This video explains the 2 options for where to put our house on our 1/4 acre block! After showing you through the options we’re hopeful together with your help we can come to a decision!
We Show a few floor plans today but after we make this big decision we will be drawing up more floor plans and discussing it with you before we draw our final plan and start the build!
We’re on a small budget of 130k for our Entire homestead so things will be tight, but we believe with a few smart choices and some hard work we can bring our homestead dreams to life!
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For any additional comments, feedback or if you would like to work with us, contact us at – homestead.otr@gmail.com
29 Comments
Can you have the house on an angle on your property? Look at passive heating and cooling through permaculture design. I would suggest having a veranda style decking running across the front of the house (where the door is) so that in summer you get plenty of light but shaded from the veranda and in winter (when the sun in lower) you still get light and natural heating coming through the windows due to the lower sun. Hope that makes sense. You can still have beautiful garden surrounds and extensions. It also still blocks the front yard from the back yard. Otherwise, position 2 would be my pick.
With the wood stove in the middle of the house you would lose space due to fire guard for the children.
Option 1, swap the dinning room and kitchen, then if you extand the house or add a patio off the dinning room, it wont interfere with the view from kitchen window
Option 2, cause of the laundry and the veiw of the backyard. You can have things smaller but also make it look like a nice homestead cottege
laundry shed separate…. don't go buy what others say, look at your outside plans car shelters, shed, patios, pens, gardens, pool / pond, write a list as things will be missed then work out what gives the most out of the land
House two, option one. Wood stove would be hot in summer, and no option for extension.
I'd go Option 2. Light all day and maximise your farming/growing space also would be easier to alter / add too later. Definitely provision or think of a 3rd bedroom that you can stage in later.
What program is this?
What is the temp like in summer? Have had a wood stove and oven and it was incredibly ro use in the hot months
1. With either option make sure you have enough room to put a verandah on the sunny sides of the house so you can hang shade cloth blinds to keep out the hot summer sun.
2. With option 1 the bedrooms can collect morning sun and act as a heat bank to let warmth into the living area.
3. One advantage of having the washing machine in the bathroom is that it makes it easy to recycle the bath water into the washing machine to wash your clothes. Having said that, I have been bucketing water from the bath to the laundry or garden for the last 30 years.
4. Provided you have enough storage space, a big kitchen isn’t necessarily better. A small well designed kitchen with a good work triangle can sometimes be more efficient, providing there is only one person at a time in there. I raised 5 children with a small kitchen, preserved food etc etc. I actually love my little kitchen. When we first moved in 30years ago we thought we would need to make a bigger kitchen and extend but we never did. Bigger isn’t necessarily better.
4. With the wood stove in the last design you need to think about where you are going to keep the wood and how you are going to protect bodies from getting burnt.
5. Down the track you could consider putting a laundry and or compost toilet outside.
6. If you make a verandah or b the sunny sides, could part of that be enclosed for extra space?
8. With option 1, instead of a verandah, you could plant deciduous fruit trees on the sunny sides so you get winter sun and summer shade. Just remember passive cooling is just as important as passive heating in Australia.
9. If you want to put solar panels up in the future consider which roof orientation will maximise your solar collection.
Hope that helps. 🦋🙏
Option 2 BUT some more modifications needed, there is some wasted space near the hallway to the bedrooms. However the laundry allows for storage! Option 1 had almost no storage. You need space for linen, kids crafts, cleaning supplies, vaccuum and mop etc. See if you can combine elements from both!
Are you allowed to flip house 2 to face the other way and put it at the back of the property? Further away from the road means less noise no dead space at the front. The summer sun won’t hit the bedrooms and the winter sun will come in to the living room and kitchen. The first thing you see when you arrive is just garden with all you sun loving plants at the front. Then you walk through and discover your little house tucked away at the back of the property. You can stand at your kitchen sink and watch the kids play in the garden while you wash up and see anyone approaching the property from the road. Could an outside laundry on one end of the deck work? Not ideal but it would ok for now. Perhaps have a little wood heater in the house but have a nice outdoor kitchen set up on your deck and you will probably use it far more throughout the year.
