ishoultz Posted July 22 Share Posted July 22 Quick question.........Will it still be possible to finish monthly payments (4 of 12) for purchasing Home Designer Pro 2025 license WITHOUT having to update to the 2026 subscription based license? If so...........I'm assuming at that point, no updates for perpetual licenses ever again without monthly subscription payments? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhillipCA Posted July 22 Share Posted July 22 Hello ishoultz, Thank you for your question and interest in Home Designer! Yes, you will be able to continue on your Home Designer Professional 2025 rental without updating to the Home Designer 2026 subscription based license. Upgrading to a Home Designer 2026 subscription is optional, but not required. I hope this helps and feel free to reach out if you have more questions! Best, Phillip Chief Architect Software Monday – Friday, 7am – 4pm Pacific sales@chiefarchitect.com | 208-292-3400 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BalutFX Posted July 22 Share Posted July 22 1 hour ago, PhillipCA said: Hello ishoultz, Thank you for your question and interest in Home Designer! Yes, you will be able to continue on your Home Designer Professional 2025 rental without updating to the Home Designer 2026 subscription based license. Upgrading to a Home Designer 2026 subscription is optional, but not required. I hope this helps and feel free to reach out if you have more questions! Best, Phillip Chief Architect Software I know you guys are switching from perpetual to subscription licensing for the 2026 and beyond Home Designer software, but it's unfortunate that you are not honoring your rent-to-own free upgrade to the next version, nor are you allowing current Home Designer users the option to at least be able to upgrade to the 2026 version as a perpetual license before you force any desire to upgrade into a subscription. You allowed existing SSA subscribers for the Chief Architect Premium line to grandfather-in to the perpetual license as long as they kept their SSA up to date. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Donco15 Posted July 24 Share Posted July 24 On 7/22/2025 at 3:37 PM, PhillipCA said: On 7/22/2025 at 3:37 PM, PhillipCA said: @PhillipCA When will we know about the system requirements and pricing for the new Home Designer 2026 product? You mentioned that we can still keep our 2025 version if we want. Thanks for the feedback On 7/22/2025 at 3:37 PM, PhillipCA said: Hello ishoultz, Thank you for your question and interest in Home Designer! Yes, you will be able to continue on your Home Designer Professional 2025 rental without updating to the Home Designer 2026 subscription based license. Upgrading to a Home Designer 2026 subscription is optional, but not required. I hope this helps and feel free to reach out if you have more questions! Best, Phillip Chief Architect Software Monday – Friday, 7am – 4pm Pacific sales@chiefarchitect.com | 208-292-3400 Hello ishoultz, Thank you for your question and interest in Home Designer! Yes, you will be able to continue on your Home Designer Professional 2025 rental without updating to the Home Designer 2026 subscription based license. Upgrading to a Home Designer 2026 subscription is optional, but not required. I hope this helps and feel free to reach out if you have more questions! Best, Phillip Chief Architect Software Monday – Friday, 7am – 4pm Pacific sales@chiefarchitect.com | 208-292-3400 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekPedersen Posted July 26 Share Posted July 26 @BalutFX Thank you for commenting. I understand what you are saying and will pass on the feedback. The Home Designer Pro, Architectural and Suite products are being discontinued and consolidated into a new single product with additional features (such as Real Time Ray Tracing). Since the 2025 version will be the last release for Home Designer Pro, we will not have a new 2026 version to upgrade to with the Home Designer Pro rental. Again, I appreciate you taking the time to provide your thoughts. Derek Chief Architect Software Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robborito Posted July 27 Share Posted July 27 On 7/23/2025 at 5:37 AM, PhillipCA said: Home Designer 2026 subscription is optional, but not required. Is the annual and monthly subscription cost available for release yet? Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barthmv Posted July 27 Share Posted July 27 If I don't do the 2026 rental but already have a perpetual 2025 will the 2025 license always be honored? I realize that the support for 2025 will eventually be discontinued and at that time what happens to our license? Right now we have to log into our accounts to keep the license active. How will this be handled? I hate to think the time and expense I have spent on the 2025 license will disappear. Has any thought been considered to make our perpetual license stand alone without needing to sign in? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhillipCA Posted July 28 Share Posted July 28 @barthmvYour usage of Home Designer 2025 will not change. You will still manage your plans, license, etc. as you always have. Generally we support the current version and one version back. You can learn more about technical support eligibility here: https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/#contact Phillip Chief Architect Software Monday – Friday, 7am – 4pm Pacific sales@chiefarchitect.com | 208-292-3400 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ishoultz Posted Tuesday at 11:07 PM Author Share Posted Tuesday at 11:07 PM I think what a lot of us are wondering is if we do decide to purchase the 2026 license occasionally, will we still be able to keep accessing our 2025 perpetual license? Will they be treated as 2 separate licenses, or if we do purchase the 2026 license will we lose access to our perpetual 2025 license? I think that's why @barthmv mentioned a stand-alone license. Or would we have to have 2 different licenses? Log-in as 2 different users? I am also very interested to see the monthly fee for this version of the software. Thanks in advance for the clarification. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Donco15 Posted Wednesday at 01:33 AM Share Posted Wednesday at 01:33 AM Thanks everyone for keeping this issue alive. I am sure all users are interested in knowing the costs associated with the new subscription model. I for one am... Chief Architect - Please let us know something about what you are thinking in terms of how this new version will work and how our existing versions will operate. The suspense is killing me.. I love Chief Architect and really hope that you see how much your Home Designer Pro Users rely on the software. I know that I can't justify the Premier Version for my business. The Home Designer Pro version works perfect for me.. If you could at least give us a sneak peek video of this new software or give us a video on how existing users will have an option or not to go subscription based or if they can use their existing 2025 and test out the new 2026 program. Thanks for explaining this sooner rather than later. The suspense is not fun.. Please understand that you have loyal users on the Home Designer side also. Best Regards to the Home Designer Team and all that you do to make this wonderful product. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhillipCA Posted Wednesday at 04:45 PM Share Posted Wednesday at 04:45 PM @ishoultz and @Donco15 If you decide to purchase Home Designer 2026 it does not affect your Home Designer Pro 2025 license. A few notes: (1) Plan files have always been forward compatible. They have never been backwards compatible. This means if you save a plan in Home Designer 2026, it cannot be opened in Home Designer Pro 2025. This is not new, but I thought was worth mentioning. (2) If you are on the rent-to-own path for HD Pro, you can continue making the consecutive monthly payments towards ownership. There is also a rental buyout option where you can make a one-time payment to pay it off and save money in the process. This avoids any potential issues from a missed payment (credit card decline, etc.) and secures your 2025 perpetual license. Contact sales directly for more details. (3) Upon release, there will be a free trial of Home Designer 2026 so you can evaluate the new program. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barthmv Posted Wednesday at 09:50 PM Share Posted Wednesday at 09:50 PM I have always upgraded to the latest version of Pro every year since I first started with a dongle. The cost last year was $119 to upgrade from 2024 to 2025 for the perpetual license. Rental for the software was $59/mo which comes to $708 a year. If that's the way this is going to go then I will no longer upgrade and will most likely stop using the software if my 2025 version becomes unusable. Such a deal huh? I am very disappointed with the direction not only this software company but the majority of software companies are going. We won't know the price of rental until the 2026 version is released but you can be sure it will be far more than what the upgrade price has been. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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