The short version
Draw the outer walls before you decorate, roof the shell before you furnish, and budget for a bed, fridge, stove, toilet and shower before you place the pretty stuff. No source publishes a typical build total — but every premade two-bedroom in Melino has a listed price, in the table below.
- Simple empty terrain is the fastest practice lot — no Paras required
- Plan bedrooms and bathrooms with interior walls before paint and flooring
- Roof in one or two pieces, then drag the edges out for a slight overhang
- Run the house-needs checklist on the budget tool before you save
Step 1–3
Plan the footprint
Rooms cannot move once drawn, so get the shape right on an empty lot before you touch paint or furniture. A simple rectangle with one interior wall for a bathroom is enough for a first home.
- 1
Start on an empty lot
From the main menu pick Simple Empty Terrain for a free practice box, or buy any vacant lot on the map if you are building for an active household. Click the house icon in the bottom-left corner to enter build mode — no loading screen either way. If this is your first time in the toolbar, read the full build mode tutorial for autosave and grid settings before you draw anything permanent.
Simple empty terrain skips household setup — straight into build mode.Watch at 0:00 - 2
Draw the outer walls first
Select full walls and drag a rectangle on the grid — one metre per tile, half-metre steps with Shift held. Keep the first build square and on 90° angles; angled walls are harder to resize later. Do not furnish yet: the footprint is fixed once the room exists, although you can drag a single wall to enlarge one side.
Outer shell first — interior walls come next.Watch at 0:30 - 3
Split the floor plan with interior walls
Add walls inside the shell for a bathroom, bedroom and open living area. A starter home for two Paras needs at least one bedroom and one bathroom; put the plumbing cluster on an interior wall so you only run pipes once. Toggle wall visibility with Home / End if the cutaway view blocks a corner.
Three zones — living, bed, bath — from one interior wall run.Watch at 1:00
Step 4–5
Exterior and floors
Exterior siding and floor paint read as finished long before the furniture arrives. Split kitchen tile from living-room wood now — separators are only needed if you want different wall colours in the same open space.
- 4
Exterior face only — save wallpaper for the inside.Watch at 1:40 - 5
Tile where spills happen; wood where people sit.Watch at 2:00
Step 6
Doors and windows
Cut the openings before you spend on couches. Windows resize freely; doors need the inside/outside flip right so the lock faces the room.
- 6
Switch side of item on wall — not flip — for interior doors.Watch at 3:32
Step 7
Roof the shell
Open the roof tab, drag a gabled piece across the footprint, then pull the edge handles out for a slight overhang — the default sits flush against the walls.
- 7
Drag the edges out — overhang is manual in Early Access.Watch at 4:46
Step 8
Kitchen essentials
Hunger and cooking need three objects minimum: fridge, stove and counter space. Place them before you worry about decor — Paras will walk past a bare bedroom to reach a missing fridge.
- 8
Fridge, stove, counter — the hunger trio.Watch at 7:28
Step 9–11
Beds, dining and move-in
One bed per Para, a table with chairs, and a quick top-down check that every room has a light. Then save and switch to live mode — or run the needs checklist one last time if you are unsure.
- 9
One chair per Para at the table.Watch at 4:28 - 10
One bed each — energy need will not wait for decor.Watch at 8:40 - 11
Top-down pass catches missing doors and dark rooms.Watch at 10:00
The options
All starter homes: premade or empty lot
Before you draw a wall, know that the town already sells finished houses. Every starter home you can buy is one of two things: a premade home with rooms, roof and furniture already in place, or an empty residential lot where you build all of that yourself. The whole list is below — and which starter home to choose comes down to three questions: how much you want to spend, how your household sleeps, and whether you would rather decorate or build.
There are 9 premade homes on sale, from P24,848 (Industrial — next to the railway) up to P71,742 (Countryside — modern manor outside the city, fully furnished), plus 10 empty lots starting at P644. All of them are plain Residence lots: Paralives has no separate starter, family or apartment lot type, and you cannot change a lot’s type.
The premade homes, priced
| Property, as listed | Beds | Baths | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Industrial — next to the railway | 1 | 1 | P24,848 |
| Industrial — 3-bedroom apartment | 3 | 1 | P26,912 |
| Old Town — beside the Elementary School | 2 | 1 | P27,436 |
| Old Town — in the middle of the Train Station | 2 | 2 | P27,838 |
| Old Town — suburban area | 4 | 2 | P28,203 |
| Old Town — main plaza apartment | 1 | 1 | P28,473 |
| Countryside — manor outside town, unfurnished | — | — | P43,138 |
| Old Town — cliffside | 2 | 2 | P46,316 |
| Countryside — modern manor outside the city, fully furnished | 3 | 1 | P71,742 |
Prices and room counts are what two independent community guides measured in May 2026 and cross-checked line by line — the studio has published no price table. A dash means no source gives that number: one Countryside manor is sold unfurnished and has no documented room count. The full lot breakdown, with all three competing source framings, is on the Melino lots page.
Old Town — suburban area is the largest premade by room count — 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms — and the closest thing the town sells to a family home.
