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The link your provided appears to be broken so I'm going to be guessing a bit here. What version of Home Designer are you using? If you have one of the newer versions (2026/2027) or Home Designer Pro you might be able to achieve what you're looking for using the techniques in this article: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-01958/creating-an-arched-parapet-wall.html You wont be able to do the curved roof plane that the article shows (It's a Chief Architect article) but if you're just going to have multiple elevations or a gable, using multiple roof planes would work for controlling the wall heights quickly If you need the curve you could have multiple roof planes like this article shows: https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-01187/creating-a-barrel-roof-in-home-designer.html Another technique you might use is to break the wall polylines and adjust the wall edge manually, which is sometimes faster sometimes slower depending on the shape. If you use the roof planes though you can use them for creating finished edges instead of leaving raw framing exposed. Hope this helps!

3d shapes? I did that once to show sloped garage floor and to simulate a sloped pool bottom. Do need to be creative and will not be exact but can make it look good. Another way is to make individual slabs and then go into sectional view and you can rotate them in the axis thru the screen like you would in plan view but along the x or y axis. Not a lot of commands/features for sloped things.

Did you try right clicking on the file in the project browser?

If you try it as 3 separate ones. Like an inverted bay window roof

You must be joking? Chief cant do a bidirectional sloping roofplane?

I have never tried it, yet could it be done with roof planes with a very low baseline and thin structure?

Anyone know how to do this in Pro 25? Should be pretty straight forward. Nope.

I deleted all the linked files from my layout. Why do I still see my Plan file in the project browser? How can I remove it?

The general category in the materials list is a high-level summary. You may find it helpful, or you may find it better to go to the details as you mentioned, for the siding, house wrap and other items

Thank you, missed that one !

Not harsh at all. If you’ve been using this software as long as I have (since 2011), you’d realize it’s an incapable CA program issue as opposed to a user issue. You can use points, lines, regions etc, it makes no difference. It’s not fussy, it’s stupid. You will get spikes, dips, abnormal behaviour for nearly everything you do. Chief can’t do a gentle straight-line slope from A to B. It will hump or dip in the middle. Why? Add more retaining walls perpendicular to other retaining walls, and the software will hang for about 3 mins while it “Interpolates terrain” (only using 6% of my computer resources btw) and generates unnecessary spikes as if it doesn’t know what it’s doing. I’m using CA HD Pro 25. The use of the word “Pro” stands for Professional. These “glitches” have not been fixed since 2017 and will never be fixed because Chief took away so many controls from HD Pro and rolled it all into an inferior 26 subscription version at double the price and now support for Pro 25 is unavailable.

Did you turn on roof trusses to be visible in those camera views?

I use Home Designer Pro 2021 on a Windows 11 PC, my question is . . . why don't trusses show up in Perspective Full Overview or even Full Camera view ? I have roof auto build, frame auto build all set up but they don't show. The design also has no ceiling. The whole idea is to have them (trusses) visible from inside. I've looked everywhere to find my answer but having no luck. TIA

I'm trying to use my materials list to generate a rough estimate/take off. I see the category of General. This just seems to be measurements of walls but not actually materials. I see items like siding, house wrap, etc. in other areas. I'm assuming for a material take off, I can disregard the General category or, by doing so, would I be making some mistake? If making a mistake, what would the problem be?

Home Designer does not have the symbol import that allows you to choose the symbol type like electrical lighting objects – see the example from Chief Architect Premier. So, what you might try – import the 3D model and place a light behind it so it appears to emit light.

good luck.

If you look at the top of that article, you will see where it applies to legacy products of Pro & Architectural, not Suite.

I have successfully been able to export a dwg file, but not import. I just received a dwg floorpan file, and given my experience with very simply exporting one, I thought I was good to go. Not the case. I followed the process on this page : https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-03139/importing-a-dwg-or-dxf-file-into-home-designer.html and it appears that my version, 2022, does not support the importing of a dwg. This may very well be an operator error on my part, but I simply can't see how to do it given the options in the UI. I am starting with a blank plan file and only want to pull in the dwg floorpan, save it, edit it, and then export it back out. Maybe I need to have more in the plan file on order for the import functionality to present itself? I would greatly appreciate it if someone could help me out on this. Cheers, Shawn

I think I'm going to pull the trigger and just get the yearly subscription plan. I will share my plans with everybody openly as I build and let the cards fall. Thumbs up.

I get it. I actually learned AutoCAD back in the day and used it for 3D modeling Gazebos and Sheds. The business that I worked for went out of business and I then became a truck driver. I miss it. I was a designer and a hands on builder. So here I am 20 years later and just asking the question that started this thread. I'm just looking for some honest helpful friendly advice.

Not that I want the job, but I make a lot of money off of people with this same idea... Never have I said, in my long career..."Oh great! Another client who bought some software and now wants me to trust their design and create permittable building plans from them." Although it has happened more often that I care to admit. The one I will never forget is the client who bought software and created a 10,000 sqft remodel/addition design to his 1500 sqft home....with a 40' clear-span floor system over the 2nd story.

"I am actually thinking about hanging up design work and doing wood work in my garage shop? " I want to design myself and need help and advice as stated.

Home Designer 2026, not Architect. I've got importing 3d models/fixtures figured out, but I can't reliably figure out light sources. I can add a light and mess around with it, but I don't seem to be able to create an "area light" property on imported fixtures so that, for example, a pendant light with a glass shell glows properly. It's either opaque or it isn't, so if I put the light source outside the shell the illumination works, but inside the shell, there's no light (because the shell is blocking it). Any suggestions here? I don't want to upgrade to Chief Architect to get this working.

I am actually thinking about hanging up design work and doing wood work in my garage shop. I think I would enjoy the occasional project such as yours part time though. If you so desire we can set up a way for you to send me your hand drawn sketches. I can create an initial plan where you can review and mark up as needed. Should go quickly if you are pretty much settled on the features you like. I'm thinking a couple of weeks if you need a full set of plans, less if not. Could save you the software subscription / time to learn unless that's something you might enjoy. Otherwise, best wishes! Sincerely, Max Humphreys 832 964-8633 maxrhj@gmail.com

@PhillipCA: Thank you! This is the type of answer I was hoping for. I just didn't see it called out anywhere that I could see, it just seemed to say that a new instance gets installed, no mention of a migration wizard. And I just didn't have the time to do an install and then risk doing a manual migration incorrectly or incompletely. Thanks again!