Better Homes and Gardens Architectural Home Designer [OLD VERSION] (B0012BW00O) - Reviews and Prices

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Editorial Review:

Better Homes and Gardens Architectural Home Designer is an all-in-one Home Design software and provides feature rich tools for design projects including: Home Design, Remodeling, Decks & Landscaping, Interior Design, Site Planning & Estimating. Quickly place and arrange walls, windows, doors, and cabinets. Choose colors, place furniture, create decks and landscaping. Powerful building tools like standard CAD tools, automatic roof generation, dormers, stairs, framing, foundations, and Plan Check make it easy. Choose from a Library of more than 7,000 items including windows, doors, lighting, furniture, interior/exterior fixtures, cabinets, and more. A Sprinkler Designer tool and full landscaping capabilities including a library of 3,200 plants are included.

Create Your Dream Home... Better Homes and Gardens Architectural Home Designer provides an advanced yet easy to use set of tools for Home Design, Remodeling, Interior Design, Kitchens, Baths, Decks, Landscaping, Site Planning and Cost Estimation.

Create your dream home today. View Product Demo.

Use the Pathway tool to design curb-appealing landscaping using stone, pavers, or sidewalks--line with trees, shrubs, flowers and more.

Design your ideal kitchen--move walls, create new cabinets, add appliances, and more.

Exclusive All-in-One Home Design Solution

• Exclusive Better Homes and Gardens Design Planning Center for expert design advice
• Choose from over 2,500 Sample Plans
• Design Inspiration Galley contains photos by type for design and inspiration design ideas
• Choose from built-in home style templates or create your own custom home design, or use the House Wizard
• Powerful building tools like automatic roof generation, dormers, stairs, framing and foundations

Get Started Quickly and Easily

• The Quick Startup Options Guide will help you begin with "How-To" tutorials based on the type of your project
• Use the House Wizard for quick and easy layout of your rooms
• Select from the pre-designed Home Design and Landscaping Style Templates complete with colors, cabinets, decks and more
• Exclusive Design Planning Center for up-to-date How-To and Design Tips from the experts to help in your design process
• Includes Step-by-Step Tutorial DVD Packed with over 40 easy "step-by-step" tutorial training videos that will quickly get you started on your next home design project

Kitchen and Bath Design

• Design the Kitchen of your dreams--move walls, create new cabinets, add appliances. Design your perfect workspace!
• Plan the new layout of your bathroom with custom cabinets, sinks, showers and garden tubs. It's easy to visualize your ideas in 3D.
• Create custom cabinets in minutes by choosing your own colors, countertops, door styles and more
• Design your new kitchen or bath with using the Cabinet Designer Tools
• Use the Cabinet Designer tools to create unlimited of cabinet styles. Choose your own colors, countertops and door styles.

Interior Design

• Use the Better Homes and Gardens Design Planning Center to help guide your designs with guidelines, tips and expert advice
• Design Inspiration Gallery--Our gallery of photos will help you to jump start your design and decorating style ideas with inspirational photos by rooms
• Material Painter lets you apply colors and materials quickly and easily
• Choose from thousands of colors and textures or create your own materials using a digital photograph
• Design for your lifestyle and personality--change colors, add lighting and choose furniture to accent your new room

Glass House View provides a full translucent view of your design.

Choose from over 3,200 plants with the Plant Chooser.

Decks and Landscaping

• Powerful deck and patio tools allow you to design and visualize your new deck with 3D models and can help you estimate the costs
• Design single or multi-level decks complete with automatic deck framing
• Quickly lay out your deck with stairs and arrange furniture
• Deck foundations automatically generate to match sloped lots
• Exclusive Better Homes and Gardens Plant Encyclopedia
• Choose from over 3,200 plants with the Plant Chooser
• Plant Hardiness Zone reference maps
• See what your plants will look like in 0-20 years
• Pathways--Use the Pathway tool to design curb-appealing landscaping using stone, pavers, or sidewalks--line with trees, shrubs, flowers and more

3D Models and Virtual Tours

• Design in 2D and 3D. 3D Views are automatic with a point-and-click of the camera tool.
• Glass House View provides a full translucent view of your design
• Doll House View, a 3D overview without the roof, is an effective tool for space planning of furniture placement and traffic flow
• Create a Virtual Tour--draw your record line to Automatically Generate; or record your camera movements
• Visualize your home with day and night views
• Assemble a scale model of your design with Model Maker
• Generate shadows from the sun for realistic 3D views
• Point-and-click to remove wall surfaces, or use 3D Cross-Section Elevation Slider to quickly create a 3D slice of your desired view

Site Planning & Estimating

• Use Automatic Build Terrain and Terrain Perimeter tools to create flat, irregular shaped, or sloped lots--use a GPS to import or enter elevation data
• Create plot and perimeter plans; automatically generate a 3D model of your actual terrain
• Make your backyard design come alive using several easy-to-use terrain and landscaping tools. Add a pool or pond and visualize in 3D.
• Sprinkler Designer tools to easily layout sprinkler zones
• Fences and Driveways--With the Fencing tools you can choose a variety fencing styles and custom gates. You will also find driveway, sidewalk and curbing tools
• Hill and Valley tools make it easy to add gardens, beds and slopes that automatically appear in 3D views. Choose from landscaping style templates or create your own.
• Cost Estimating--Don't be surprised by the cost of your project. Automatically generate a complete spreadsheet for your project costs, broken down by category. Calculate the amount of lumber for your deck or concrete required for that new patio.

Customer Reviews:

Avg. Customer Rating: 3.5 / 5.0

Great for remodeling, landscaping, interior design concepts, but...:

I trialed this software in hopes that I could create drawings that could be provided to a draftsman to review, or to work with drafters that work in the "big brother" - Chief Architect. After working in Chief Architect and Softplan demo packages, I found the BH&G Architectural Home Designer software was relatively easy to navigate and begin to create basic house & garage layouts.
In starting to spend more time in the details that are important to contractors, drafters, etc., I found the... more info

Unstable, not so easy to use.:

I really had my hopes up when I spent $200 on this product. Getting the basic wall design is pretty straight forward, but when you try to more in and get to the details I found that the screen wouldn't redraw, or the image reduced in size to nearly nothing and finally would crash my computer. I do a lot of video and photo editing and my computer doesn't crash very often, except with this software.
I'm really sorry I wasted my money. I wish I would have purchased the least expensive product and see how... more info

Amazing still!:

In high school I used a higher end program made by the same company. I was expecting this to not be nearly as nice or have the same abilities, I was wrong. I am now in college as a pre-med/computer engineering major who is doing the courses to get the undergraduate certification for architecture (then to my masters) and this program is great!
The university wanted us to buy a program through them for $500+ more and this is better than the program.
One thing I like thought, whether you are an... more info

An excellent tool to create MOST floor plans and visualize projects:

I'm an amateur architect (never pursued a degree but have been designing and have helped build renovations, additions, custom furniture, etc.), so I was eager to finally get myself a good, cheap CAD design tool. I was very pleased by this program, and it does MOST of what you'll need it to do.
The only frustrating parts were the floor limitation (1 basement and 2 other floors max, it auto-generates a plain open "attic" for you), and the roof concepts (to create 2nd floor dormers, extend a roof from the... more info

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