Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?

There isn’t just one set of building codes for every jurisdiction, different jurisdictions adopt various sets of code.

Different geographic regions require various things that other areas don’t require. My state doesn’t have earthquakes or hurricanes, but we do have to have stronger roofs for handling snow load. Buildings in Florida need specific methods to handle hurricane force winds. Buildings in California need specific methods to handle earthquakes. And so on. How a building is designed is highly dependent on where it is located geographically.

You’re also underestimating just how many different materials/fixtures/fittings get installed in a house. Plumbing fixtures and light fixtures, electrical wiring devices, floor/wall/ceiling finishes, doors and door hardware, siding (type, color, trim color), windows, woodwork, cabinet, cabinet hardware, countertops, bathroom vanities, appliances, rain gutters, garage door, driveway/sidewalk material and color, deck material and color, etc.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that designing and building a building is far more complex than it seems.

Random text/image generators have no intelligence, no knowledge of design, building regulations, engineering, physics. A fun little tool to set up boilerplate is its peak usefulness.

Or an app with some dials and checkboxes for a constrained design space. Like for micro homes. Or vertically integrated companies like Lindal Cedar Homes. Kind of like buying a customized airplane or RV.

But for general purpose construction documents? I'd bet no. So many different construction codes. Site planning. Construction tech and products are constantly changing. Customers are psychotic. Etc, etc.

Disclaimer: I was just a drafter working misc A/E/C jobs. And I wrote add-ons for arch and civil engr. But mosdef am not an architect. Would like to be proven wrong.

The initial design could be done using an interactive tool that you can use. This is not different from web tools used to design a kitchen. I also think IKEA uses one.

I live in Scandinavia so it is probably different from what you know.

The company designing the house took our drawings and ideas and created drawings and an excel sheet they used to calculate the price of the project. A tool to do this would be valuable and same the customer some time ad I would be able to do most of the work designing the layout.

After the contract is signed the company would make proper plans used for building the house etc..

The complexity of the whole project is enormous but the initial planning would be a good fit for an interactive tool.

If you really don't believe me just survey home owners in those now 2-year old tract homes. Even if the actual houses have excellent construction you'll discover the builder completely declined to take into account things like drainage of the lot or how maintenance can be performed.

It's more general than lot to lot, but still seems to take into account the general lay of the land, the city's codes and etc.

There will be compromises because they build for average buyer, not for you.

And people that are looking for a house usually want to move there as soon as possible, doing custom not only means you need to pay more but that you also have to wait longer and pay for the place you're currently living extra year or two.

Ideally all would start from some common plans then architect would customize it based on the future home owner input but that's frankly expensive.

I think you're getting balloon and platform framing mixed up.

Why not? Perhaps the US is different, but in mainland Europe you'll find plenty of brick houses in the forest.

Yes, historically you'd build a log cabin out of materials found on-site, but is anyone doing that anymore? Presumably you'd want logs shipped from elsewhere, if only to get ones that have dried out already.

At that point, why would it be prohibitively expensive to choose other building materials?

One, it is meant to be read alongside The Timeless Way of Building. It is not simply a how-to manual.

Two, it comes from experience gleaned in the field working as an architect and builder. It is not simply highbrow art, mysticism, or eccentricity.

Three, the patterns are separate from implementation: "[You] can use the solution a million times over, without ever doing it the same way twice." He goes on to distinguish patterns in which he believes an invariant property has been established from those in which more research is needed. He even states that some patterns are just a guess and shows how to identify those in the description of each pattern.

Lastly, he states there is a danger that people will assume that this one pattern language should stand for all time: "Is it not true that there is a danger that people might come to rely on this one printed language, instead of developing their own languages, in their own minds? The fact is, we have written this book as a first step in the society-wide process by which people will gradually become conscious of their own pattern languages, and work to improve them."

The purpose of the book and its principles is not to recreate an aesthetic through pastiche. You are meant to use the principles in the book to create your own language that works for your context. A pattern that works for me in my environment may not work for you. That fact doesn't nullify the value of the pattern. The purpose of the two books together is to acknowledge that humans have deep feelings about the environments they inhabit. Whether those feelings can be explained or not is beside the point. The point is that we have them. These feelings happen across cultures and time. When we apply those feelings about our environments to the built world, several patterns seem to emerge. Hence, you get the concept of pattern languages.

Alexander takes the bold step of not only acknowledging human feelings but centering them in the discussion about how the world should be built. This point should interest those who are sympathetic to the Agile Manifesto, or to principles of user-centered design, or to product design and product management. This fact is also likely why certain interests are uncomfortable with his work. Powerful interests do not, in general, like to lose power, and change is expensive.

Later works, including his series on The Nature of Order go deeper into his exploration of these principles, even the possibility of an objective evaluation of beauty. And yes, there is a bit of woo going on which can make some people feel uncomfortable. We are all capable thinkers. You can decide for yourself which ideas resonate and which do not.

