Questions to Ask Clients When Designing a Home
For architects and residential designers meeting a prospective client about a new house, an addition or a major remodel, before any drawing starts. The questions are grouped by subject: the project and the people, the site, daily life, the rooms, style, then money, timing and who decides. Each has a note on what a good or a worrying answer sounds like and what to do with it, and the guide says which ones to bring forward when you only have an hour.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Project
What is prompting you to build or remodel now?
Why ask it
A growing family, a parent moving in, retirement or a lot they finally bought each points to a different house. A good answer names an event and a date. 'We have always wanted to', with nothing behind it, often means the project is still a wish, so ask what would have to happen before they commit.
Who will live in the house, and how do you expect that to change over the next ten years?
Why ask it
Ask for ages, not a head count, since a plan for two toddlers is not a plan for two teenagers. Listen for the changes people half expect: another child, a parent who may need a ground-floor bedroom, kids leaving. If two owners answer differently, that has to be settled before you fix a bedroom count.
Is this the house you intend to stay in for good, or one you expect to sell within a few years?
Why ask it
A house for good can be shaped tightly around one household's habits. One that will be sold has to make sense to a stranger, which argues against the most personal moves. When they are not sure, keep the unusual parts to things that are easy to undo.
What do you like about where you live now, and what drives you up the wall?
Why ask it
Their current home is the only full-size model they have ever tested. Complaints come out specific, such as a laundry two floors from the bedrooms, and each one goes into the brief as a problem to solve. Write down the likes just as carefully, because those are the things clients forget to ask for and miss after they move.
If the house could only get three things right, what would they be?
Why ask it
Three forces a ranking that a long wish list never does. A strong answer mixes something practical with something felt, like a kitchen everyone fits in and sun at breakfast. If you get three features from a magazine, ask what each one would let them do that they cannot do today.
Have you settled on building new, adding on or remodeling, or is that still open?
Why ask it
Clients often arrive certain because of one conversation with a builder or a relative. If it is still open, comparing the routes is your first piece of work, and it needs rough costs for each before anyone grows attached to a plan. If it is settled, ask what settled it.
Have you sketched a layout yourselves, or found a floor plan you like?
Why ask it
Take a client's sketch seriously and ask what each move was for, because it is a wish list drawn as walls. A purchased or published plan is different: find out whether they want that house or one like it, and have them check what the plan's license allows before anyone copies or alters it.
Have you built or remodeled before, and what would you do differently this time?
Why ask it
First-timers need the stages explained and usually underestimate how many decisions are coming. People who have done it before tend to arrive with a grievance, most often about cost or about not being told things. Whatever they name is what they will be watching you for.
Which of our past projects made you pick up the phone?
Why ask it
Pull up the house they name and ask what caught them: its size, the materials, the way it sits on its lot. Then say in round terms what a house of that kind costs to build now, which is the quickest honest check on their budget. Someone sent by a friend who cannot name a project should be asked which room of the friend's house they remember.
Have you already talked to a builder, and did they give you a price?
Why ask it
A builder's price per square foot, given with no drawings to price, turns into the number a client carries around for months. Ask what the figure was and what it left out. If a builder is already chosen, find out whether they expect a seat at the table during design, which often helps the budget.
Site
Do you own the land or the house yet, and if not, how far along is the purchase?
Why ask it
An owned lot means you can start from a survey. A lot under contract, with time left to back out, is a chance to walk it together before the money is committed, and worth offering. With no land at all the brief is provisional, and it is kinder to say plainly that the site will rewrite a good part of it.
What drew you to this particular piece of land?
Why ask it
The reason is nearly always the thing the design has to protect: a view, an old tree, the street, the walk to school. Mark it on the site plan before anything else. If the answer is the price, ask what they would change about the lot, and you will hear what the design is being asked to make up for.
Do you have a survey, and do you know of any easements, setbacks or neighborhood covenants on the property?
