Floor plan of a single-family house with basement, 150 sqm, only single-story allowed

Somehow she is always afraid the rooms are not big enough. It’s not easy to put into words, since she tries to argue very much on a "feeling" basis (which I am very poorly accessible to). Her spatial imagination is also rather limited, so I always have to show her with some examples.

Female spatial imagination does not work "worse," but simply "differently": men describe spaces based on dimensions with coordinates and vectors, women based on landmarks (not "turn east at the junction with Bahnhofstraße," but "turn left behind the pharmacy"). My aunt parks forwards in half the time I do backwards, accurately straight and without scratches. So it can’t be such an "underdeveloped" ability. Get yourself one of those stupid Klickibunti 3D applications that I always recommend keeping distance from when planning the new house, and recreate the current apartment in it. With real measurements of your actual furniture (fitting that in takes longer than drawing the whole place), then she has a comparison between what she can feel and how that looks in a simulation. If she prefers a smartphone over a PC, then choose a nice app instead of a PC version.

Lazy compromises with wife/husband are a terribly bad starting point for building

"Now the doofus is building us a new house with the same shortcomings, so we might as well have stayed in the old apartment." Basically, you can invite the divorce lawyer already to the topping-out ceremony. No happy wife, no happy life; this stakeholder must be heavily involved in planning. Maybe the architect person should best be a female architect, and your wife goes there alone, you only represented by a list or something similar. and wife are very satisfied with Mrs. Forster (whom I recommend with reservations), even in an online consultation (which I strictly advise against). Maybe your wife goes to her alone, and you stay ready to join later via Zoom call.

The "office" has quotation marks because although I’m officially supposed to plan my home office there, for her it’s already certain that things will be parked there that are needed often, but not always. Certain shoes, thick winter jackets, the vacuum cleaner. Also a closet for everything that is needed on the ground floor. Sometimes we already call it the "utility room."

So broom closet I ("office") and II (XXL wardrobe). Put that on the list right away. The "dressing room" possibly on the ground floor, due to one-storyness.

That’s why I’m already planning my office in the basement. [...] As you’ve noticed, my wife likes to store things somewhere without bringing them to the basement.

Sounds like contradiction/conflict – you notice yourself, right?

I explained that. Two bathrooms in the house are clear. Currently one is on the ground floor and one upstairs. You can "push" the second bathroom upstairs and thus create space on the ground floor, where again can be "stored" what my wife had planned for the dressing room, which would then no longer exist.

So: family bathroom in the attic, retrofit shower in guest WC from teenage phase onwards. If attic may legally become upper floor, put on the list to ask whether second bathroom optionally upstairs. You see: overwhelming for a draftsman.

As written several times, I’m first waiting to see what comes of Katja’s plan.

Katja has noted herself that as "Plan A" a relaunch to find the more elegant solution.

Well, I have a bit of the feeling that you don’t know exactly what you really want and need yet. But you want to start the final stage without clarifying it. That’s not good, to put it mildly. The list of must-haves and no-gos has to be fixed. Otherwise there’ll only be disappointment and trouble.

The six lists (hers and his musts, nicetohaves and nogos) must especially flow in before the preliminary design, not only be iterated into the design later.

Yes, in our company that is called "Requirements Capture Phase." And like there, the customer (here I/we) don’t know what they want unless someone knowledgeable nudges them in the right direction.

Then just act as if you were your own client. Maybe your team wants to puzzle on that during lunch break / after work.

In this case it’s really a shame you’re only here now. Especially the needs can best be discussed with other home builders. But better now than too late.

The fresh start can soon be discussed from the scribble sketch stage.

Of course a good freelance architect could guide you through the project and also give the needed security and act as mediator between your ideas; a planner of a general contractor will often only implement that to a limited extent in your sense.

A draftsman primarily has the task of formatting the whole mess ready for stamping. The concrete workers and masons have no downtime, the subs can flow in afterwards. How long customers stay married is not important for the construction company.

We didn’t know, for example, where our favorite places would be; now, for example, it’s our super-comfortable dining sofa and we almost never use the living room because everyone often finds their own corner in the house and does their own thing.

Also an interesting approach, not only for this thread.

