houses not being used, but cant figure out why?

[Carpii]

Revisiting this game after a couple of years. I played it about 20 hours at the time, but coming back to it, it just seems confusing and clunky.

Brand new colony, I built a row of houses at the bottom...

https://i.imgur.com/Lcf7SMj.png

People aren't moving in, and I can't figure out why.
So I click the house and it just presents me this..

https://i.imgur.com/jEr3iNl.png

What info am I supposed to get from this absolute mess?

[Dr. Jaska]

You have 10 citizens. Each house can house a maximum of 5 citizens without upgrades. The other 6 houses are vacant because all your citizens already have a home.

[Friends with Benedicts]

Long houses house ten people iirc

[Carpii]

Dr Jaska: I'm not sure that's the case. My houses only have capacity for 5, and the first one has 4/5 residents with the rest being empty

https://i.imgur.com/0BlbbJi.png

I did wonder if I need to build more furniture before they can move in, but I've 30+ in storage

[Carpii]

I think it may have been proximity related. I built a few more houses closer to workplaces, and people started moving into those

[Friends with Benedicts]

Originally posted by Carpii:

Dr Jaska: I'm not sure that's the case. My houses only have capacity for 5, and the first one has 4/5 residents with the rest being empty

https://i.imgur.com/0BlbbJi.png

I did wonder if I need to build more furniture before they can move in, but I've 30+ in storage

No need for furniture. I had 5k pops with barely no furniture in their houses.

furniture is like the last of the last thing you actually do to increase their happiness. Focus on growing your city first.

[Friends with Benedicts]

Originally posted by Carpii:

I think it may have been proximity related. I built a few more houses closer to workplaces, and people started moving into those

Oh yeah, you ALWAYS need housing near their workplaces

[Carpii]

I ended up just restarting and things are going a lot better.

I also realised I was making my buildings way bigger than necessary

I've still got a carpenter building furniture though, think I'll destroy that for now, Thanks for the tips

[Friends with Benedicts]

oh yeah once you get the hang of the game you realize you dont need big buildings till later in the game. Obviously there's a sweet spot where the building has the perfect size but to each it's own. City architecture vary wildly between players.

[.:Lachdanan]

Citizens lives revolve around their workplace, not their home. Build services and homes next to the jobs. Also, forget furniture for the beginning of the game. I have 900 humans, 0 furniture, and maxed happiness. Services will do much more for happiness, and don't require you to stress about production flow.