Why ask it
Most owners know some of this and few know all of it. Take what they hand over as a starting point and tell them you will confirm the rules with the local planning office, and with the homeowners association if there is one, before you sketch. How big, how tall and how close to the line a house may be differs from one town and one subdivision to the next.
When you stand on the site, which way do you find yourself facing?
Why ask it
People turn toward what they like without thinking about it, and that direction is where the main rooms want to look. If it is also the side that takes the low afternoon sun, say now that the glass there will need shading. A client who has never stood on the lot for an hour should have the next meeting there.
What do you know about the ground: slope, drainage, rock, wet spots, anything a neighbor has warned you about?
Why ask it
Owners know where water stands after a storm, and neighbors remember who hit rock digging a basement. None of it replaces a soils report, but it tells you whether to recommend paying for one before design starts. Pin each remark to a spot on the plan while they talk.
How is the property served: public water and sewer or a well and septic system, and what about power, gas and internet?
Why ask it
A blank look means nobody has checked, and the first job is a call to the utilities and to whichever local office approves wells and septic systems. Where those can go may decide where the house can sit. Ask too how far the nearest power line is, since bringing service down a long driveway is a cost that is rarely in the client's figure.
Which trees, outbuildings or parts of the existing house have to stay, and which would you be glad to see go?
Why ask it
On a remodel, the part they most want to keep is sometimes the part in the worst condition, so hold any promise until someone has looked at the structure. For trees, ask whether the town or the neighborhood protects any, because in some places removal needs permission. The 'glad to see go' half is often said with relief, and it frees up the plan.
From inside the house, what do you want to look out at, and what would you rather not see: the neighbors, the road, a parking area?
Why ask it
'We don't mind the neighbors' usually means nobody has pictured the bedroom window facing next door's deck. Walk the lot lines together and ask at each side. The answers place the windows, the driveway and the outdoor seating long before the plan has a shape.
How old is the existing house, what has been added over the years, and what problems do you already know about?
Why ask it
Ask for old drawings, permit records and the inspection report from the purchase. Additions done without paperwork, a damp basement or dated wiring all change the cost before design has begun. 'It's fine, we only want it opened up' is the answer to be careful with: recommend a measured survey and a look at the structure before anyone prices anything.
Daily life
Take me through an ordinary weekday in your household, from the first alarm to lights out.
Why ask it
You are listening for collisions: two people who need one bathroom at seven, someone asleep after a night shift, homework spread over the kitchen counter. Each is a line in the brief. When the day sounds too tidy, ask what actually happened yesterday.
Who cooks, how often, and is anyone else in the kitchen while it happens?
Why ask it
A household that cooks from scratch every night needs counter length and a pantry. One that mostly reheats needs a good table and less of the budget in appliances. People often brief the kitchen of the cook they mean to become, so ask what dinner was on the last three nights.
When you have people over, how many come, how often, and where does everyone end up?
Why ask it
Size the house for the occasion that happens monthly, not the one that happens once a year. Twenty people at a holiday can be handled by a room that borrows space from the one beside it, while dinner for eight every Friday earns a real dining room. 'Where everyone ends up' is nearly always the kitchen, so plan for standing room there.
Does anyone work from home, and what does the work need: quiet, a door, clients visiting, storage?
Why ask it
Two people on calls at the same hour need two rooms with doors, not one handsome office. Ask how many days a week, since a need that comes up twice a month can share a guest room. If clients or staff will come to the house, tell the owners to ask the town what it allows for a home business before you draw a separate entrance.
Where does each of you go when you want to be left alone?
Why ask it
Open plans disappoint the households that were never asked this. Good answers name a place and what happens there: a chair for reading, a workbench, a long bath. If everyone insists they are always together, ask about a sick day or a teenager five years on, then decide how many doors the plan needs.
Which door does the household really come in by, and what comes through it: shoes, backpacks, groceries, packages, a muddy dog?
