ᐅ Single-family house ~200 m² floor plan design on a gentle slope
Created on: 23 Dec 2025 17:18
H
huhxkux
Development Plan / Restrictions
Plot size: 512 m² (5509 sq ft)
Slope: Yes
Site coverage ratio: 0.4
Floor area ratio: N/A
Building setback lines, building line, and boundaries: See overview
Edge development: N/A
Number of parking spaces: 3
Number of floors: 2
Roof type: Gable roof
Architectural style: N/A
Garden orientation: West
Maximum heights / limits: 9 m (30 ft) ridge height from a specific terrain point on the plot
Additional requirements
Client Requirements
Style, roof type, building type: Single-family house, 2 full floors, gable roof
Basement, floors: Basement yes, 2 full floors
Number of occupants, ages: Currently 3, soon 4, planned 5 → Persons: 2 adults over 30, 1 child (1 year), 1 unborn, 1 planned
Room requirements on ground floor (GF), upper floor (UF):
GF: Kitchen (with pantry if possible), dining area, living room, toilet, utility room.
UF: 3 children’s rooms, 1 storage room.
GF or UF: Parents’ area with private bathroom, office
Office use: Family use or home office? Home office
Guest stays per year: About 40 nights per year (3x parents and siblings live far away)
Open or closed architecture: Open?
Conservative or modern construction style: ???
Open kitchen, kitchen island: Open kitchen with kitchen island desired
Number of dining seats: 8
Fireplace: No
Music / stereo wall: Yes, near the TV
Balcony, roof terrace: No
Garage, carport: Yes, 1 garage in the house and either another garage or carport next to the house
Utility garden, greenhouse: No
Additional wishes / special features / daily routine, also reasons why some things should or should not be: N/A
House Design
Planning by: Architect
What do you like most? Why? We like almost everything in the floor plan very much, especially the option to use the office upstairs while the children are small and move the office downstairs, and then later move it back downstairs when the children are older.
What do you not like? Why? Only minor details that we would still like to adjust. As nothing will be revised over Christmas, feel free to point out anything we might have missed.
Price estimate by architect/planner: €790,000 including additional costs / photovoltaic / kitchen / driveway / terrace, excluding finished basement apartment
Personal price limit for the house including features: €800,000
Preferred heating system: Air-to-water heat pump
If you have to give up on certain details / expansions
- What can you do without: Basement (but ideally not because of the slope), basement apartment (guest room would otherwise suffice)
- What you cannot do without: 2 shower bathrooms for parents/children, straight staircase
Why did the design turn out as it is now?
For example:
At first, we really wanted to build simply without a basement to avoid exceeding our budget. The initial plans, however, had very steep driveways or the driveway was on the south side. Since we have been reading intensively here for many months, we decided to hire a surveyor because of the slight slope to clarify the planning. And yes, what can I say—our plot became a victim of the “11ant’s basement rule” 😱. Consequently, we continued planning, a bit smaller but this time with a basement. As we do not really need the space in the basement, we now have a basement apartment prepared for finishing, where we would initially only complete the bathroom and finish the rest ourselves. To have a parking space already, the garage was placed inside the house.
We thought a lot about whether we wanted a proper hallway. In the end, we left it open in the current plan because the designs with a hallway made the kitchen and dining areas feel very tight.
The furniture positions in the floor plan are only examples, and we would probably still adjust a few things, for example, arranging the kitchen in an L-shape with a passage through a cabinet to the pantry, or possibly placing the sofa more in the corner of the living room and slightly moving the corresponding window with a lower sill height forward. Also, the terrace should only be on the west side with doors leading out from both the kitchen and dining area. The south side of the dining area would have a fixed window only.
Since we are now slowly moving towards signing the contract, I would like to get your feedback on whether it makes sense to change or add anything and include it in the offer, or if we should reconsider the floor plan entirely.
Thank you very much in advance for your feedback!
UG:
GF:
UF:
Attic:
North view:
East view:
South view:
West view:
Plot size: 512 m² (5509 sq ft)
Slope: Yes
Site coverage ratio: 0.4
Floor area ratio: N/A
Building setback lines, building line, and boundaries: See overview
Edge development: N/A
Number of parking spaces: 3
Number of floors: 2
Roof type: Gable roof
Architectural style: N/A
Garden orientation: West
Maximum heights / limits: 9 m (30 ft) ridge height from a specific terrain point on the plot
Additional requirements
Client Requirements
Style, roof type, building type: Single-family house, 2 full floors, gable roof
Basement, floors: Basement yes, 2 full floors
Number of occupants, ages: Currently 3, soon 4, planned 5 → Persons: 2 adults over 30, 1 child (1 year), 1 unborn, 1 planned
Room requirements on ground floor (GF), upper floor (UF):
GF: Kitchen (with pantry if possible), dining area, living room, toilet, utility room.
