Callington vs Dawley: Why the Smaller Plan Costs More

The Callington at Vintage Oaks is about 68 square feet smaller than the Dawley and costs roughly fifteen thousand dollars more. That looks like a mistake, and it is not. You are not paying for floor space—you are paying for a third full bathroom, and plumbing costs more than open floor.

So the choice between these two is simple to state and hard to make: a third full bathroom, or a second living area upstairs.

Side by side

Why plumbing costs more than space

A third full bathroom is not just a bigger room. It needs its own shower pan, its own drain line, its own vent stack up through the roof, its own water supply lines, and its own exhaust fan. All of that is labor and materials inside the walls.

Adding 68 square feet to an upstairs living area needs a floor, a ceiling, two more feet of wall, and some paint.

That is the whole explanation. The Callington is more expensive because of what is behind the drywall, not what is in front of it.

What a "flex room" is

The Callington has a flex room measuring 11 feet 10 inches by 10 feet.

A flex room is a room with no assigned purpose. It does not have a closet, which is why the builder cannot count it as a fourth bedroom. In practice people use it as a home office, a guest room, a playroom, or a gym.

If you work from home and need a door you can shut, this is the room. It is a real, separate space, not a corner of a hallway.

What an "upstairs living area" is

The Dawley has an upstairs living area measuring 11 feet 1 inch by 10 feet, plus a storage room.

This is an open second sitting space at the top of the stairs. It has no door. It is where a television and a sofa go, away from the main living room downstairs.

Families with teenagers tend to love it because it gives everyone a second place to be. It is a worse home office than Callington's flex room, for the obvious reason that it is open to the whole floor.

The other differences worth knowing

The living room. The Callington's is 12 feet by 20 feet 8 inches—the longest living room at Vintage Oaks. The Dawley's is 12 feet by 16 feet 7 inches. That is four feet, and you will notice it when you put a sofa and a television in there.

Bedroom 3. The Callington's third bedroom is 11 feet 5 inches by 10 feet. The Dawley's is 9 feet 8 inches by 10 feet. If a child or a guest is going in bedroom 3, the Callingtons are meaningfully bigger.

The dining room. The Dawley wins here—11 feet. 7 inches by 13 feet 7 inches against 12 feet by 10 feet. If you host dinners, that is the room that matters.

Storage. The Dawley has a dedicated storage room upstairs. The Callington does not. In a townhome with a one-car garage, a storage room is worth more than it sounds.

So how do you choose?

Work through these in order.

Do you regularly have overnight guests, or does someone in the house need their own bathroom? Buy the Callington. Three full bathrooms is the single hardest thing to add later, and it is the only plan in the community that has it.

Do you work from home and need a door? Buy the Callington. The flex room is a proper room.

Do you have teenagers, or does the family need a second place to sit? Buy the Dawley. The upstairs living area does that job, and the flex room does not.

Do you host dinners and need somewhere to put things? Buy the Dawley. Bigger dining room, plus the storage room.

Is the price the deciding factor? Buy the Dawley. You get a bigger home for less money. Just go in knowing you are choosing a half bath downstairs over a third full bathroom.

What is the same?

Both plans are two stories with a one-car garage. Both get the identical standard finishes — granite in the kitchen with a waterfall edge on the island, quartz in the bathrooms, impact-resistant glass, a tankless water heater and the Home Is Connected smart home package. The whole list is in what comes with a Vintage Oaks home.

Both have a covered front porch, 19 feet by 7 feet 6 inches, and a balcony off the upstairs primary bedroom, 19 feet by 4 feet 3 inches. Neither comes with a fenced yard.

Both sit in the same gated community on Northlake Boulevard, with the same planned amenities and the same HOA. What is around them is covered in schools, shopping and getting around near Vintage Oaks.

See them both.

These two are close enough on paper that most buyers change their minds once they walk them. The Callington's long living room and the Dawley's upstairs space are both things you feel rather than read.

Call 561-704-0091 or book at nationalhousesearch.com/schedule and we will walk you through both. If you also want to see the smaller pair, start with Abingdon vs Banbury or the full four-plan comparison.

Common Questions

These two change people's minds in person. Call 561-704-0091 or book at nationalhousesearch.com/schedule and we will walk the Callington and the Dawley with you.