Over the years I’ve seen good home office design plans and I’ve seen others that had disaster written all over them. Laying out your home office is easier when you take the time to plan out your space and figure out how big your furniture can (and should) be.

Planning ahead can save time and money.

• Start by measuring your home office space (including alcoves, windows, doorways and closets).

• Do a rough sketch of your home office and plug in all the measurements. Your sketch doesn’t have to be pretty, just accurate.

• Using graph paper, redraw your sketch to scale (one square equals one foot). Or transfer your sketch to a computer-aided design program (CAD). I use CAD instead of drawing plans by hand because it’s easy to create several layouts for my clients. But unless you’ll be creating plans often, don’t invest in a CAD program. It can be expensive.

• Measure your existing furniture and either make templates that you can move around on the paper or draw the furniture directly on the paper. Before you draw any furniture, make a few copies of your drawing so you don’t have to erase as often.

• Take your drawing with you when you go furniture shopping so you’ll know whether a certain desk, credenza, armoire or other piece of furniture will fit inside your office. You’ll also be able to tell quickly how large an area rug can be.

Measure twice. Buy once. Enjoy your office daily.