app.sketchup.com is the AMAZING web app version of SketchUp. In the 3D Warehouse, there are millions of homes & buildings already made. You can download all for FREE and then easily take them apart & make them unique. NOTE! When you first get to the 3D Warehouse area, you'll default be in & searching the "Products" area, this is just for official Products that manufacturers have uploaded (super cool!) but you must click "Models" button/area right next to that, this is where billions of models uploaded by random people are found & 99% of the time the only place to search. Some Models are insanely detailed. Keep searching different words to find what you want, search here is picky. Good Luck!
Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
201–210 of 262 posts
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#202May I assume that you want a DB so that you can see similarly sized houses/flats and get ideas on laytouts, balconies, etc? Someone already wrote: ads. Go to your house/flat hunting website of choice, use the appropriate filters (house/flat) floors, sqm/sqft, etc. Usually the photos and the layout are there, and if you put a price range you can also see the cheap ones vs the expensive ones.
A very surprising number of housing listings don't include a drawing/diagram of the floor plan. Just photos of the interior taken with a wide-angle lens that distorts the size of everything.
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#203Here's the thing: The idea of planning a house without taking into account the site where it will sit will never produce a good house. Would a pre-existing plan account for the sun exposure of your land? Would it have a roof that makes sense for how much it rains or snows? Would getting sunlight in the bedroom also mean facing traffic? Would it take advantage of elevation for views or make sure to block a nearby neig…
Nearly every new home that has been developed in my town for the last 5 years looks exactly the same, with the exact same floor plan. These new houses replace old houses that also looked exactly the same with same floor plan. It's a fugly two-family townhouse. Good houses don't matter to buyers in a seller's market. Poor architecture, poor execution, poor everything and yet they're selling. Only the rich can afford g…
Developers go cheap.
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.
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#204Earlier quoted context omitted.
> While you are not wrong, those requirements are the same for all houses. 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…
> Not every house needs triple-pane windows and R25 insulation in the walls Yes they do. Cooling is a large energy cost. Besides, you end up with that much space in your walls anyway just because for material strength reasons you need wide walls. > sitting on a 8-ft deep basement A basement is a line item that can be added or deleted at will. If you don't have stairs to the basement you still need that space except i…
> A basement is a line item that can be added or deleted at will.
If you already need a deep foundation and basements are common enough in the area so people know how to do them well, maybe. For other areas, it's a significant expense, a lot of work, might require design changes, and it'll probably leak.
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#205Here's the thing: The idea of planning a house without taking into account the site where it will sit will never produce a good house. Would a pre-existing plan account for the sun exposure of your land? Would it have a roof that makes sense for how much it rains or snows? Would getting sunlight in the bedroom also mean facing traffic? Would it take advantage of elevation for views or make sure to block a nearby neig…
I was coming here to say this.
This is far more complicated that the author appreciates.
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#206Here's the thing: The idea of planning a house without taking into account the site where it will sit will never produce a good house. Would a pre-existing plan account for the sun exposure of your land? Would it have a roof that makes sense for how much it rains or snows? Would getting sunlight in the bedroom also mean facing traffic? Would it take advantage of elevation for views or make sure to block a nearby neig…
I’ve worked in construction, maybe this was true for post-and-beam and perhaps some other methods where you are using what is available from nature. Historically, for example, log cabins are popular in the woods because logs are plentiful and adobe was used in desert environments because of the abundance of sand, lime, binders, etc. I would not build a solid wood home in the desert of New Mexico for the same reason w…
> Historically, for example, log cabins are popular in the woods because logs are plentiful [...] I wouldn’t build a masonry house in the forests.
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?
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#207See if someone sells knocked down kits. And if you've never heard that term, you have an entire world to explore now.
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#208Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think ideally we would all live in modest, reasonably sized simple rectangular houses that are built to last, to be energy efficient, and which achieve low cost through standard designs. The "then architect" part of the process results in McMansions that are awful to live in, are environmentally disastrous, and contribute to the growing unaffordability of housing for all but the upper classes.
> I think ideally we would all live in modest, reasonably sized simple rectangular houses that are built to last, to be energy efficient, and which achieve low cost through standard designs. In an ideal world yes, in the real world you'll get run out of town being called a "communist", or no one will buy the houses because actually built-to-last homes are waaay more expensive than the cheap drywall and wood stuff tha…
Building with bricks adds 3x the cost compared to stick framing.
On top of that, they'll hold up better to a weak tornado, but anything over EF2 will structurally compromise one.
Add in all of the other disadvantages, and it is small wonder why people don't use them often in construction anymore.
They're pretty high up on the list of CO2 cost as well, between firing and shipping.
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#209Earlier quoted context omitted.
They just want to sell a bunch of houses quickly, not to create perfect houses. Good enough is quite literally good enough for them. 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 curren…
I think ideally we would all live in modest, reasonably sized simple rectangular houses that are built to last, to be energy efficient, and which achieve low cost through standard designs. The "then architect" part of the process results in McMansions that are awful to live in, are environmentally disastrous, and contribute to the growing unaffordability of housing for all but the upper classes.
Architects don’t design McMansions. The lack of an architect is actually how they are produced. Less than 10% of housing in the US was designed by an architect.
Re: Ask HN: Where to find open-source house plans?
#210Not completely what you are looking for, but still open source plans of house: Wikihouse https://www.wikihouse.cc/ Earthships are also said to be open source, but the plans are (definitely) not free https://earthshipbiotecture.com/ You can also check Open Source Home, by Studiolada (those are free, but the plans are in french) https://www.countryliving.com/remodeling-renovation/news/g46... Open Source Ecology is now…
Wow. I scanned through this entire thread, and haven't seen an automatic house plan generator. I saw one comment with a request, and no responses. The architecture industry is enormous. Real estate is enormous. There's no automatic drawing, electrical, plumbing, insulation, ect... generators given specifications? I'm kind of amazed no one's trying to disrupt that. "Hi Stable Diffusion, please draw me blueprints for a…
I work in construction management and I think you’re underestimating the complexity of generating a set of construction plans that meets code, passes inspection, and has coherent aesthetics.
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.