A pergola will obstruct light into the structure. What is the structure used for? How do you plan to use the deck for? Eating? Sitting? etc? Plan the activities and the furniture you'll need and draw up a floor plan. Floor plans are important outside & inside. The steps to the deck from the lawn are a little too abrupt. Needs a transition. Consider adding cement pavers to the grass, not as an extra patio but for a nicer transition design.

Tess, I hope I'm not too late with the following advice. Don't ever paint brick. Your house is a simple design, exterior wise. Paint wont fix it. What's missing is a designed garden. Even the simplest brick house can look like an inviting, lived in home when it has a structured garden surrounding it. For less than the price of paint, invest in a landscaper to design a garden that will soften and greatly enhance your homes street appeal ...and add many $ in value. Painted brick detracts from value and has to be repainted periodically, defeating the purpose of brick, which is, no maintenance. Besides, your house, painted white or cream as has been suggested here, would stand out in the street like a proverbial sore thumb. Trust me, landscape, starting at the street boundary and leave the bricks alone. Good luck.

Although you may be anxious to see some quick yard results, I'd put the porch renvoation before the landscaping, keeping the money tucked away so you don't have to redo items. I think adding a roof and entrance area, as shown in some of the pictures, would be a huge benefit but you can't tell until you figure out the porch part. And I'd put some of the money there if needed because it will be a long term result. The stairs need help with a larger stoop area - again the renovation and possible porch door roof/entrance will help there. Then I'd raise the walkway to the level of the first or second step, make it a bit wider, and open it up in a spreading fan shape and put a step in it the end of it where it joins the sidewalk. That would allow for a small wall, 2 or 3 pavers tall, along the sidewalk to define the area and set up the flower beds. Now I see some nice flower beds and landscaping in 2 curves from the new front step at the sidewalk end up towards the sides of the house with a grass areas on either side of the walkway. Not too high maintance because you could make them as narrow or as wide as you wish. It would frame the whole house/yard. Also, move the mailbox to the edge of the lot line. As you dig out the landscaping and flower beds you can build up the walkway area. But please consider putting the horse before the cart and doing the porch next. It may give you a whole new perspective on where you want to go with the yard.

Hi all, Thank so much for the responses! Some really brilliant ideas. I suppose a couple of follow up points from me... 1) Budget. Really good point. To be honest I dont know. Im the type of guy who tends to work the other way around. Want to understand what the best is, and work backwards until I find what I think is the best bang for buck. Not sure if that makes sense. I guess we are still working out our budget in some senses.. 2) The verandah, some great ideas above! The problem as I see it, is the roofline currently goes over the verandah. So I couldnt do a "stand alone" type of verandah like my neighbours have unfortunately. Ill need to get an engineer in to assess how the arches could be either removed and replaced OR squared off. 3) Sounds like rendering might not be the best option. Would painting over the bricks be any better though? That would leave the brick outline right? 4) Correct that the window frames are aluminium. Moving to wood would be good, though I suspect expensive. Would that be right? We also have window shutters on all of the external windows, I suspect we would need to remove these as well? 5) Definitely planning on removing the arch over the driveway. I suspect we can just chop it out, though it connects to the bricks on the side of the house, so may need an engineer to double check for us. 6) Landscaping wise, totally agree we need something. I suspect this will happen after the vast majority of the work is done. With that said, you dont want to see the backyard. It is a complete desolate wasteland :P and would probably constitute its own post hehe. 7) That Heritage building group page had some great ideas. Maybe something like this? http://heritagebg.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/renovation-brighton-front-2.jpg 8) Roof and gutter wise, agree a change in colour would be nice. Would it be worth considering a tin roof? Ill definitely post some photos when we complete the work :D