Starting a Homestead: A Few Questions

Hey, Andrew here,

I'm living in the city currently (Southwestern US), and I'm considering some land, about an acre, before I commit to buying it and starting a homestead. The land looks pretty pristine (flat, green grass), but I'm wondering if first
 
1. I should go with a normal homestead layout like the ones I see on Google and reference some images before making my own generic layout I don't want to do too much (just want to provide a happy and fun gardening/animal-raising experience for my family, provide a full human diet that is also healthful, and get back into nature because I don't currently feel good in the city.) on this homestead, just enough for friends and family.
 
2. I should reference permaculture design and go deeper into certain elements while designing it. I also feel I could boost food production through permaculture.

I have a list of what I want to raise and do on my site, and I feel that option 2 would benefit me more. (I haven't visited the site yet, so I hope that'll influence my decision).

Welcome to the forum, Andrew!

Whatever you decide to buy, here are some of the approaches I would take:

First I would need somewhere to live with electricity and water.

Once those are taken care of I would start small and slowly.  Maybe a small garden with a few chickens,

Once the garden is in and the chickens have a home and settled in, then I would decide what I wanted next.

While doing all this I would use my knowledge of permaculture for my Zones and my designs.

Best wishes for your land purchase and getting that homestead going.

I'd highly recommend taking the Wheaton Labs PDC with Alan Booker this summer.  Alan's awesome and it will help you sort out a lot of those things before you put the chicken coop in the wrong place.

I'm really glad the place I bought came with a house.  That saves you a lot of time in getting things rolling.