Why ask it
In many households the front door is for guests and the family comes in from the garage, so that is the entry to design first. Size the mudroom from the list they give you, hook by hook, and include the pets. Ask too where a package waits when nobody is home.
Which hobbies, sports or collections need room, and how much space do they take up today?
Why ask it
A kiln, a loom, six bicycles and a weight rack each come with dimensions, and some need extra power, ventilation or a stronger floor. Ask to see where the thing lives now and measure it. Treat a hobby they plan to take up differently: give it a corner of a flexible room, not a room of its own.
How many vehicles do you have, and what else needs parking or a roof: a boat, a trailer, a mower?
Why ask it
Garage and driveway are among the largest things on the site plan, and often where lot coverage rules pinch, so check what this lot allows. Ask whether the cars really go in the garage. Plenty are storage rooms, and it is better to design honest storage and a smaller garage than to pretend. Ask about charging an electric car while you are there.
Does anyone who lives here or visits often have trouble with stairs, or might they in the years you plan to stay?
Why ask it
A grandparent who comes every month counts. Some clients wave the subject away, and a lecture will not change that. Suggest a ground-floor room with a full bathroom beside it, used as a study or a guest room for now, and doorways wider than the minimum, since both are far easier to plan in today than to add to a finished house.
Rooms
How many bedrooms and bathrooms do you need on the day you move in, and how many would you like?
Why ask it
Get both numbers, because the gap between them is where the budget conversation will take place. Then ask who sleeps in each room. A guest room that is slept in twice a year can usually double as the office and save a room's worth of cost.
Which rooms in your current home do you hardly go into?
Why ask it
Formal living and dining rooms come up most, and clients who never sit in theirs will sometimes ask for another one anyway. Ask why. Resale or a family tradition is a fair reason, but they should choose it knowing what a room they walk past costs to build, heat and furnish.
Do you have a square footage in mind, and where did it come from?
Why ask it
The number tends to be their current house, a neighbor's house or a builder's plan book. A figure with reasoning behind it can be tested. One with none is often bigger than the budget will carry, so say you will add up the room list and set it beside the number before drawing.
One story or two, and how do you feel about a basement?
Why ask it
The preference is often a childhood house or somebody's knees. Slope, soil and local height limits may make the decision for them, so promise to check before agreeing. Listen for the reason underneath: 'kids upstairs, us down' is really a request for separation, and there is more than one way to give it.
Which rooms do you want the sun in, and at what time of day?
Why ask it
Ask when each person gets up, since an early riser wants light at the kitchen table and a late sleeper wants a bedroom that stays dark well past dawn. Then hold the wish against the lot. If the view and the morning sun are on opposite sides, say which rooms can have both and which will have to choose.
Where should your own bedroom sit in relation to the children's rooms, the guest room and the living areas?
Why ask it
Parents of a baby want to be a few steps away and parents of teenagers want a floor between them, and a house kept for twenty years has to serve both. A thoughtful answer mentions the stage the family is at. One fix is a small room next to the main bedroom that starts as a nursery and ends as a study.
What should the kitchen open onto or sit beside: the table, the yard, the garage, the family room?
Why ask it
This is about connections, not cabinets. Sketch bubbles and lines while they talk so they can correct you on the spot. A client who wants the kitchen next to everything should be asked which link they would give up first, because on most lots something has to.
Do you prefer rooms that run into one another, or separate rooms with doors?
Why ask it
Most people say open, then describe work calls, a sleeping baby and a kitchen they would like to hide when friends arrive. Ask about noise and cooking smells in the home they have now. The brief that comes out is often open with a way to close it: a pocket door, a den, a back pantry for the mess.
Is there furniture, art or an instrument the house has to be designed around?
Why ask it
A table that seats twelve, a grand piano or a painting eight feet wide fixes a room's dimensions before you draw it. Get the measurements and ask how the piece will get inside, which can decide a door width or the turn of a stair. Things they might buy one day stay off the list.
