Seeking Recommendation for House Design Software

[GinaC]

Hello all, I'm looking for a SIMPLE, low-priced program for messing with floorplans and design options. 3D would be nice, but it's not necessary.

My house has some oddly shaped rooms, so it's hard to get a handle on what can fit in there and what can't. I've seen several phone apps that do the measuring for you, but that screen is just too tiny for me to work with in the long run. If it can export to my computer that would be fine.

It just seems like all the good ones I've found so far are made (and priced) for professionals.

[mjt]

"what can fit in there" - are you thinking furniture or something else?

Even though I'm a tech guy, I usually went old school with this problem. That is, I drew the room to scale on some paper and made paper cut-outs that were to scale for the furniture. In this blogpost I took it to an extreme with one piece and made a full-size 3D template so I could make sure it would fit up the attic stairs...

[GinaC]

Well, furniture placement, yes, but also for kitchen & bath renovations. I'd like to be able to put an image on my phone so that it is portable to show to contractors or so I can pull it up when I'm out shopping.

[phil]

I experimented with software for that and found myself learning the tools. If it's 3D there is a learning curve anyway. You could just try autocad or autodesk, that's what's used commercially , you can get a 30 day trial. there are student versions and tutorials, at least that way you'd be learning "real" software and not some cheapened down version with limits.
I agree with just doing a scale drawing and making little pieces you can move. I did this with my kitchen and every option. at least that way you don't need to learn about autocad. It's good to learn if you do go that way. If you have multiple computers you might extend the length by downloading again from a different computer and location.. Back in the day it used to be easy to download free pirate versions but I'm not sure now. It didn't hurt the software companies if people learned their software and if you want to use it commercially you need to buy the costly and real version.

just take a pic of your drawing and it'll be on your phone or take the piece of paper with you , It's portable

[mjt]

For my real job I have access to a variety of tools. Microsoft Visio has some floor/home plan templates, but no 3D as far as I can tell. Same with LucidChart. Neither is probably something an Architect or Design/Build firm would use, but they will probably work fine for non-professional use.

I think Visio is what I used to create these drawings of our attic: before and after.

[Seabornman]

Sketchup is the way to go. It's still free I think. Once you get the hang of creating walls and openings, you can download (also free) furniture, kitchen cabinets, windows, you name it. You can also apply patterns and materials to walls, floors, lawn, etc. You can even dial in sun angles and shadows. You can get a fairly good appearance with the standard program. In fact many "renderings" of proposed projects you see are sketchup based. I have not found a free true rendering add-on that was user friendly, but there are some pay versions that you can add lighting etc.

[phil]

there is this one. If I remember right I played with an earlier version. never really figured it out and decided I'd be best to learn something that was a bit more like a professional product, but maybe I didn't give it a good enough trial to be fair to it.


https://www.homedesignsoftware.tv/ppc/v ... EsQAvD_BwE

[Seabornman]

I have AutoCad and Sketchup. I'll use them together for my own projects. I designed my house addition in Sketchup but then did drawings in AutoCad. I'll use Sketchup for odd little things that I want to use in 3D and "ask" what a dimension is or see what it might look like. I hear about architects using Sketchup for construction drawings and that loses me a little.