Thanks for the input! The bathroom won't be a master bath -- it's just a second bath that will be used both by us and guests, as we only have one bathroom now. Our tastes are on the simple side, as in we like old-fashioned bathrooms, and will choose good quality but not fancy fixtures, and a tiled shower maybe 3 X 4 or so...? No kids. Single vanity. We plan to put in a skylight as there are no windows. I think the easiest wall for plumbing will be one of the short walls. The design nycbluedevil described was more or less what we were thinking of so far -- shower on one short wall closest to the door wall (i.e. on the high side), and sink and toilet on the low long wall. I was thinking there might be some nice way to build shelves or something into the remainder of the low wall, but frankly I am lousy at interior design and would rather be in the garden! So thanks again for your input.

I don't think you're going to find anyone who's going to say, "Garage sticking out in front -- YES! Just what we want." Ah, a closet. Given that it has a window, I was trying to make it into a tiny office space. Knowing now that this is a closet, I'd say make the master bath a little more narrow -- eliminating some of that unnecessary floor space between the sinks and the shower -- and allow the closet to be a little larger. As you say, more storage is always good, and you'll never miss it in the bathroom. Still on the bathroom: I still vote for a linen closet; it gives more storage for a lower price than linen towers, and it'll keep your dirty clothes hamper hidden. It's not the width of the master hallway that'll be the problem -- it's the turn. We bought a king mattress recently, and even bringing it down a straight hallway and turning it into the bedroom was tricky. The movers had to open my daughter's bedroom door and maneuver it back and forth a bit to get in the door. And a mattress has some "give". If you have a double or triple dresser, it'll never get into the room. One possible fix -- now that I know you're in Florida -- is that you might ditch the large windows in the bedroom and instead go with glass doors. In addition to being in keeping with Florida houses, you'll be able to move furniture in through the back very easily. Thing about the utility room space is that it's not laid out in a user-friendly layout. All that space is in front of the washer/dryer -- you can't hang things in that space because you need it for walking. And the washer/dryer are too far from the folding area.

Your parents are in their 70's. At 70 my Mom and Dad could go up and down stairs. My Mom went to the gym 5x a week. However at 72, my Mom developed Parkinson's disease and by 76 could no longer do stairs. She lived until age 84. My Dad could also no longer do stairs by his late 70's. In fact for the two of them in their last years, the shower curb might as well have been Mt Everest for them. One step up or down was difficult. And it would have been hazardous for them too. With both houses you are having to adapt yourselves to the house instead of the house working for you. If you're spending 6 figures of your hard earned money, why build a house that doesn't work for you and where you'll be constantly trying to adapt it to work. You have unique needs in that you have your parents staying for long stretches of time and they are getting up there in years. Like Stinky said, why would you either want to give up your large bedroom to allow them to stay downstairs, or relegate them to a room the size of a child's room? Frankly if you want to consider either of these poorly designed plans (and they're poorly designed for lots of reasons, not only because of your parents), the only solution would be to add in an elevator. (That can be done for around $20,000) Then your parents could easily move from upstairs to downstairs, and visa versa. Are you allowed to build a truly custom house on any of the lots you're considering instead of these overblown, poorly laid out houses that will allow no natural light into the spaces and will not live well for your needs? BTW: Not only the lanai will be hotter from April through end of October, but so will any rooms that face west. It's very poor design to orient a house east/west in our climate. (I'm in SW FL) My house will be oriented N/S with my backyard facing south so my lanai blocks the summer sun and my 32" eaves block the upstairs summer sun.

What this shows is you really do not know what you don't know. (Garage is too small for anything other than 2 of the smallest cars. Master closet is not wide enough for hanging clothes. Laundry area isn't deep enough at 5'6" for the new machines which stick out over 30". Lots of wasted space in the middle of the house which I assume is your dining area, which also means it's the traffic pattern to the rest of the house. Etc.) You think you understand how to design a house because you've lived in houses before but just like you wouldn't design and build your own car, why do you think building a house would be easier to design? Plus one other thing you're not truly taking into account is if this is a retirement home, you need to consider future ADA accommodations. Answer PPF's questions because when designing a house, you don't put together tetris blocks and the stick a facade on the outside and plop it down on a piece of property. To properly design a house, the exterior, interior and the land it's sitting on, including views, light, how the sun affects it, etc all has to be considered at the same time.