What do you own that your current home has no proper place for?
Why ask it
Holiday boxes, camping gear, luggage, bulk groceries, tools. Ask for photographs of the garage and the closets as they are, because lists made from memory run short. Storage is the first thing squeezed when a plan grows too big, so it goes into the written brief with sizes attached.
How do you want to live outdoors: a porch, a deck, a pool, a vegetable garden, somewhere for children to play?
Why ask it
Outdoor spaces belong on the first site sketch, since they compete with the house, the driveway and any septic field for the same ground. Ask what time of day they would sit outside, which settles the side of the house. A pool 'someday' still needs its spot kept clear and a way for an excavator to reach it.
What should the house be ready for later, even if we do not build it now: a finished basement, a suite for a parent, a second floor?
Why ask it
Allowing for a later phase costs least now: capped plumbing, closets stacked where a stair or an elevator could go, a structure sized for another floor. Ask how likely each one honestly is, allow for the probable ones and note the others. A separate unit for a relative depends on local rules, so check those before you promise it.
Style
Show me the houses you have saved, and tell me what keeps pulling you back to each one.
Why ask it
Look for what repeats across pictures that are supposedly different styles: the same roof pitch, a deep porch, tall windows, a lot of wood. Point it out, because clients often have not seen it themselves. When two partners' folders share nothing, book a separate meeting for style and do not try to settle it today.
Setting looks aside, how should the house feel when you come home to it?
Why ask it
The words you get, sheltered, bright, quiet, lively, can each be drawn: a low ceiling and a deep porch for sheltered, tall glass and a long view for bright. Ask for a room they have been in that felt that way. Owners who pick opposite words can both be served, in different rooms.
Is there a house you have driven past or stayed in that you still think about?
Why ask it
Expect a childhood home, a grandparent's porch or a rented cabin, not a famous building. Ask what they remember first, the walk up to the door, the light or one room, since that is the part to spend design effort on. If the house is nearby, go and stand in front of it together.
What would you never want this house to look like?
Why ask it
Ask for an example every time, a house on their own street if there is one. To one person 'too modern' means a flat roof and to another it means white walls with no trim, and the words alone will not tell you which. If something they describe resembles a house in your portfolio, say so now.
Should the house blend in with its neighbors, stand apart from them, or disappear from the street?
Why ask it
The answer shows how much attention they are comfortable with, and it is where design review boards, covenants and historic districts come into the picture. Find out which of those apply here before you show anything bold. Trouble is one owner saying 'blend in' while the other says 'stand out'.
How much exterior upkeep are you willing to take on: painting, staining, sealing, clearing gutters?
Why ask it
Ask what they do on their present house and what they pay someone else to do. A client who loves weathered wood but is away half the year will come to resent it. Their real habits, not their intentions, should pick the siding, the decking and the roof.
How much do energy use and running costs matter to you, and would you spend more up front for lower bills?
Why ask it
Find out whether they are after comfort, low bills or a certificate on the wall, because each one spends the money differently. The most useful answer includes how many years they would wait for the extra spending to pay back. Minimum standards and incentives depend on where the house is, so say you will look up what applies.
Money and decisions
What is the total you are prepared to spend, and what does that figure have to cover?
Why ask it
Have them list what is inside it: land, construction, your fee, engineers, permits and utility connections, landscaping, furniture, a reserve for surprises. First figures are very often construction alone. Write the split down in the meeting and read it back to them.
Is that figure what a lender has approved, what you are comfortable with, or your sense of what a house like this costs?
Why ask it
Those are three different numbers. A lender's ceiling is not a comfort level, and a guess has to be tested against what builders in the area are charging this year, which you should ask them and not quote from memory. When the comfortable number is the lower one, design to it.
How will the project be paid for: savings, a construction loan, the sale of your current home?
