a rough copy of your plans may make it easier for HOUZZERS to make suggestions

and can you please post the current plans you have for including a bathroom and ensuite

You are brilliant Oklouise..thanks... I will post the plan (you actually drew it up for me approximately).....

An updated picture. Hallway is 1130mm wide.

My key question is: Should I stick with current plan of where to put the bathroom with the consequence being that I only have kitchen window outlook to park at back of house and a future area extended off kitchen and a bathroom, or do I try to find another place to put bathroom/s now and open up wall between kitchen and current bathroom space and use that as additional eating or living area that looks onto park, and possibly not do a future extension to house or just do a smaller one to have an indoor/outdoor sitting area (given that combined current kitchen/bathroom space) is not that bid. I am trying to have maximum liveability of house for minimum cost. I have also considered changing entry and exits from the house, converting current toilet and bedroom entry space into a bathroom and making entry into smaller room via other front bedroom. I cannot think of a solution that works. I had allowed $25K for the planned small bathroom/ensuite (as per picture below) and I was hoping to not spend more than $100K on the house in the future. I have ruled out raising the house to legal living height due to the expense in doing this. I just want to ensure I am positioning the bathroom in the wrong place in the house in order to maximise views/liveability of house. Being in Brisbane, we get hot humid summers, but don't really ever get a true winter.

I have had one quote so far, and it totals $26,000 to do the two bathrooms (tiny bathrooms) and the laundry cupboard. My nephew is a cabinetmaker so he will do the cabinetry in that price.
That is also based on me stripping everything out of bathroom so it is ready for work to commence and also digging the channel in the ground for the plumbing. There will be a new toilet vent pipe being put through the roof within the wall that adjoins the two bathrooms. The old ceramic pipe will just be capped and left in place in its current place on west of house. There will be one to two people living in house full-time.

I will put the measurements on your plan, but here they are also:

Distance from side fence to my house on West of House: 2200 mm

Distance from side fence to my house on East of House: 2300 mm

Distance from Back (South) of my house to back fence 20.150 metres.

Distance from Garage (Front/North) of my house to front property boundary 10. 7 metres.

that's a great price for two bathrooms and considering the generous space and views to the rear i suggest that you keep the bathrooms in the present location and add a generous deck across the whole back of the house and how would you feel about a laundry as part of the new deck...perhaps a walled area at the western end for the laundry with a sink and barbq for an outdoor eating?

Thanks oklouise. Yes I had thought about the laundry on the extension, but because I didn't know when it would happen, I thought it would be better to have the laundry cupboard upstairs now. I guess it won't cost too much more in plumbing costs now to have it off the kitchen and I could always convert it into a general storage cupboard in the future when a deck is done.

So you don't think it would be bad to have the deck directly off the ensuite bathroom/window?

windows onto decks are quite normal and you could have frosted louvres or blinds or shutters or highlight windows in the bathroom and maybe add doors out to the deck off the bedroom and a servery from the kitchen ... think about the deck being a generous outdoor living and dining area that can be flyscreened or partially enclosed like a traditional Queenslander but what are the walls of the house made out of and what is the height of the inside floors from the ground on the kitchen and bedroom corners at the back of the house?

Thanks oklouise. Here is a picture of the back of the house. The kitchen floor to the ground is 2.365 metres.

that height seems like a good opportunity to consider adding a downstairs room with bathroom so that you could have a separate rentable space below with a private deck above??

Hi oklouise. That height is to the ground outside. Unfortunately, It is not actually legal living height under the house after I take into consideration the concrete depth and the beams from the floor and raising the house would chew up the majority of the $100K future budget.

This is a photo of the front of the house. None of the shrubs/trees are at the front anymore. This is the northern side of the house.

adding a downstairs at the back outside the frame of the original house would mean lowering the new concrete floor for the downstairs not raising the height of the old house...well worth considering

Oklouise, do you mean like doing a self contained granny flat but attaching it to the back of the house and using a deck (indoor/outdoor living) extension on the original house as the roof/ceiling to the granny flat? That is a good idea that I hadn't considered. I think I would have to make the ground higher because I believe the rules have changed regarding minimum habitable ground level since the original house was built. The inside walls of the house are 2.7 metres and so there may be some scope to step up to the deck addition (not sure how this would look though...not ideal). It could end up getting quite expensive doing the extra downstairs room as appealing as it sounds. Most additions that I have seen on Houzz appear to work out at about $3000 per sqm (a lot more than the $1500 per sqm that is often reported generally). I keep thinking of having the planned ensuite just a walk in robe in order to avoid having a deck backing onto a bathroom (and to keep costs down), but I doubt I would save much by not doing the second bathroom given that the plumbing for the second bathroom is largely just an extension of what is happening for the "main" bathroom.

Very roughly, I think eliminating the ensuite bathroom and just having it as a walk in robe (in which I just have as a vacant space in the short term) would reduce costs by about $8000.

usually you have to step down from the house to a deck but if the "downstairs" doesn't have an internal stair case the ceiling of the downstairs can be higher than the floor of the upstairs (or the floor of the downstairs may be able to be lowered to fit under the upstairs floor ie a granny flat in front of the bedrooms and bathroom with a roof below the bedroom and bathroom windows and a separate deck in front of the kitchen ...but, with so many options i think it may be time for an on site designer to help work out the precise specification to decide what's possible but with the upstairs so high it seems a shame not to try and take advantage of being able to look over the top of a useful extra downstairs room without losing the view from the bedrooms, bathroom and kitchen...it's such a gorgeous house and well worth improving and i hope you don't change the classic style