Which starter home to choose
Three questions settle it, in this order.
Buy or build?
A premade home is playable the moment the purchase goes through — roof, plumbing, lights and furniture already placed. An empty lot costs a small fraction of that on the map, and then you spend the difference on walls, a roof and every object you put inside. Tight funds and some patience: buy the plot and follow the eleven steps above. Comfortable funds and none: buy the premade.
How does the household sleep?
Bedroom counts are the real difference between these properties, and most of them are small. Count one bed per Para, because the sleep need is per-Para, and treat the listed room counts as a floor plan rather than a rule — Paralives has no room requirement that decides whether a house works. If no premade fits your family, that is a reason to build, not to compromise.
What about a family home?
There is no lot type called a family home. Every house on this list sits on a Residence lot, residences are the only residential lot type in Early Access, and all of them are single homes — apartment buildings are currently not possible. So the family-sized option is whichever premade has the most bedrooms, or a plan you build yourself; the written family home layout on the house ideas page is the one to copy. A household may also own more than one residence, so upgrading does not force you to sell.
Can you change your mind later?
Yes, and that is what makes the first choice low-risk. Homes for sale carry the light blue ‘For Sale’ marker on the town map — select one and confirm ‘Purchase Lot’ — while your current lot’s menu has ‘Sell this lot’, with no new purchase needed first. Move the household with ‘Move lot’ and the family, skills, careers and savings come with it.
Whichever you pick, the money question comes before the design question: the budget calculator turns a room list into a Paradimes estimate, and the same page carries the house-needs checklist you run before switching to live mode.
What nobody has published about these homes
These price lists are community measurements, not a studio data dump, so a few obvious questions stay open:
- Whether the prices still match today’s build. Both guides measured them in Early Access build 1 in May 2026 and no official table has replaced them since, so expect drift.
- What your household starts with in Melino. No official source publishes a town starting balance; the funds figure other pages on this site quote belongs to the Simple Empty Terrain sandbox, which is a different mode.
- Which premade stands on which plot. The guides publish prices and room counts without map coordinates, and the community map’s empty-lot markers do not line up one-to-one with the empty-lot prices.
Starter home questions
- How much does a starter home cost in Paralives?
- Paralives publishes no price list, and no official per-lot table exists. Premade homes do carry fixed prices — every one of them is in the list above, cheapest to dearest, with the figures sourced and the gaps left blank. A self-built starter costs only what you choose to buy: run the build budget calculator before you place walls, and copy SETMONEY if you are practising on an empty lot.
- What does a Paralives house need before live mode?
- At minimum: one bed per Para, a fridge, a stove or oven, a counter, a toilet, a shower or tub, a sink, a dining table with chairs, and lights in every room. The house-needs checklist on the build budget page lists nice-to-haves like a TV or skill object.
- Should I build on simple empty terrain or a real lot?
- Simple empty terrain is best for learning — no household money deducted and no Paras to worry about. When you are ready to play, buy a vacant lot in Melino and rebuild the same floor plan, or save the lot to your library and place it on an owned empty lot.
- How is this different from the full build mode tutorial?
- The tutorial covers every tool — autosave, separators, terrain sculpt, the lot library. This page skips straight to a playable floor plan: footprint, roof, openings and the furniture Paras need on day one. Read the tutorial first if build mode still feels unfamiliar.
- Do I need a foundation for a starter home?
- Not for a flat single-story box on level ground. Foundations matter once you want a raised porch or split level — see the foundations and rooms guides for the separator workaround.
- Are there premade homes in Paralives?
- Yes. The town map sells built, move-in-ready houses on residential lots — roof, plumbing and furniture already in place — and the table above names each one with its price and room count. They are not the same thing as the Steam Workshop lot library: a premade is bought with Paradimes, while a Workshop build downloads for free and still has to be placed on a lot you already own.
- Which starter home should I choose as a beginner?
- The cheapest empty lot, if you want to learn build mode and have the funds to furnish what you make. The cheapest premade, if you want to play live mode tonight. Either is reversible: sell the lot from the town map and buy another one. The difference is this walkthrough — a premade needs nothing from you before someone can live in it.
Keep building
Tiny house
The smallest lot in town, a full home anyway — walls on a curve and a garden in the wedge.
House ideas
Six written layouts with the reasoning — the starter and the family home included.
Suburban family house
A full two-story family program — three bedrooms, two bathrooms and a backyard — built step by step.
Apartment build
A family apartment made from an open plan — because apartments are not a lot type yet.
All Melino lots and homes
The complete real-estate table: purchasable homes, empty plots and occupied residences, with sources.
Full build mode tutorial
Seventeen steps through every tool — settings, separators, terrain and saving lots.
Rooms explained
Why there is no foundation button and how separators split zones for paint.
Roofs guide
When roof pieces fight each other and how to patch a missing ceiling.
Build budget calculator
Paradimes estimate plus the house-needs checklist and SETMONEY cheat copy.
15 build mode tips
Same-height cloning, colour codes and the tricks that save a rebuild.
All build guides
Stairs, porches, curved walls and the rest of the build cluster.