How to Make Printable House Floor Plans

Some design applets feature 3-D tours of printable house plans.

Floor plans describe the layout of the walls, appliances, fixtures and other items you want for your home. Drawing these floor plans on paper requires minimum experience because almost anyone can draw them. But for printable plans, use drafting software, such as the free applets available on several websites. The drag-and-drop interfaces of these applets make it possible for beginner designers to create and print floor plans. You can use what you've learned from this project to create and print plans for structures besides houses, like furniture.

Things You'll Need

• Tape measure

Instructions

Small Blue Printer

1. Use a measuring tape to measure the dimensions of your existing house. For a new house, write down the dimensions you'd like for the house.

2. Open the Small Blue Printer site in your browser, and then click the "Start" link near the page's center.

3. Click "Sample," then "OK" to load an existing plan into the drawing area. You'll modify this plan to match your house's plan.

4. Click the right palette's "Size" icon, and then drag on the sizing handles of the plan's exterior wall icons to size them to the dimensions. Use the graph paper background to determine size.

5. Click extra walls and click the palette's "Delete" icon to delete them. Drag walls, doors, and other items from the palette onto the drawing area. Click the palette's "Rotate" icon and drag an item's handles to rotate it.

6. Click the "Print" tab and follow the prompts to print the completed plan.

Floorplanner

1. Write down your house's measurements or use measurements you've previously taken.

2. Open the Floorplanner homepage in your browser, and then follow the prompts to create a free account and enter the design area. The display of the drawing grid at screen center and the tool palette at screen right indicate you're in the design area.

3. Click the "Construction" heading's leftmost icon, and then drag in the drawing area to create exterior walls matching your dimensions.

4. Drag interior walls, fixtures, furniture and other items from the palette at screen right.

5. Click the printer icon in the upper right of the screen to print your house plan.

Homestyler

1. Measure your house's dimensions, and then open the Homestyler page in your browser.

2. Click the "Gallery" link, then the "Copy" button of the icon whose plan most closely matches yours.

3. Click and drag exterior walls to re-size them. Delete extra interior and exterior walls by clicking them and then clicking their "X" icons.

4. Click on items and then drag their curved icons to rotate them. Drag new walls, furniture, fixtures and other items from the palette at screen right.

5. Click the "File" menu's "Print" command to print your finished plan.

References

• "Independent Builder: Designing & Building a House Your Own Way"; Sam Clark; 1996
• YouTube: Autodesk Homestyler - Start designing
• Floorplanner: Floorplanner Tutorial

Resources

• David Doull: Small Blue Printer
• Autodesk Homestyler
• Floorplanner