*This is a guest post*
If your family hardly ever sits still, and fitness and fun are the daily norm, then you’ll want to make sure that your dream home accommodates your family’s active lifestyle. An environment that’s conducive to your family’s passions is essential, so here are some easy tips to follow when building the fit and active family home.
Choose a Fitness-Friendly Location
When choosing where to build your dream home, consider the surrounding facilities. It’s great to be able to have plenty of locations available and accessible to encourage the family to keep active, whether it’s a public pool, cricket nets, soccer ovals or even just walking or cycling tracks. The closer the better as it’s less of an ordeal to transport the family there, and if close enough, walking or riding to these locations can be encouraged.
Some housing estates are especially mindful of this, and actually provide their own facilities for residents to use. A prime example is Maddison Estate ), which provides an array of state-of-the-art facilities all over their estate, including a fitness centre, an aquatic centre, tennis courts, ovals, parks, cycling and walking tracks and even a skate park and BBQ facilities, meaning residents are always encouraged to get the family outside and active. 
Plenty of Outdoor Space
A yard with plenty of space for activities is essential to the happiness and comfort of the active family. There’s so much benefit to having a few sporting or fitness facilities available right there on your own property, rather than having to travel to them. For example, a basketball hoop with a cement area or a soccer net on a nice big patch of lawn means a spare half-hour can be used for sport rather than having to put aside a whole afternoon, or wait for a training session each week.
Plenty of Storage
The active family often experience clutter, with all sorts of sporting equipment taking up room in the house. Clever storage is a great way to be able to accumulate all the required equipment without having to deal with constant mess and mayhem. For example, hooks in the garage for bikes will mean less inaccessible floor-space as bikes are removed from ground and stored out of the way. A big cupboard in the garage means dirt-encrusted hockey sticks can be stored out of sight without being dragged through the house, and a shoe-rack at the front door means you’ll always know where the footy boots are, and no grass ends up mashed into the carpet at the front door.
Home Fitness Center
It’s great to be able to have some gym equipment in the home. If you can designate a room just for fitness equipment, you’ll have created a separate space where the family can burn away some energy at night or on weekends without having to leave the comfort of the home. Some simple weights, a treadmill, a rowing machine – anything that your family will all find enjoyable. Don’t choose any equipment that’s only going to gather dust.
Keep the TV Separate
To keep the active family active, it’s important to design your house in a way that discourages bad habits. For example, having the TV in the same area as the dining table or the kitchen can tend to integrate TV too heavily into daily life. Have a separate media room, so that watching TV, a movie or playing video games remains an activity that has a designated time and place.
Simple yet effective, these easy steps will ensure your active family has what they need and are never left bored or stifled, and can rest soundly at the end of the day with no more energy left to burn.
Written by Natalie King