It depends on what your life style is like. A Designer needs to understand the client, before any decisions can be made. How many in your Family? What is your Style? Where are you planning on Building? A little more information is needed before someone can help you. Good Luck. Let me know if I can be of any further assistance.

Hi peggib, It depends on what stage you are in life. How many people will be living in the new house? Is your familiy growing? or are the kids gone and you want to scale down? Do you have special hobbies that may require some space to do ?

There is also the cost factor, it's almost always more expensive to build an addition to an existing home, rather than starting from scratch and add the square footage while the house is still in the planning stage. You could always find a function to an 'empty' room, but it's hard to do it the other way around.

So to summarize, my advice for you is look at your current and future needs,

Thank you for the reply. Married, in our late twenties, no kids, but plan to start once we have a home. We are building on family land, but it's mostly flat, 5 acreas were deeded to us. Love to entertain, and we are in the South--Alabama. Which option would be easier to change down the road? Thank you again.

In that case, I'd say go for the typical 3-4 bedroom 2.5 bath home with large great room / kitchen / dining area, a private den / office.

Addition on later is more expensive than just interior renovations.

It's better to have a smaller, unique home, with lots of builtins and other well-considered details than a series of huge empty drywall boxes.

Here's some reading for you:
http://www.susanka.com/

Thank you all for the comments. Appreciate the guidance.

Yes, I do believe in the "not so big house" for small families or retired people. But wonder if it's possible in reality especially for working families with young kids and all their toys and other material things they'll need as they grow older.

That is most definitely my concern.

I would definitely go for the smaller, unique house. I moved into a small house, which I thought I would add on to as my children got older. I found that I really did not need to. Don't forget you need to paint/wallpaper and perhaps carpet some of the rooms, as well as furnish them. Better to start with a nice jewel box of a house and evolve from there. Also, look into options of expanding your house through porches and/orscreenhouses. At the moment, I'm looking into adding an oversized shed to my yard, which I plan to put a small daybed and a comfy chair in to enjoy some sheltered outdoor space - my version of a pool house without the pool!

Oh my, this could be a never ending discussion! Do you have a square footage or some floor plans in mind ? It's hard to comment of even advice what is considered 'big' or 'small' without know the size of home you're thinking of :)

Our original plan was right at 3000 for the overall floor plan, with an additional 500 bonus room over the garage. Since we've gotten a few quotes, I either can build the 3500 SQFT house plain, or downsize to roughly 2500-2700 and go unique. Luckily, my father is a draftsman and can easily update my plan. I'm really stuck on a side two car garage, mud room, utility, dining, kitchen island, nursery and master on one side of the house, and two kids' rooms on the other side. I'd rather the kids' rooms be on the side of the mud/garage/utility and have the great room, kitchen, dining in the center of the house. A keeping room would also be ideal as a study type of area. Will all of that be too cramped in 2500-2700?

Not at all, 2700 sqft not including the garage would be plenty of space for the rooms you described.

"2700 sqft not including the garage would be plenty of space for the rooms you described."

When I think of how my parents, sister and I lived in a house that was a mere 1500 sf - I have no idea what we would have done with 2/3 more space!

everyone has their ideal square footage, and if 1500 sqft worked for your family bepsf then I would congratulate you on being able to live in a 'not so big house'.

I think you can have both. My construction crew thinks I'm insane sometimes with the materials and ideas I throw at them, then they stand back and scratch their heads and say they can't believe how expensive it ends up looking. It's possible to make every $10 you spend look like $100 if you look at raw materials with an open mind and creative eye. You're in the right place for ideas!

Great question. I think 3000 sqft is a nice size home. It's more important that the space be functional than large. Life does change drastically once kids arrive, they have so much stuff and so many phases. It's important to constantly edit once the kids arrive, otherwise you will run out of house to store everything no matter what size it is. I think Dytecture's suggestions are very pragmatic. He is right, it's more expensive to add space after the fact and so inconvenient. If you have a little extra space for future use, I don't see the harm in that. I often advise clients to leave some "negative space" in their homes because there will be travels and experiences that happen over time. You might want to buy art or a special piece while on a trip somewhere, you may even develop a hobby that will require extra space. Houses should feel like things were acquired over time, not purchased all at once. I also think that simple finishes that are thoughtful and quality controlled can make a house look special or unique. My opinion is build a little more house and have fewer things right now, it will get filled up eventually. Hope that helps and good luck. Charmean Neithart
http://www.houzz.com/pro/cninteriors/__public

How about starting with a master plan? Phase one is the smaller house that works great for where you are now, but spend some time to think about how to make a sensible addition to add space, while minimizing future disruption and unnecessary remodeling later. As long as you earmark space to add to the footprint, rather than on top of the existing house, it can be pretty economical.

Think about the maximizing the site (maybe the addition helps create a courtyard), connection to phase 2 (you don't want to have to remodel the kitchen to get the new den), and how the new roof will tie into the existing. Don't forget to upsize mechanical and electrical systems too in anticipation of future need.

Matt

Wow, what great feedback. Comments are greatly appreciated. Charmean, great perspective on filling it up as life evolves. CAST, I really like the "master plan" idea. Thanks again for all of the guidance.

You're very welcome. Good luck with your project. Charmean Neithart
http://www.houzz.com/pro/cninteriors/__public

I like small houses, *but* small houses are VERY expensive per square foot. The most expensive rooms to build are the kitchen and bathrooms! And you need 1 kitchen and several bathrooms in most any house. The bedrooms, family, etc rooms are much cheaper to construct and will bring down the square foot cost considerably and give you more room to roam around to boot.

We recently designed an 800 SF 2 br/2 bath cottage, and while the cost per square foot was higher than our average project (because you have less SF to distribute the cost of the high finish spaces like the kitchen), the smaller overall size gave the owners room in the budget to get really high quality materials, such as handmade tile, custom casework and clear woodwork, great windows. They made the choice to go for quality over quantity, trading the square footage they'd so rarely use for a very high standard finish throughout the whole house.

On the other hand, I'm working with another client that wants a big house (4000 SF +) and is not finishing about a 1/3 of it in order to get to his budget.

I'll take a one of a kind, quality built, smaller house over a boring McMansion any day.

Oh c'mon, let's not get ridiculous here. I bet you could get a really really quality house @ 400 SF.