I really also have the impression that the basement was planned exactly for this reason of uncertainty to become a placeholder for all sorts of things. But for that it is way too expensive and in the end does not bring the desired overall success because a basement stays a basement and does not become a sunny living space. Maybe you find a trusted person with a clear view and enough ratio to at least find a clear plan for everyday things like: actually needed indoor storage space for vacuum cleaner, brooms, cleaning agents, step ladder, extra kitchen appliances, suitcases, etc. and then add buffers respectively, but that does not necessarily have to end in a possibly six-figure basement. Maybe a nice, dry garden shed can also serve many of these wishes for much less money.

I fully agree with the impression regarding the basement as well as the proposal.

I wouldn’t do that, because you might have guests or strangers in the house who have no business upstairs, but an extra WC on the upper floor connected to the bathroom for common plumbing might be useful with growing children.

Between family and guest bathroom there does not necessarily have to be a staircase, yes.

If she doesn’t change that or won’t change it then she should plan this utility room on the ground floor as she needs it. Then that is simply one of those fixed specifications for a planner to plan exactly such a room on the ground floor. And [...] if then a bay window results from that, that’s nice but not the other way around. The house must function inside for the residents, therefore I would proceed like that and then see which options arise.

With the money not wasted for a diffuse basement you can visit captain’s bays more often in the original. And in the garden a path paved with clinker bricks leads to the Frisian wall raised bed.

I also find a bay window "for practical reasons" generally difficult to imagine. I suspect it is usually built only for aesthetic reasons.

P.S., the two main reasons for bay windows (sometimes both at the same time) are:
1. due to the total length of a straight single-run staircase and an extendable dining table, the floor plan is forced to "transport the homeowners' wishes with an open tailgate";
2. the desire for captain's gable "Frisian style" (and in the upper floor, dormer windows with desks for the children, standing height in the dressing room, or similar).

Moreover, the Anstattvilla providers like to market the problem of not being able to fit the entire ground floor layout into a square as a clever and relaxing architectural form. Unfortunately, they consider their clientele very successfully naive.

So - I have now read many different and extremely helpful tips from several other original posters. Also, the advice to take your time to read through the many similar construction projects here in the forum; especially further back you will find extensive discussions that mostly describe your situation as well. From this, you can then draw your own conclusions if you lack your own security. Taking this time is worth gold! Provided your development plan allows it (I don’t know much about that), in your case I would definitely forego a basement and realize the necessary spaces above ground, where there is light and I can avoid unnecessary stairs. This also allows for much better planning of the expected change in needs due to children growing older. Nobody wants to live in the basement; the way there is usually narrow, dark, and the construction unnecessarily expensive. I know that would reset your planning to zero again, but as you have read multiple times, this is urgently recommended to you anyway. Of course, one does not want to postpone their project and finally get started, but a later awakening is very annoying and that would be a pity. Having such an initial draft created within the permitted conditions should not be a real problem. If you had a slope or other basement-requiring condition, I would understand it, but otherwise I would find it a shame to spend money that could be so well used above ground. If I were the husband coming to this certain stance (as I am here), I would then also assert myself in order to subsequently implement the understandable needs of the wife, not out of stubbornness, but because I had dealt with it thoroughly and deeply... also here inside. A neighbor of ours, for example, built a basement on the flat meadow. When asked why, he justified it with the potatoes, which can be stored better in the dark, and smiled about the cooler beer. It is obvious that he ran out of financial air in several places inside the house itself. I am definitely not comparing you to him and it is an extreme example, but he ultimately said that people always had a basement. I have already had a house with a basement and would always prefer ground level for comfort and usage reasons. In the new house, we have no basement but a large carport with an attached "shed" for the lawnmower, storage stuff, tools, buckets, wood....

One of our neighbors, for example, built a cellar on the flat meadow. When asked why, he justified it with the potatoes, which can be stored better in the dark [...].

An earth cellar like the one at is a fine thing.

Unfortunately, I have to say that the larger house is not possible because of the Z15 subsidy. It caps living space at 160 sqm. Since the basement does not count towards that, it is a practical extension for us. A larger house without a basement and without subsidy is significantly more expensive for us than a 150 sqm house with a basement.

But I really like the earth cellar. I did not know the term, but I would like to build it adjacent to our basement, which, however, will be fully heated and insulated.

Unfortunately, I have to say that the larger house is not possible due to the Z15 subsidy. This is capped at 160 sqm of living space. Since the basement does not count towards that, it is a practical extension for us. A larger house without a basement and without subsidy is significantly more expensive for us than a 150 sqm house with a basement.

Why not go to the maximum with 160 sqm? With your needs, that could definitely be realized as a comfortable living space with good planning.