Waterfront Homes: 200 Plans for River, Lake or Sea

This book is my favorite of many home plan books. Lots of interesting design ideas. Though I believe any "canned" plan like the ones in this book needs to be adjusted to the site and to personal tastes by a architect or designer, this has a lot of choices and orientations. I have purchased one of the plans and have a permit to build. I own several ocean view lots and have targeted two other plans in the book that will suit the sites.The plans are mostly by eastern builders if you buy the plans you will find that some of the specifics are foreign on the west coast.Though one reviewer mentioned the plans were "cookie-cutter" I did not find them so. I have 6 other home plan books with plans that are much more similar to each other, and much less innovative. One caveat for would be ocean builders is that in most coastal areas winds are fierce. Houses must be engineered to meet codes for hurricane force winds on both coasts. We had to have an engineer licensed in our state go over our plans and it was fairly expensive. Steel beams had to be added for reinforcement when the window to wall ratio was too low. It appears to me that the architects did their best to retain windows and views while making the houses buildable without spending a fortune, or having the owners replacing oversize windows when the seals break. This may be the reason that many of the plans do not seem overly "view" oriented, as one reviewer mentions.Overall, I love this book. I lost my last copy and am buying it again. It's the only one I know of that has plans to suit my view lots.

There are some exciting and distinguished house plans of all sizes in this book. The written features are succinct and describes characteristic features well. The plans are drawn fairly large and clear. The housplans themselves vary from vacation types of greater than 1200 square feet and more to luxurious residential homes abutting the lakeshore or river over 5,000 square feet. The plans have the front view drawings of the home. If you are looking for a home to build that is a vacation getaway in the Florida Keys or along the eastern intracoastal waterway, this may be your book to look through... its worth a glimpse at the very least!