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    House building advice please! (update 2)

    AnitalifegurlAnitalifegurl Posts: 281 Member
    edited November 2019 in The Sims 4 General Discussion
    First off, I'm horrible with designing my own house in this game! It always feels like it's so weird for some reason lol. And one think I definitely don't ever get it right; I feel is whenever I put down stairs! I'm so unsure of where to place them so I get the most use out of both the ground floor and making an upstairs or basement! Like I get them put down, and it feels as though I can't use the space right to get use out of most of it. I hope some others feel similar and can relate to that.

    And the game had updated a while ago with the terrain changing heights tool? That was weird to discover, making the ground raise or cave in for no reason. And just using the lot space in general seems so hard for me! I don't know why that is.

    It's like I make a house, my sims complain of how simple it is and it could be better, so I upgrade it of course, and that in turn makes it larger, which also could take away yard space I could use for future plans! >.< And ugh. I don't know why I can't use a pre-made game house. I always choose an empty lot and build up my house from scratch and always never completely satisfied with how I used all my limited space.

    So any simmers out there with house designs they like or stair placement that is good for basement needs or going upstairs would be so kind to hear from! :smiley: Idk maybe I'm insecure about how I build my house or I'm very bad at designing it to use every single part of it. But getting suggestions would be so nice! :smiley: Please be kind!

    (Also sorry if I put this in the wrong category, I didn't know where to put it since it's discussing how poorly I manage to design my own house when the tools to do it are AWESOME. So, if it needs to get put in a proper category, the organizer of the forum can do that.)

    Thanks in advance! (P.S. I'm not sure if I can share any screen shots to show off my main family's current house design. I don't know when I can share screenshots or if that would be useful for this post. But I'm sure you can imagine the awkward stairs placement where I try to make a half wall maybe just under that one little strip length of steps, BOOM, stairs vanish XD cause I had clipped it through the lean of stair well. I like the one that is "floating steps with the single bar down the stair's centers" I'm sorry I forgot it's name. But you know, all stairs have a triangle like space area.)

    (Sometimes I wish there could be swirl staircases in the game. Idk I think then the stairs might take up less then?)

    Okay, okay, now I'm done with this post. Please be kind. Thanks again before commenting!
    ~~~
    Update 1:
    I tried to just think about how I wanted my dream house to be in my head ;u; Massive fail so far on remodeling. I think the stairs are the most evil thing for me, cause I can't get it right so they'd be tucked in a corner or something and still usable, but also not overlapping. :neutral: I have 6 current sims, ugh and I'm struggling with a better house! :cry:

    I know I want at least 2 bathrooms, on ground floor and one upstairs. I like one to be a master's bathroom for the parents only (you know only way in would be through a door connecting to the parents' bedroom, then 2 teen bedrooms, play room and kids' bedroom for the twins. Living room, dinning room, and kitchen, and 2 studies probably. And I failed to get the layout to go well and I blame that on the stairs :cry:

    I didn't research about houses or look up images of houses like people said to do for help. So it's my bad. I was so hyped up with all the awesome replies I thought I could do it from my head :cry: And had failed this time.

    But next time I'll try, I'd look at houses on google and blueprints and such to try to plan it out before going in.Man, it was such a mess I wish someone else could have taken over and just MADE it for me, then I'd go through and personalize it :neutral: But I gonna do it myself. There's no one else who can play Sims 4 and build my sim family a house but me.

    Maybe now I explained how many are living there, feel free to give me more help specific to 6 people houses please ;u;

    ~~~
    Update 2:
    So I tried again after getting some rest after the first attempt and it went better :smiley: So have I have a more decent house for my sims to live in, and all rooms they can use :smiley: So I'm not completely happy with it, but I discovered better layout so I can have several rooms for my needs. And things are going well so far :smiley: Thanks to all that helped out :smiley: (I'm not sure I might try to get a screenshot of the house in it's new state for this post to share what I had some help with. But I never took screenshots of my sim house before, so it'll probably not look too well Idk. If you're looking forward to that, stay tuned for a 3rd update please.)
    Post edited by Anitalifegurl on

