I have over 400 households in my library or saved onto my hard drive waiting to be installed if I decide I want one for a particular purpose in any game.

I do still make new sims in CAS quite often too to add interest or if I find some new skins I want to try out or get ideas of different trait mixes or careers.

I have put a lot of time into making them and teaching them their skills I don't see any reason not to use them over and over again. This way I get to know and appreciate the features of my sims. The majority of my existing households though are of individual Sims so I can easily mix and match personality types depending on what I want for a particular game. Many of my households include Sims of all ages and pets too. This means I can have brand new never played sims or sims/households with skills and possessions.

I have my existing households in the state they were in when first made plus after they've been played for varying lengths of time. They were all made by people I knew of and trusted - such as Sim Gurus.

I have downloaded a couple of sims from the Exchange - a couple of dogs and a cat. I prefer to get my existing households from my library.

Sims 3 family home download