If you have some furniture to start with, I would just use the basics for now and live in your home for at least 6 months - 12 is better - and get the feel of the house, the lighting, how the rooms are affected by heat and cold, decide how you are going to live in each room and what your needs will be. This will also help you determine traffic flow, which ultimately affects how your arrange your furniture. It is amazing how many times you can change your mind during this initial period. Most importantly, create your home for YOU, not to impress others, you are the one living in it and happiness comes from the peace and contentment you feel in your surroundings. In the meantime, look through photos on Houzz for ideas, save them in your ideas book for reference and use this to build your decorating.

"Architect-designed houses are not accessible to all." This is a myth championed by the building industry. Alternatively, why not focus on the key benefits architects bring to a project. Here are a few for you: • Appoint an architect to your project and you’ll gain a home designed for the way you want to live.The alternative is a builder-designed home that suits what the builder is used to building. Quality builders will ask for plans and specifications to be thoroughly documented so that they can go ahead and do what they do best, which is build. Working out with the owner what you’re going to build and why is the architect’s role. • An architect manages planning approvals. This process is complex, often arbitrarily applied by many Councils, fraught with pitfalls for the novice and is ramped up every year with new hoops to jump. If you want a professional on your side who knows the territory, will go in to bat for you and will forge a way through this minefield, you need an architect. • If you’d prefer to put the works to tender to a number of builders rather than having to accept the quote of the builder you started the process with, you need an architect. • If you’d prefer to protect yourself with a proper, architect-managed ABIC contract that works equally for both parties and is legally enforceable, you need an architect. • An architect will minimise costly changes during construction as he or she will produce a proper level of drawings (expect 20 x A3 pages for a new home, rather than the 1-2 pages you’ll receive from a drafting service.). The reasons for this are that you have on paper exactly what you want to build. Without this, you are entering a contract with a builder with none of the details resolved. You wouldn’t do that if you were buying a house, so why do it when spending an equally significant amount of money? Unfortunately, some builders see this approach as an opportunity to happily accept constant changes from ‘project managing’ owners because it’s just another variation that he can charge for. The longer he is there, the better for his margins, particularly when there’s no contract to speak of. Finally, an architect is a specialist with a professional duty of care, irrespective of financial gain. In other words, they’re there to support and protect you, without benefit to themselves. No one else in the building industry can provide this.

Hi fb57, Great charming federation house, retain the front and fix the back, then maybe later you can put in a granny flat - depending on cost and local council bylaws. I would not put in an attic - stairs are a good place for mishaps and as we age it might have limited functionality - but if its something you have your heart set on it might prove worth while. It appears that you are competent enough to do a decent measure up plan, going from what you have posted - you might need to take a few photo and a few other dimension to get a good design from someone working online. The idea is to get a design that you are happy with and then get a local competent Drafts-person to do your working drawings for a Building Permit and then get it built with a Builder of your choice. This would result in my opinion in a significant saving and a design of your choice, especially if you are willing to do some of the legwork with council and other authorities. To get a good design that you feel is a solution to your requirements, you need to produce a variety of design schemes (plans elevations perspectives etc.) and this can be done online with any competent Building Designer that you can get along with. It will not take one go at it - and it will not be quick, as you need time to digest every scheme but generally it works out in the long run. These are some of the things I would look at: 1. The possibility of breaking up the build into stages - maybe stage one do the renovations at the back and the stage 2 place in a granny flat. 2. As you have good access on both sides of the property I would place a new garage on the largest width and possible gate and walkway on the other side to give individual access to the granny flat. The new garage would be as closely to the front as possible, with the new fence an gate on the other side it would greatly improve security. 3. Depending on budget I would provide a bathroom shower and toilet with a walk in robe to the main bedroom and redo the kitchen and laundry if required. 4.The area next to the lounge area I would develop into an external entertainment area. 5 Since you mentioned that you have a "Fibro Extension" it implies to me that you may have asbestos on the property - get an expert in and determine if you need to remove asbestos when you renovate - this is a dangerous material and you should take all precautions possible to avoid long term damage. 6. An indication of the position of your neighbors windows and setback might also help in providing a design that complies with your planning laws and respects your adjoining neighbors. Like all things it will take a few revisions to get it right , but if you are willing to work at it, it will payoff in the end. The first thing is to draw up the existing conditions to scale so that an initial proposal showing possibilities can be worked on. I would be willing to work on this project with you online, I hope this is of some help. Regards Michael Manias mm407p@gmail.com

It’s the wall colour that doesn’t look nice everything else is fine. Repaint the wall it’s easy and you want regret it , use neutral colours but not light go for darker and for the corner I would plant giant bird of paradise either in the huge pot or if possible in the ground but keep it well away from the wall to give it space to grow and give you tropical look and feel. If you are using pots you can have few of them they won’t drop leaves in the pool.