Fun, did you have more than one living space growing up? We had a formal living room and a family room so the family room is where our toys were kept. However, we didn't have nearly the same amount of toys as kids do nowadays! The way our family room was laid out, there was a corner where all the toys were kept. I shared an average size room with my sister, so we didn't have much room for playing in there. I'm sure we did a bit but for the most part, we were in the family room when we were young or outside. I also can't imagine having kids' toys in every room. That would drive me nuts! Most of the houses around here have basements or more than one living area so the basements store the bulk of the toys and then the family room, which is typically open to or next to the kitchen is where the main floor toys are stashed. Having four kids has relaxed my anal tendencies but I still go a little nuts with crap laying around. The peninsula in my kitchen becomes the drop zone but I can't stand having that clutter. And dh is the worst b/c he will leave his stuff there and never come back for it but then get annoyed if I move it or ask him to. He's used to clutter from his childhood. I used to have complete order in the house b/f I went to bed, but now I'm so exhausted by then that I have slacked off a bit and then get all stressed when I come downstairs the next morning to clutter and have to clean up b/f I can function. I'm like that with cooking too - I can't start cooking unless the counters are clear, no dirty dishes out, etc. DH looks at me like I have two heads. Am I the only weird one like that? Oops, sorry, I have a habit off going off on a tangent!

I must be the oddball, I'm willing to overlook a bad floor plan, if the space, location, view is good, I'll remodel the interior. To me, bad layout is one of the deal breakers, if it cant be fixed/changed. That would bug me forever. What did you see from the floor plans that eliminated the homes? One of my dealbreakers is running into the stairs when you open the front door (crowds the foyer too much). This can be shown in photos, but often is not. Layout would show it and save a trip. Example 1: A house had 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, and I think 3 living areas mentioned. Upon viewing, the bedrooms were tiny and the living areas were oversized, and the layout was such that you couldn't carve from the living areas to make another bedroom. Example 2: A house had 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, and living and family rooms. But the 2nd bath was a tiny powder room off the master bedroom, and expanding it would have meant cutting into the kitchen. In both cases, a floor plan would have let me play with remodeling options, and I would have been able to quickly figure out that it wasn't feasible. And no, the room sizes in and of themselves aren't sufficient info. Because we moved walls to right-size rooms before. But until you see the floor plan, you don't know if walls can be moved.

Timely subject. Our neighborhood just received our property tax assessments for 2016, payable in 2017. Our property taxes have gone up 45%. Our home values have not. We had a refi appraisal within the last year & our home value was less than the current property taxes, prior to this increase. A 45% increase & our taxes are already high. Illinois is number 50, of 50 states, in public pension debt. In the recent past, the federal government has given Illinois stimulus money for education. The majority of that money has NOT gone to schools & students - it has paid for pension debt. We're going to need another bailout from the states that have been fiscally responsible. Edit: We will be appealing - we do every year. The first time we used an attorney, whose fee was 50% of of the tax savings. Then we started doing it ourselves. We have the choice to appeal based on "uniformity" or "overvaluation." "Uniformity" involves collecting & submitting comps of other comparable homes. "Overvaluation" is submitting a home appraisal with a date of Jan 1, 2016 so we get tax credit for the entire year. We've had better results with the home appraisal, overvaluation method. Everyone in our neighborhood's home value has jumped up by between $200,000 - $400,000, according to the taxing authority. I'd have no problem with it if our home value had truly increased, but it hasn't.

We "built" the house we live in now, tract home in new neighborhood, with some customization. House conversations with friends and neighbors always have regrets in there. Bump-outs, boneheaded designs we should have caught, upgrades that should have been made, upgrades that aren't worth it... the list goes on. Based on our experiences here, I already know there will be design / decor issues that will have D'oh! moments. It's impossible to think about EVERYthing. I think we've hit all the major points, and have enough flexibility to change in the future. Our lives changed quite a bit in the 6 years since building (the once large pantry is now crammed because I now do the majority of grocery shopping at Costco and that not change for at least 15 years for example). I can't see into the future, but we learned from this build, and kept the evolution of our family in mind with our design. 1) The architect/draftsman is only as good as the information provided. They don't know us, or live our lives, ( I wonder if there'd be a benefit to having separate design consultations with the clients, much like relationship counseling, to get a really clear picture, lol), which is why we rely on their education and expertise. 2) The reason copy editors exist: to catch the technical mistakes writers make, and can no longer "see" due to closeness to the project. Same reason med errors occur. I think when we originally like a design, then look at it, dream about it, obsess over it, we can't "see" the flaws or potential problems that others might. Hence all the floor plan critique posts here. I think too, that online and builder plans lull us into a false sense of security- "they design and build houses all the time, they're experts, hundreds of people have bought the design, what could go wrong?!" We found that customizing our builders plan threw them for a loop, and didn't realize it would do so, until after the house was built, and weird things weren't right; towel bar location, depth o linen closet, outlets, etc. 3) We are often playing on tilt. We're all living SOMEwhere, right now, and designing a new place to live, with many features that we love (or would love to have) or without the ones we loathe, those HTOD, that we obsess over in our current or past homes. Finally, the same way any artist of any medium does, we aren't always satisfied with the end result of a project. Sometimes you just have to be DONE, even if to your artists eye, you could have kept going. Having said all that, I know there's going to be some regrets, but hopefully -I believe- the joy will outweigh them!