Why ask it
Financing sets the calendar as much as the design does. Lenders differ in the drawings, appraisals and payment stages they want, so ask the client to find out what theirs requires and when. If the money depends on a sale, ask what happens to the start date when the house sells late.
If the first estimate comes in over, what gives: the size, the finishes or the budget?
Why ask it
Ask before there is a number to be upset about. 'Size' and 'finishes' are both workable answers, and each tells you how to draw from day one. 'None of them' is a warning that the estimate meeting will be hard, so plan for a builder to price the sketches early.
When do you want to be living in the house, and what is fixed about that date?
Why ask it
A lease ending, a school year or a baby is fixed, and 'by next summer' is a hope. Lay out the stages honestly: design, approvals, pricing, construction. Tell them that approval times belong to the local office and that you will ask what the wait is at the moment. A date that cannot be met should be named as such today.
Where will you live while the work is going on?
Why ask it
On a remodel, staying put means building in phases, a temporary kitchen and a longer schedule, while moving out means rent that belongs in the budget. A client who has not thought about it is probably underestimating how long construction lasts. On a new build, ask how many months of paying for two homes they can carry.
Who makes the final decisions, and is there anyone else whose opinion will carry weight?
Why ask it
Think of a parent putting in money, a grown child, a brother-in-law in the trades. Ask that everyone with a veto comes to the meetings where a plan is approved. If the owners glance at each other before answering, have each fill in a priority list alone and compare the two at the next meeting.
What do you want from us: drawings for a permit and a builder, or someone beside you until the house is finished?
Why ask it
Many clients do not know there is a choice, so describe each level of service in a sentence and what it leaves them to handle alone. Someone who wants only a permit set and plans to manage the builder should hear what you will not be there to catch. Put the level they pick into the proposal in plain words, so nobody is surprised later by when you are on site and when you are not.
How involved do you want to be: every fixture and outlet, or only the big moves?
Why ask it
The answer sets the number of meetings and how you price the service. Someone who wants to choose everything but travels three weeks in four is a risk to the schedule, so agree how fast decisions will come back. With a hands-off client, ask which three things they do care about and guard those.
What helps you understand a design: floor plans, a physical model, 3D views, a room taped out on the floor?
Why ask it
Ask them to trace the route from the car to the kitchen on the plan of a house they know. Someone who gets lost on paper needs a model, 3D views or a room marked out in tape before approving anything, and that work belongs in your fee proposal. It costs far less than moving a wall after framing.
What worries you most about taking this on?
Why ask it
Listen for whether the worry is about money, about the builder or about each other. The first two you can answer with how you work: a price check on early sketches, help choosing the contractor. The third is theirs to sort out, and your part is making sure both owners see and approve the same drawings.
Is there anything you assumed I would ask about that we have not covered?
Why ask it
Clients arrive with their own idea of what an architect asks, and the subject you skipped may be the one they prepared hardest for. Add whatever comes out to your notes in their words. Then say what happens next and when they will have a written brief to correct.
How to run the first meeting and turn it into a brief
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Before the meeting
Send a short list ahead
Some answers need digging out, not thinking up. A few days before, ask the client to bring the survey or the listing for the property, any old drawings, their folder of saved houses, and a list each owner has written alone of what they like and dislike about their present home. Keep the request to those four things. A twelve-page questionnaire sent to someone who has not yet hired you mostly goes unanswered.
Meet where the answers are
The best places for this conversation are the site and the client's current home. On the site, the questions under Site answer themselves as you walk. In their home you can see which door they use, where the bags land and which rooms are shut up, which is more reliable than what anyone tells you across a conference table. If the first meeting has to be at your office, make the second one a visit.
Ask for every decision maker to come
A brief taken from one half of a couple gets rewritten when the other half sees the first sketch. Say when you book the meeting that you would like everyone who will approve the design to be there, including anyone contributing money. If someone cannot come, send them the written brief afterwards and ask for corrections before you draw.
