Finally! Someone is building a nice, "boring" plan with a good use of space and access to various rooms. Good for you! A couple of comments (of course!) 1. Ditch the fireplace in the MBR, romantic but will just be used as a clothes hamper... 2. Make sure the "future rec room" is well insulated (floor over garage and walls) since it looks like it will be constantly used as a path from kitchen to bedrooms. Or wall off the stairway path from the rec room, so you don't have to heat and light the rec room all the time. 3. Might increase the size of the pantry into the garage storage space. 4. Don't wall off the garage storage space from the rest of the garage- it's cute, but will just make it hard to wrestle stuff in and out of that area. 5. You might put a wall and door from the corner of the utility room to the corner of the back stairs, to seperate the side door, garage door, and utility room from the kitchen, creating a "back foyer", and preventing cold air from blasting into the kitchen. 6. You could move the family room fireplace to the outside corner of the room, leaving the wall space available for normal height TV placement. I've also seen houses that put it where the picture window is, but that stinks since it ruins the nice view. 7. Bravo on using the space over the family room. Another possibility would be to change the His/Her wardrobe to a bathroom for BR#3, and expand the master BR into the space over the family room, including a couple of big walk in closets (one his, one hers....seperate wardrobes help with family calm...). 8. Nit-picking, but you might look at the flow from the living room to the family room, it seems a little odd that it looks like it has an open hallway from the family room and then a closable door into the LR, not sure why the door. (maybe for sound blocking?) If a door, should be a wide one for visual and flow. 9. "Entertainment center" seems useless for a TV and such, but maybe a good place for stereo and storing vids and music. 10. I agree with folks on leaving a full bath downstairs for illness/handicap issues, and making doors and hallway access wider into the bath and into the whole area. 11. Do you really need an entrance from the LR to the stoop? That means stuff will get tracked onto the LR rug. It might be nicer to just put another big window there and have an L shaped window seat in that corner. (If you have dogs, they LOVE having a window seat. Trust me.) If you want a wide/double door, put it in the breakfast area. 12. Why not put a washer/dryer on both floors? An up/down compact in the utility room for first floor stuff, and a full set on the 2nd? That would be a "touch of luxury" that you will actually use, and would get a LOT of good comments, for not a lot of extra expense. 13. Don't ignore the space under the stairs! Have it finished with access doors or shelves or such, storage space is valuable! But overall it's a very nice plan, very "livable", just needs a "few tweeks" to make it a great plan!

We are experiencing something similar. My husband retired from the military 18 months ago. We had enough equity from the sale of our last home to finance this build. The builder appeared to be very professional and claimed to be in good financial shape. The house was started last March, and still not completed. Due to the economy the builder started borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. He has a couple of unsold, unfinished spec houses as no one is buying at this time. (We suspect he used our first 3 draws to finance these 2 houses). Since July we've had to take over the payments to the subs, after we'd already paid him $140k plus! The subs show up only when they feel like it. The builder has not shown up since August, does not return phone calls or emails. The building supervisor, DH and myself are trying to get our house finished. It has been a painful, expensive experience. If your builder is avoiding you now, and hasn't been upfront with you, what will it be like once you start building? Your husband may like this builder but this is not the military where personal accountability is front and foremost! Have a good think about things, interview a couple of other builders, ask friends and acquaintances for references and take it from there. As nice as it would be to have a new home ready by July, I'd try hoping for the end of the year!

1. Straight valence. Generally I'd say no valence, but in your case I think the valance adds form as well as function. Form in that it helps to draw the eye down to the cabinetry as your focal point. In the pic without a valence, the soffit stands out (because the window disappears so deep into it) and draws the eyes up. 2. I think the beauty molding (but the pic is had to see on my ipad). Good luck. Looks like you will have one *gorgeous* kitchen whatever you decide! This post was edited by taggie on Thu, Aug 28, 14 at 13:32

I have a few thoughts I'm wondering if you and your team have discussed... Did you consider adding a wall between the present formal living room and the present dining room? It seems particularly odd to me to have this whole first floor totally open with two seating areas open to each other. If you added that wall perhaps you could turn the front room into a music and sitting room. The locations of the windows and doors across the back wall don't seem to related to the different spaces. I was thinking you could put a swing door between the dining room and the living room and another between the kitchen and the dining with windows centered on each of the three spaces aross the back; living room, dining room, kitchen windows. Did you discuss putting your clean up sink on the exterior wall and a prep sink in the island? I thought maybe instead of reach in pantries you could frame in a walk in pantry behind the fridge. The areas in teal are a reach in pantry on the left and a walk in on the right. Just food for thought...