of flash, not much substance.

Overall thoughts:

If you want a modestly priced house for a growing family, I'd suggest you keep these things in mind: Simple shape, simple roofline, single eating area, and a shared bathroom for the kids. Here's an example pulled from the internet at random -- I'm not saying this is THE ANSWER for you -- I'm showing it to you as an example of a more simple, inexpensive choice. This house gives you larger bedrooms, way more closet space and bathroom space in the master, and a much larger living room ... yet the whole thing is only 1850 ... 225 more if you build the bonus room.

Thank you so much for these thoughtful tips! You all have given me much to think about! I started to look for more family friendly house plans with mud rooms, kids rooms on the same floor but with their own space, easy functional flow that would work for our day-to-day living and found this one:

https://www.houseplans.com/plan/2282-square-feet-3-bedroom-2-5-bathroom-2-garage-farmhouse-traditional-country-40999

At first I didn't want an attached garage but this really looks part of the house so it doesn't bother me. Would this be really expensive being that it's not 2-story and more spread out or could we offset that with keeping the finishings economical? Any tips on where best to save money and where best to spend money when building for a long-term residence?

Rather than a typical day--which we idealize--think of the most obnoxious and interfering activities that are likely to happen at least once a month. Design so that they aren't stressful of obnoxious to anyone (or as non obnoxious as is practical, at least). :)

This plan seems way less expensive and more flexible.

There isn't a coat closet by the front entry for guests. Also, I would close up the wall between the foyer and the dining room and put in double doors on the other side. Then it can start as a playroom and eventually become a living room or office or activity room or craft room. No linen closet near kids.

Kitchen can be improved. Fridge in the corner???? The great room has a lot of invisible halls and is smaller than you think. I would widen the house there for a breakfast table and the coat closet in the foyer. Breakfast bars and small children aren't a great combo--you'll really want a real kitchen table near the kitchen. The powder room placement is a bit odd off in the master wing.

The roof line looks much cheaper than the other house and the layout more usable.

That is my favorite type of jack and Jill bath and the only one that makes sense.

Two story houses are LESS expensive when they are a full two stories. They get pricy when the roof gets really big and complicated to make room for a partial second floor and there isn't that much square footage upstairs.

I was following this a while back. Which plan did you go with? We are in the process of building the Capeside Cottage. We did change it quite a bit but it's still a similar look and layout.

That's exciting! We are actually going a different route. We thought that as our children grow we would need a little bit bigger house. But, I love the Capeside Cottage plan, hope it goes well for you!

Coastal, did you decide to use an architect? Just curious. Thanks!

Sarah Wilson - would love to see photos of your project if you would like to share.