Do you want to keep the wood floor? It is rare to see wood floors as garage floors. I've seen homes like this moved onto pour basement slabs (same concept as pile foundation...but with a basement instead of dirt. If you want to keep the wood, then there has to be a way to keep the wood off of the concrete. An 18" crawl space (dirt covered with 6mil poly sheeting or cement) is always an option. The 18" crawl space would have to be cross vented/heated properly. This is for "keeping" the wood. Flooring. I'm not sure what has to be done to remove the wood floor and have the building sit (joists and all) on concrete. Remove the joists and you have plenty of stability problems. You would need to speak with a local architect/building engineer who has some knowledge of what you are trying to do, soil conditions, etc. to get this right. In theory it can be done (we've just landed a small car on a comet...we should be able to put an old building on a cement slab)...I'm wondering about the expense to get it there (excavation + soil stabilization + concrete + piles, etc).

Hi Luke, thanks for your reply. Yes, there is existing plumbing but we need to create a gradient somehow on the wood floor. Concrete floors can be ground to create the gradient but need to come up with some other solution with the wood.

my suggestions has the central entry and a small study off the living room...(twin desks provides more counter and wall storage and avoids sitting face to the wall) there's a generous laundry mudroom with direct external access, a bathroom with separate powder room, more space in the master suite with the window offsett for furniture and more privacy from views across the courtyard and reversing the wiw and ens allows for morning sun in the shower and the wiw creates a sound barrier against the guest room.. adding furniture helps suggest room sizes and there's various setdown spaces and extra storage throughout the house ...luckily there's plenty of room for more than minimum offsets to create a garden, alfresco, courtyard, screened spa room, entry, kitchen and laundry porches, garden sheds and drying areas and careful choice of building sizes allows for a neat gable roof with the extended eaves and a hip roof over bed 3 keeps the whole roof simple and economical to build

Hi Mandamaree, You are fairly limited in space and in the size of the bedrooms to introduce what you request without compromising these spaces and future expansions to the house. The lounge too is a bit of a thoroughfare in the current layout. However, a few suggestions to ponder. Ensuite to B1, this could be just a 1m wide x 2.7m long space either along the wall to bedroom 2 or expand the wardrobe to 1m wide and re build a 600mm int. depth W/R along the B2 wall. If you used the existing wardrobe for the ensuite though, B3 would have no robe, but if it is to be a study, this may not be a concern. Alternatively, you could build in the space where the back door is and incorporate a toilet beside the laundry. Put the back door in the laundry. The toilet could be either beside the bathroom or B2. You could also economise by not having two accesses to the back corridor. (one from the living room and one from the kitchen) If you are looking at renovating the kitchen, I'd block off the back hall access opening and build a full wall of bench and joinery along that wall and either make an opening in the wall between the kitchen and living room or open it all up, except the back 600-700mm portion at the end of the joinery. If you remove the wall between the kitchen and living - might need a beam to replace it, then I'd extend the peninsular bench between the dining and kitchen, making sure it does not make the dining too small. You should have a minimum of 1200mm between kitchen benches so 2560 is good for this. You can butt the dining table upto the peninsular and still have 5 people seated around the table rather than have a breakfast bar. The space is too tight for a bar. Storage - always a drama in these older homes. Work high level units into the laundry and if possible, the bathroom. If you can afford to lose a few mm from the living room, make B2 robe the proper 600mm deep and include the old fireplace area too. As it is only a guest room, make part of that for the storage you need, i.e, suitcases, boxes of 'stuff' etc. The robe in B2 should be no less than 1200mm long to future proof this as a kids room or for rental. Hope that helps. Cheers, Christine.