House Design Pro

The “HELP” available within the program is pathetically basic. And the MODE ITEMS in this “help" don’t evem match the items in the program. How about a manual for download at least with something more than a few pegs of screen shots with a couple VERY short bullet list info.

This could be an excellent lightweight program. I think it just needs a little polishing. Pros: Highly intuitive. It’s quick and easy to create a layout. Attractive program. Uncluttered UI. Cons: Cannot print drawings to one sheet of paper - however, one can use Export to create a PDF, which in turn can be printed onto a sheet of paper. The Auto Snap checkbox is hidden in the Preferences pane, which is definitely annoying, as pointed out by other reviewers. Creating interior walls can be a bit iffy. It sometimes seems to only merge with the exterior walls properly when Auto Snap is turned on. Sometimes quirky measurements. For example, sometimes it will display measurements to the center of a wall, instead of the interior edge. The 3D rendering function might as well have been left out of the program - the developers would do better to focus on polishing its other aspects.

So far so good. Very easy to use.

I was looking for a reasonably priced application to do home layouts on. My son is buying a house that needs major renovations so I wanted a tool to plan everything out. I bought the Pro version ($5 more) but I’m not really sure what it has that the regular version doesn’t. I tried several economy class home layout products. This one hit the sweet spot. I had all the features I was looking for and the user interface worked pretty well. The documentation is very sparse but most things are fairly intuitive so that’s OK. I would be nice to have a button bar for things like turning snap, labels and measurements on and off. I would also like to ability to add lines not walls. This would help with step ups and other stuff. There could also be graphics for pocket doors. Overall a great product at a great price.

For the price, this app can do quite a bit and is quite useful if you’re planning a home renovation or redesigning a room. There are a few UI tweaks that I think would make this app easier to use. First and most important, there should be a quick key to turn the Auto Snap on and off. Having to go the File>Preferences every time you want to turn the snap feature on and off gets tedious. The auto snap has a fairly wide range and can be frustrating if it’s activated when you’re creating new elements that are inches away from an existing element. Secondly, when using the ruler tool, there should be an option to leave the distance you have measured with it active on the screen when you select another tool. (Say, for instance, you are creating a new wall two feet away from an existing wall, it would be helpful if that distance could be measured with the ruler and have that ruler measurement remain on screen when you select the wall tool). All in all, though, a good app for the price if you’re trying to design your own home improvement/renovation.