    Comments

    • Coley666Coley666 Posts: 119 Member
      Generally I have a browse through google at particular house styles and use several as inspiration to build my own. You can also look at google for blueprints which will tell you where to place your rooms and stairs etc.
      How much have you used the new stair customisation? You can now fit stairs in much "neater" places using it.
      Sims Builder - Coley666
      jWIA95z.png
    • AnitalifegurlAnitalifegurl Posts: 281 Member
      Coley666 wrote: »
      Generally I have a browse through google at particular house styles and use several as inspiration to build my own. You can also look at google for blueprints which will tell you where to place your rooms and stairs etc.
      How much have you used the new stair customisation? You can now fit stairs in much "neater" places using it.

      That's something I didn't think about googling to build my house XD And darn that's a good one! I'll have to try that out! Cause I can always fix up my house cause it always feels like its a hot mess. XD

      How much have I used in the new stair customisation? I don't know what that means exactly. I haven't played since Friday so far, so I'm not sure if it gotten an update for new stairs. But I have 3 floors to my house. And it feels like it could have been organized better especially with where I put the staircases xD and the bedrooms are odd shaped :/ I'm not a fan of it's current look XD and layout of the bedrooms XD And I'm just never sure how to fix it XD

      Thanks for commenting :smiley:
    • Jasonschick80Jasonschick80 Posts: 686 Member
      As @Coley666 said googling images helps. I like looking up old Sears houseplans, have a whole bunch saved to use to compare to when Im building. Also, I build houses Ive lived in before or spent a significant amount if time in. I also watch TONS of building videos to get ideas and learn sime tricks.
    • AnitalifegurlAnitalifegurl Posts: 281 Member
      Jasonschick80 wrote: »
      As @Coley666 said googling images helps. I like looking up old Sears houseplans, have a whole bunch saved to use to compare to when Im building. Also, I build houses Ive lived in before or spent a significant amount if time in. I also watch TONS of building videos to get ideas and learn sime tricks.

      You lived in houses you helped make?! Man, that probably feels very cool :smiley: Cause it's so personal then :smiley: I agree to check out some google images and maybe some building vids would help me create a dream out so all my sims can get all their needs make and I can finally be happy with my sim house for once! :smiley: Just thinking of improving my silly, messed up house is getting me eager to work on it more! :smiley:

      Thanks for the lovely comment :smile: I don't know if you could tell, but I'm a city girl that never really built construction projects before. Lol, like maybe closest is agreeing to do a bird house with my dad so many years ago XD And of course back then I was a kid, and he did all the work for it yet I remember I got to pick the paint. Maybe even helped paint it, and he put real roofing rough stuff on top of it :smiley: Other than that, is helping break a driveway up so a garage could be put there and of course there was new flooring for the parts be broke with sledgehammers. I was a kid then too, and I had proper protective gear and used a smaller, lighter sledgehammer cause being a kid XD I couldn't handle an adult one. But those are the only projects I remember being a part of in my life. Lol.

      So I don't know anything about how houses are formed, but they can flow so well with how all the rooms can connect and all that :smiley: I'm grateful for all the knowledgeable construction workers who build so much good structures. And I know I can't do the same in real life, but hopefully after getting some knowledge from google images and building videos, I might have a chance of building a dream house in Sims 4 for my beloved Sims family :smiley:

      Sorry my comment got so long, I rambled. My bad. Thank you for all the hard work you done and do :smile: I know we most likely won't ever met, but still I love living a cozy life in a house and going to buildings, safe from the elements :smiley: So just showing some appreciation towards you and numerous others that do that kind of labor! Thanks!
    • asimbsimasimbsim Posts: 476 Member
      I completely get what you mean about stairs! I don;t move my camera too much when I play, so I like to just be able to see everything from the front. Stairs tend to block out spaces, so I can;t see rooms behind them, and it becomes a sort of dead space. The update to stairs was a while ago, and it definitely helps. There's a little white square arrow type thing that appears over the stairs once you've placed them, and you can click and drag and make them U shaped stairs, and it really helps with the space issue, because you can shove them in a corner somewhere ;)

      I like to make my builds as simple as possible, and use google or Pinterest for some good exteriors, and then I make a simple layout inside that suits my gameplay, so I tend to ignore real floor plans. I only have a few, but if you search me on the gallery (asimbsim), I have a few simple, clean style houses that you can have a look at? I've only just started experimenting with the new stairs, but they really do help :)
    • Jasonschick80Jasonschick80 Posts: 686 Member
      Im a city girl too, but when I moved to the backwoods of West Virginia to be with my hubby I pitched in and helped him for a few months when he was down a few guys on his familys home improvement business. Quite a culture shock when the closest Starbucks is 1.5 hrs away and they have never heard of Nordstroms or Macy's 😀!

