What is Project NXT House? A Small, Affordable House

What is Project NXT House?

It’s the name we’ve given our project to build out next house! After a lot of time researching, we’ve revised our previous selection of a floor plan and begun to pre-select and extensive Pinterest board of materials and finishes to help our future builder understand our vision.

The Specs

The specs on the house haven’t changed much since our first post, we still want 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, 2 car garage on one level around 1,300 square feet.

But, The Hurdles are More than a Few

The finances aren’t perfect, but no ones really are, are they? That aside, land to build the home on seems somewhat scarce in our target area. Finally, we will need to come up with about 10% of the total project price to get the ball rolling. That’s over something like $10,000.  All sobering thoughts. But, the alternatives seem even bleaker.  

The inventory of available houses in our price range are few and sales of them is (fairly) fast moving. And we continue to see very few worthwhile homes in our budget friendly range. Certainly, we don’t have the challenges of larger metro areas but, some of our struggles are shared by those living in those areas.

So, that has led us to consider building a home, our next home.. NXT Home.

What’s Our Home Style?

It’s not too traditional and not too country. In a word it’s transitional. Within our selected design, we’ve planned for cost-effective nods to the Arts & Craft bungalows so popular in the 1920’s. My wife and I love this style of home and are happy with a design that uses some elements and which we can add some additional ones as well. Things like the front door and the choices not to case the windows and rely on inexpensive dimensional lumber for door casings and baseboards should help us achieve the style while keeping a lid on overall costs.

So, What’s the Plan Look Like?

After looking at literally 1,000s of floorplans we landed on one from Architectural Design Plans that gets us to 99.9% of our collective vision.

Some of the exterior details will change like the brick around the foundation just below the windows. For us, it’s an optional detail. Depending on the lot, we might have a side entry garage. The “snout” of the garage isn’t something I’m all that fond of.

The floor plan is a pretty typical split ranch plan, that even at this square footage gives the owners a place to retreat. What we like is that it has a rear porch and there are views out the back from the living room. The kitchen and living room are connected in a more modern “great” room feel. On the way out to the garage, there’s even space for our chest freezer.

Finally, if you work for or, on behalf of Home Depot, Lowes Home Improvement or, a home products manufacturer of everything (including the kitchen sink):

• toilets
• bathroom sinks/vanities
• kitchen sink
• countertops
• light fixtures
• paint
• drywall
• plywood
• wood flooring
• roofing
• siding
• insulation
• windows
• water heater
• HVAC systems
• carpet

We’d love to chat about ways we can work together to get you some additional exposure.

Want to read up on our initial thoughts/objectives on the house? Check out this post.