Personally, I found that his ideas changed the way I experience the world, including giving me the ability to evaluate the kind of home I want to live in and how to optimize that home to increase my own happiness. I may not ever get the chance to build my own home. But I have a voice. I participate in society. I believe the world could and should do better than optimize itself for money. I believe I am not unique in finding the books useful.

(edited for clarity)

It's very rare to be in the position to build your own home, as you'll never do it cheaper than a mass market/spec builder. It's almost always cheaper to just sell your property and buy something already existing.

If you do end up building custom, it's almost a waste to find free plans, as you'll want to customize to your liking as much as possible.

It rains here, but it also snows here -- so a roof that can shed water but not hold the weight of 3 feet of snow is not suitable. Putting our roof on a house in Georgia would just be a waste of money.

Some ground can deal with basements. Most of Florida can't, so they build on slabs. Then they need to put the HVAC and plumbing somewhere that isn't the basement.

A house in Florida should be designed to withstand hurricanes and floods. A house in California should expect frequent minor earthquakes.

My backyard view is great. My front view is of a road. Planning for those in the wrong direction would be bad.

Not every house needs triple-pane windows and R25 insulation in the walls, sitting on a 8-ft deep basement, with a steep roof pitch for snow to slide off of. Generally, you want to cut corners, because building to code in New York would be overkill in Texas.

You could have unique plans for each climate zone, but then the slope of the land and the shape of the lot also matters. Ideally, you'd want to be situated on a southward facing slope, beneath the road, so you could have huge windows towards the back of the house to taking in winter sun, natural insulation from the hill, and smaller windows facing the street. If you can't, you'll have to compromise on something that makes the house less pleasant to live in and/or harder to heat/cool.

At this point, we might actually have 100 distinct home designs, for each climate zone and slope. If you're lucky, these standard might actually be compliant with zoning for your lot, and maximize the allowable use of the lot. Every town is different, and who knows what silly rules your town requires.

At this point, you still need a design that local builders know how to build. Builders talk about "communities of practice", where they know how to build a certain way in response to how all of the other contractors in that area will also build, so that a subcontractor doesn't ruin another subcontractor's work. If you hire builders to build in ways they're not familiar with, they'll make mistakes. Most mistakes will be fine, but they could add up to failing to meet the code or standard for which the house was designed.

Ideally, you want to find an architect and a builder who have worked together before, to design and build the kind of house that you want using the techniques appropriate for that design, with the builder having crews of subcontractors that he/she has worked with before. If you've reached this point, you might as well take the extra step to building the perfect house for you, and customize it just a little more.

Maybe in your city.

A home designed for Texas is not a good home in Calgary.

Our house will have a space for one car (under a roof but not in the garage) a motorbike and some bikes (all bikes in a shed). If some of the kids will have their own car before they move out (IMHO 40 % chance), they can park on the street.

Not all houses need to meet the form based codes. If you want to do something different then you need a professional engineer to stamp and approve the plans - once stamped the town needs no more input.

Apartments and commercial buildings start to get more complex (but even then many meet form based codes as it is cheaper than calculating out all the stresses). However again professional engineer needs to approve the plans not the town.

My first house was a Seattle skinny, garage off the alley. The plans on file were for a garage in front, different upper floor layout, and a different roof shape.

Something like this look: https://www.stocksy.com/791391/two-story-house-with-wrap-aro... is exceptionally resistant to weather issues.

Part of what I want to see is how others use their space, and use that as a "springboard" to how I could use mine.

I realize that actually building it will require customization for local codes, etc, but I’d love a place to start - and I want to integrate building science instead of building spectacle.

The big thing is the detailed blueprints. The “look” is just the start of it.

What I'm really looking for is someone who has taken a basic "square/rectangular" house and though out interesting and intelligent ways of arranging the rooms inside.

It's the sort of thing that's got me thinking that the next time I need to build a garden shed I'll give it a go. Anything that doesn't need foundations, like a deck with a roof on an existing concrete pad, or similar, I'd give it a go to get some experience with it. Round here that wouldn't need planning permission so it's comparatively low-risk. Just need to make sure whatever I did to replace the ties into the foundation blocks was suitable, but that doesn't strike me as beyond the wit of man.

> Get an itemised estimate of the cost of land, cost of construction (include permitting and utility connect fees), and cost of housing while under construction

That's the thing: getting these estimates is not simple, especially for a hypothetical build.

In any case, I take it as a matter of tradeoffs. And the financial side of it is one of the tradeoffs. I probably would not build my own house - despite all the benefits - if it cost me double compared to a house readily available for sale, for example.

Or this Ytong https://as1.ftcdn.net/v2/jpg/01/99/70/94/1000_F_199709412_vW...

Because these are most common materials used for building houses, (in CZ).

And wanted to distinguish I don't mean classic house made of classic bricks. Because if American see a brick house, they think this, right? https://st.hzcdn.com/simgs/afd1745b0164c256_14-6933/home-des... And this type of house is very rare here. Maybe you can't even build it here, because of bad heat insulation etc.

Edit to add: I doubt an architectural firm would give their source files to plans away for free. They put a lot of effort into creating them, its their business after all.