UF: 3 children’s rooms, 1 storage room.
GF or UF: Parents’ area with private bathroom, office
Office use: Family use or home office? Home office
Guest stays per year: About 40 nights per year (3x parents and siblings live far away)
Open or closed architecture: Open?
Conservative or modern construction style: ???
Open kitchen, kitchen island: Open kitchen with kitchen island desired
Number of dining seats: 8
Fireplace: No
Music / stereo wall: Yes, near the TV
Balcony, roof terrace: No
Garage, carport: Yes, 1 garage in the house and either another garage or carport next to the house
Utility garden, greenhouse: No
Additional wishes / special features / daily routine, also reasons why some things should or should not be: N/A
House Design
Planning by: Architect
What do you like most? Why? We like almost everything in the floor plan very much, especially the option to use the office upstairs while the children are small and move the office downstairs, and then later move it back downstairs when the children are older.
What do you not like? Why? Only minor details that we would still like to adjust. As nothing will be revised over Christmas, feel free to point out anything we might have missed.
Price estimate by architect/planner: €790,000 including additional costs / photovoltaic / kitchen / driveway / terrace, excluding finished basement apartment
Personal price limit for the house including features: €800,000
Preferred heating system: Air-to-water heat pump
If you have to give up on certain details / expansions
- What can you do without: Basement (but ideally not because of the slope), basement apartment (guest room would otherwise suffice)
- What you cannot do without: 2 shower bathrooms for parents/children, straight staircase
Why did the design turn out as it is now?
For example:
At first, we really wanted to build simply without a basement to avoid exceeding our budget. The initial plans, however, had very steep driveways or the driveway was on the south side. Since we have been reading intensively here for many months, we decided to hire a surveyor because of the slight slope to clarify the planning. And yes, what can I say—our plot became a victim of the “11ant’s basement rule” 😱. Consequently, we continued planning, a bit smaller but this time with a basement. As we do not really need the space in the basement, we now have a basement apartment prepared for finishing, where we would initially only complete the bathroom and finish the rest ourselves. To have a parking space already, the garage was placed inside the house.
We thought a lot about whether we wanted a proper hallway. In the end, we left it open in the current plan because the designs with a hallway made the kitchen and dining areas feel very tight.
The furniture positions in the floor plan are only examples, and we would probably still adjust a few things, for example, arranging the kitchen in an L-shape with a passage through a cabinet to the pantry, or possibly placing the sofa more in the corner of the living room and slightly moving the corresponding window with a lower sill height forward. Also, the terrace should only be on the west side with doors leading out from both the kitchen and dining area. The south side of the dining area would have a fixed window only.
Since we are now slowly moving towards signing the contract, I would like to get your feedback on whether it makes sense to change or add anything and include it in the offer, or if we should reconsider the floor plan entirely.
Thank you very much in advance for your feedback!
UG:
GF:
UF:
Attic:
North view:
East view:
South view:
West view:
Papierturm schrieb:
And PS, since posts can’t be edited:
Make sure to include the cost of soil disposal!
You can actually calculate it yourself just for fun. Without a slope (which makes it cheaper), disposal costs here (more of a mid-range) and assuming Z0 (best possible disposal class), I came to about €35,000 just for soil disposal. The slope then makes it significantly cheaper. Maybe somewhere between €20,000 and €25,000? You’d have to calculate it based on the height measurements.
But if it’s not Z0, the cost can increase again. Around here: Z1 about 30% more. Z1.2 about 50% more. Z2 about 150% more.
Again: soil survey is essential!
(Any sewage pipes, access roads, cisterns, and so on during excavation are not included here, only the excavation for the house.) Yes, we will start the soil survey in January. We also have a rough estimate, which is rather on the high side and assumes 330 m³ (435 cubic yards) of soil for the house, driveway, and carport/garage. For good soil quality, costs were estimated at €30 per m³ (about $30 per cubic yard) for transport (€18 per m³ estimated value) + disposal (€12 per m³ actual value). For poor soil quality, costs would be around €120 per m³ (approximately $160 per cubic yard) including €100 per m³ landfill fees. So a range of €10,000 to €40,000. In our calculation, we assumed €30,000. The 330 m³ does not yet include that we plan to raise about 0.5 m (1.5 ft) on approximately 220 m² (2,370 sq ft) of garden area. So, looking at it pessimistically, we could subtract about 100 m³ (130 cubic yards) of soil again. That would put us in the worst case at the mentioned €30,000 according to the rough estimate.
How did you calculate such high numbers? Is soil transport per m³ really that much more expensive?
