In the past forty years attempts have been made to decrease the loss of life during the expected earthquakes. Attempts include changes made in the National Seismic Code. However such attempts could not bring the loss of life to an acceptable level, because these attempts were not focused on the main causes of heavy damages and collapses observed during the past earthquakes. Investigations and observations have revealed that a great majority of loss of life occurred in two to eight story dwellings and office buildings. In this paper some simple rules have been developed for the preliminary design of reinforced concrete structures, considering the main causes of collapses observed during the past earthquakes in Turkey. Also some simple detailing rules are given. It is believed that if the rules given in this paper for preliminary design and detailing are applied, loss of life during earthquakes will decrease significantly. The rules given in this paper were developed for buildings to be built in seismic zones 1 and 2. The author believes that these rules can also be applied to other zones as well by revising the rules slightly.