I think laundries, bathrooms and toilets back onto each other because of the plumbing. The way they are spread in option 2 will mean a lot of extra plumbing and dollar dollar bills. But I also have never built a house 😂 maybe it’s fine.
Shower over bath to have space for the toilet in the bathroom?
I think it’s best to put the house right up the front of the block. Maybe enough space for a good row or 2 of fruit trees to buffer out the traffic noise. The 2nd floor plan seems to lose a lot of space in hallways. Any chance that the laundry could be accessed by the corner of the kitchen? Put the fridge where the pantry is and make your pantry in the laundry.
Skylight in option 1 if you do an extension
Regarding orientation I agree with option 2.
Lots of great ideas and advise given already.
My immediate thoughts whatever floor plan is to make sure you have an entry/exit at each end of the house for safety.
You don’t want a front door and a side door only. Having the laundry in your plans created this back door entry/exit which is important.
Another safety aspect is regarding a wood stove, the heat and burns risk. The location in that layout wouldn’t be safe unless you had a fireplace surround, which encroaches on floor space. I’d have it on a main wall.
Hope my 2c helps.
Option 2 but I feel like a second story could be fitting as an extension
Option 2 , more sun, bigger backyard, closer( cheaper ) roadside connections. A few flowering shrubs along the fence line would provide a “ traditional “ look and a haven for bees.
My suggestions are to have a huge pantry if you’re homesteading, maybe a 2nd toilet in the bathroom. I would also plan to have your 2 cars next to each other so not queuing and put the garage down the back so as to not block the drive in case of trailers or caravans in the future. You may want to back a trailer down to your growing area.
Why not the laundry in the shed? I have mine in the shed and wastewater flows on to the fruit trees. I use septic safe and grey water safe detergents.
Personally I would try putting the house towards the back of the property. My house is close to road and I hate it.
😊
shalom mate,
option two looks better imo, not walking in to toilet view, also better options for extension(s). i would suggest maybe putting master bedroom window on the east side, so if you do extend then the south facing window wont be lost or could convert to ensuite doorway.. i would also recommend checking out your neighbors proximity to the front fence and also their roofing angles in case you wanna get solar down the track
i also think that an open plan might be better than the kitchen wall, the wall will significantly make the house feel smaller or cosier, while that could reduce some pantry storage space, you could maybe be more unconventional and distribute slimmer pantry space, on the western wall around the windows or ceiling-high slide out pantry over cabinets to save space and maximize storage capacity, without the hard to reach aspect of cabinets
my 2c
I think opp 2
Hi from WA! We have a small house, but a big kitchen and one thing that I love is that we have a ‘European style’ laundry space just off the kitchen – works great as a family of 4 and I close the bifolds when I’m not using the space, highly recommend if you like the extra space for a kitchen but also would like a laundry separate from the bathroom 👌
Option 2 is definitely the best option if you're going to extend it at some point. Which I think is a guarantee with a growing family. As your kids grow up, you and them will want bedrooms separated haha
Option 1
The washing machine, dryer ect… don't need to be in an insulated place near everything. It can all go in the shed.
Option 2 BUT I would take the alternative design and put the laundry in the nook you made in the kitchen in a cupboard, you might want to check the building code for a laundry as you will be required to have a laundry sink, meaning your bathroom vanity will need to be a laundry sink NOT a regular vanity! Option 2 alternative design will allow you to have a stacked washer dryer with the laundry sink next to it, and you can get a piece of wood to cover it to make it into a bench top, the small alcove in the hallway (not sure what you have placed there, directly opposite the toilet door) I would then put a linen cupboard. The wood stove would still fit against the wall between the dining and living room and yes an induction cooktop 100%, even just a 2 burner one as in summer you will not want to be heating the home by cooking on the wood stove. I would also move this entire build to the back of the property, you are going to get great big shaded spots from your house and your neighbours houses if you have it set right up the front blocking most of that sun. Situated at the back of the property the garden AND house will get the sun it needs.
Defo option 2. You have more space out back and more privacy out there. I'd kill the laundry. You can build a bigger one later. I'd also get a sewerage/septic system like envirocycle so you can water fruit trees etc.
Are you intending to put rain water tanks in later on? If so , where are you going to put them and how are you going to get them in? 🦋