Joedreck schrieb:
I really want to bring up the staircase again. All visitor traffic always goes through the living room. Always. Anytime. And everyone. That can get really annoying and uncomfortable. The whole family has to compromise for one individual’s preference. Absolutely valid point, and we have discussed this a lot and are still quite uncertain. Our architect also provided a plan with a hallway. I posted a section of it here in the thread before, which wasn’t an option for us. We also talked with the architect about a quarter-turn staircase, but that requires more landing space, which automatically makes the hallway on the ground floor and upper floor wider, which is not ideal since our site provides more length than width.
Currently, we tend to see the advantages of having the staircase almost directly in the kitchen—for example, to put down groceries, quickly grab a drink, and so on. We also imagine it nice to come upstairs into a bright, sunlit room with a view of the garden.
What convinces us more or less right now is that the living area is still somewhat separated because you typically come out into the kitchen first.
What exactly do you mean by uncomfortable situations?
huhxkux schrieb:
Current situationCurrently, you have one child and not many belongings to move in yet.huhxkux schrieb:
With the current design, we would have over 4 m (13 feet) of countertop space plus 3 tall cabinets (one housing the oven and one the dishwasher), as well as the pantry and a very deep island. For us, this feels quite spacious.I don’t count 4 meters (13 feet) once you subtract the sink and stove. I would move the staircase a bit forward (towards the bottom of the plan) and have the staircase from the ground floor to the first floor start with a turn.
Could you possibly use the slope on the side to access the utility room from outside for storing groceries?
Papierturm28 Dec 2025 18:47huhxkux schrieb:
Yes, we will start the soil survey in January. We also received a rough estimate that seems a bit on the high side, assuming about 330m³ (430 cubic yards) of soil for the house, driveway, and carport/garage. [...]
How did you calculate to reach such high numbers? Is the soil transportation per cubic meter that much more expensive? So: I made a very rough calculation because, frankly, I didn’t want to factor in the slope—it’s too much effort. So I assumed a basically flat plot. The slope actually makes it cheaper.
Rough calculation: The external dimensions of the house, plus about 2 meters (about 6.5 feet) on each side (since the wall isn’t built directly against the soil, usually some extra excavation is done, so roughly 1 meter (3 feet) clearance from the walls to the soil). Assumed basement height plus some foundation layer underneath is about 3 meters (10 feet). Rounded roughly: 15 × 12 × 3
One cubic meter (1.3 cubic yards) of soil removed in excavation usually generates about 1.8 cubic meters (2.4 cubic yards) of loosened soil volume.
So: 15 × 12 × 3 × 1.8 = 972m³ (1,272 cubic yards)
Since I rounded somewhat generously, from there I used approximately 950m³ (1,243 cubic yards) to calculate with local pricing.
With the slope, depending on how it runs, it might be around 450m³ (588 cubic yards). Maybe a bit more, maybe a bit less. I find 330m³ (432 cubic yards) for a basement on a sloped plot very optimistic if that’s supposed to include everything else as well.
By comparison: We built with a slab foundation but had to remove more soil to create a driveway since the plot is flat but about 1.8 meters (6 feet) above street level—we had to build an access ramp into the embankment. Then there were the sewage shafts, and we ended up with about 350m³ (458 cubic yards). That was just for the slab, driveway, and sewage.
ypg schrieb:
Currently, you have one child and not that much for moving in yet. Exactly, that’s why we’re even more eager to gather experiences here.
ypg schrieb:
I don’t count 4 meters when you subtract the sink and stove. Right, the 4 meters referred to the entire length. If you subtract 1.8 meters (about 6 feet) for the sink and stove, you’re left with just over 2 meters (around 6.5 feet) of free space. And without including the side areas of the island, it’s only about 1.5 meters (5 feet) usable countertop space.
ypg schrieb:
I would move the stairs a bit forward (towards the bottom of the plan) and have the stairs from the ground floor to the upper floor spiral at the beginning.
You could also use the slope on the side to access the utility room from the outside? According to the architect, the hallway would need to be about 20 centimeters (8 inches) wider if we go with a spiral staircase to keep it comfortable to walk through. But it might still work as is. The problem with the stairs is more that the dressing room would grow in size without gaining usable space, while the bathroom would become narrower and the walk-in shower wouldn’t be possible anymore.
Unfortunately, the utility room will not be accessible from outside since there won’t be a slope there, just either a carport with retaining walls or a garage.
Still, a very interesting option. I’m curious how my wife will feel about it when I show her later.
@Joedreck, in your opinion, would something like this be better, or is the staircase still too much in the dining area?
ypg schrieb:
Interesting approach with almost a refrigerator niche. I would question whether a second door to the utility room is really necessary, but those are details. The kitchen itself wouldn’t grow with this layout, though.
Papierturm schrieb:
One cubic meter of soil in the ground is excavated to about 1.8 cubic meters.Thanks, that’s the key point! I had asked for the calculation of how many cubic meters of soil need to be excavated. But I wasn’t aware that there is such a large excavation factor in the end. And then we’re already talking about 600 cubic meters of excavation, or 450 with reuse.