Paint the extruding garage a feature colour and the room above a different shade of that. For the rest of the house one colour. I like what the other person said with greys. Use grey as a feature and may be a toned down white for the rest. Posts could be black or dark grey and timber slats as you thought. If you have timber slats anywhere, I would probably leave some exposed brick somewhere, that is, if you are painting or rendering the house. I like 3 different elements in a house. eg. 3 different colours or 3 different products/textures.

Hi Guys thank you so much for your input. Yes LouieT, meals is west and dining is north. We are in Perth with scorching late afternoon sun. Julienewans, we were thinking along similar lines: changing bed 3 into laundry, use part laundry for a butlers pantry. This opens up lounge, dining and part laundry for the kitchen and living area with meals. it also gives access to both north and south side of the house. The house is on a slab and games was added later. We also consider changing meals and kitchen to a guest with bathroom / powder room. This will have an outside entrance to be accessed from the to-be pool on the northern side. New entrance between current meals and family - this allows for a wider entrance. Keeping family as a study/library / reading area (taking out the bar). Our biggest concern is how to fit a kitchen into the space that flows easily from the walk-in pantry to the lounge / dining area.

having owned and rented out a house for over 20 years before recently moving in our experience includes..you do not have rights to access property while the tenants are in residence and don't add anything that would need to be looked after by tenants...Talk to your accountant about the difference between capital works, repairs and maintenance especially about the best timing for anything for your own aesthetics (like rendering) and doesn't effect the safety and rentability of the house, make sure all electrical and plumbing is in cleaned excellent working order including air conditioning, heaters, exhaust fans, power points, light fittings, hot water service, taps (inside and out) gutters, downpipes, sewerage and drainage so you will know the condition of the home before the tenants move in and better identify any subsequent damage (compared to normal wear and tear) and also helps avoid expensive emergency repairs..Improvements worth considering include adding security screen doors, repairing and/or replacing hinges, knobs handles and locks every cabinet and door, replacing old fences and anything not in good working order. Have at least two sets of keys for every lock and a written means of identifying every key for every lock, clean exhaust fans and chimneys and ensure there are enough required smoke alarms, including in the garage. Talk to your insurance company about Landlords insurance and ask about anything you can do to reduce their premiums..We had many happy years with happy tenants because we made sure the house worked properly, when we wanted to do major improvements we made specific changes to the lease and tenants received rent discount in return..So many essential boring things to think about before there needs to be any cosmetic changes to what looks like a really good house.

Love the 80' house, because you have a lot of sun to deal with a pergola from just above the front door running along the garage wall (minus the furniture) you could set a clear roof on top of the slats for shelter from rain. could even consider a similar pergola at a lower level running across from the front entrance and above the two front windows, these can be built to help block summer sun. Maybe render the garage wall to break up the brick and paint same as the garage door and timber above, this looks pale beige /grey, then this colour above windows remembering that window and door frames are cream, they can be painted. please keep the 80's door celebrate it.