      But, it is nice when you look around and see the fruits of your labor sheltering your family. Kinda puts a bigger, more meaningful spin on things.

      Thank you for your kind words of appreciation! Im sure you do your part in making the world a beautiful place too, even if its just a kind word and a smile to a stranger. Blessed be to you and yours!
    • AnitalifegurlAnitalifegurl Posts: 281 Member
      asimbsim wrote: »
      I completely get what you mean about stairs! I don;t move my camera too much when I play, so I like to just be able to see everything from the front. Stairs tend to block out spaces, so I can;t see rooms behind them, and it becomes a sort of dead space. The update to stairs was a while ago, and it definitely helps. There's a little white square arrow type thing that appears over the stairs once you've placed them, and you can click and drag and make them U shaped stairs, and it really helps with the space issue, because you can shove them in a corner somewhere ;)

      I like to make my builds as simple as possible, and use google or Pinterest for some good exteriors, and then I make a simple layout inside that suits my gameplay, so I tend to ignore real floor plans. I only have a few, but if you search me on the gallery (asimbsim), I have a few simple, clean style houses that you can have a look at? I've only just started experimenting with the new stairs, but they really do help :)

      Thanks! :smiley: I don't keep my camera still when I play, I move it around to follow my sims sometimes. And I looked up the U shaped stairs, and it's looking good :D I might have to try it out and go from scratch lol. But if that's a great way to save space and have stairs it's beautiful :smiley:

      Oh, like houses to give out? Interesting :smiley: I never use the gallery feature XD So I'm unaware of it's power. And who knows, looking at a few example houses might inspire me to get together the house I desire! :smile: Thank you for being so lovely to help me out :smiley: I'm sure every bit will help me get my dream house :smiley:
    • AnitalifegurlAnitalifegurl Posts: 281 Member
      Jasonschick80 wrote: »
      Im a city girl too, but when I moved to the backwoods of West Virginia to be with my hubby I pitched in and helped him for a few months when he was down a few guys on his familys home improvement business. Quite a culture shock when the closest Starbucks is 1.5 hrs away and they have never heard of Nordstroms or Macy's 😀!

      But, it is nice when you look around and see the fruits of your labor sheltering your family. Kinda puts a bigger, more meaningful spin on things.

      Thank you for your kind words of appreciation! Im sure you do your part in making the world a beautiful place too, even if its just a kind word and a smile to a stranger. Blessed be to you and yours!

      That sounds like quite the life you lead :smiley: It was probably fun to help out with that business and build your own house :smile: And it sounds like it's probably kind of cozy in the woods. I hope you all are careful and safe from any beastly animals that live in woods. I never once lived in the woods, so I don't know what it's like. But I'm sure it's cozy for the right people that like the extra quiet :smiley:

      And I think I got that proud feeling helping with the birdhouse I mentioned and breaking up the driveway :smiley: Lol. Sure I can't remember if birds ever used the birdhouse, but the house where we changed the driveway to install a garage I remember feeling very proud of how little me helped out :smiley: I can't remember who built the garage, but it was like professionally made I'm positive. Cause my dad likes to build quality things in it involves such hard labor with wood and nails and such.

      You're welcome :smiley: Thank you! I enjoy making others happier if possible so I'm living good with my positive attitude to share with my loved ones :smiley: And I'm sure it's a blessing to be you too! So clever in different ways to help a stranger with a virtual house hehe :smiley: It sure makes me feel great getting kind and informed suggestions from people that know what they are talking about!

      I don't know how chilly it probably is around this time for you but I hope you stay nice and cozy cause the winter is coming in! :3
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