Pick questions to fit the hour
With a prospective client you usually have an hour and two jobs: to learn whether the project is real, and to show how you think. Take the first few questions from Project, the ownership and survey questions from Site, two or three from Daily life, and the budget, date and level-of-service questions from Money and decisions. The rest belong in a longer briefing session once you have been appointed.
In the meeting
Begin with the household, not the house
Clients come ready to recite a room list. Let them, write it down, and then go back to who lives there and how a day runs. The room list is their solution. The questions under Project and Daily life find the problems, and sometimes the problems point to a different, smaller or cheaper solution than the one they walked in with.
Ask about last week, not about the ideal
'Do you entertain?' gets a hopeful yes. 'When did you last have people over, and how many came?' gets a fact. Nearly every question about daily life works better when it asks for the most recent time something happened, and the house you design from facts is the one that fits.
Bring up money in the first half
Money and decisions is the last group on this page, but do not leave it for last in the room. If the budget waits for the final five minutes, the wish list has been built with no ceiling and you end the meeting by taking things away. Ask for the total and what it covers once you understand the project, then let the rest of the conversation happen with that number in view. If a client will not give a figure, offer a range for comparable houses you have worked on and watch the reaction.
Draw while they talk
A rough diagram of which rooms touch which, drawn upside down across the table, gets corrected on the spot in a way notes never are. It also shows a prospective client what working with you will be like. Keep it to bubbles and arrows. A floor plan sketched in the first meeting tends to be remembered as a promise.
Let owners disagree in front of you
When two owners answer differently, do not smooth it over or pick a side. Write both answers down and say you have done so. Differences about size, style and how open the plan should be are normal at this stage, and it is far cheaper for them to surface in conversation than in the second round of drawings.
Turning the answers into a brief
Write it up and send it back
Within a few days, send a written brief of two or three pages: who the house is for, the room list with rough sizes, what the site asks for, the style notes, the budget and what it includes, the date, and who decides. Ask the client to correct it and confirm it in writing. Every later argument about what was asked for gets settled by this document, so it is worth doing even for a small remodel.
Sort needs, wants and someday
Put every request in one of three columns: needed on the day they move in, wanted if the budget allows, and to be allowed for later. Have the client do the sorting, not you. When the first estimate arrives, the middle column is where the cuts come from, and nobody has to be persuaded because they ranked it themselves.
Test the list against the number before drawing
Add up the areas on the room list, allow for walls, halls and stairs, and multiply by a cost range you have checked with builders working in the area now. If the result is well above the budget, tell the client before you design anything. That conversation is uncomfortable for ten minutes. The same news after months of drawings costs the client money and you the project.
List what still has to be found out
End the brief with open items and who is chasing each one: the zoning and any association rules for the lot, whether a soils report or a measured survey is needed, what the utilities can provide, what the lender requires. Most of these differ from place to place, so none should be assumed from your last project. Design starts when the list is short.
Mistakes to avoid
Taking the room list as the brief
Four bedrooms, three baths and an open kitchen describes thousands of houses. What makes a brief usable is everything around the list: the night-shift sleeper, the view to the east, the parent who may move in. If your notes after the meeting could apply to a different family, go back with the Daily life questions.
Designing before the site is understood
A sketch made before the survey, the setbacks and the utilities are known has to be redrawn, and the client has by then grown fond of the first one. Offer early sketches only as diagrams, labeled as such, until the facts about the land are in.
Agreeing to everything to win the job
It is tempting to nod at a wish list and a budget that do not fit each other and hope the design will reconcile them. It will not. A client who hears 'that list and that number are some distance apart, and here is how we could close it' in the first meeting has a reason to trust the rest of what you tell them.
Reading the list aloud
This page is a checklist for you, not a script for the client. Every question asked in order feels like a form being filled in. Let the conversation wander, tick off what gets covered on its own, and use the list at the end to see which group you never reached.