Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

Dear All,

Interested in answers to following questions

- can you convert a garage to a habitable room here in Aus (qld) without planning permission , are there building regs. (Did this in UK and had to do double skin walls etc ) any similar things anyone experienced here?.

- Can you move internal (non load bearing) walls around to remodel the interior of a place again without planning or building regs?

- anyone had any quotes for replacing a bathroom (bath, shower, loo, sink - none of that poncey bidet stuff thank you very much mrs jones), I know it depends on fixtures + fittings but rough ideas would be nice.

- Anyone had any quotes for replacing kitchens they want to share

- Anyone had any experience of for example buying a house, then remortgaging as ahome improvement to whack in a monster pool ? does that count ;-) .

Re: Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

Hi Spalen, have sent you a PM.

Re: Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

Whilst we are on the subject, (sort of) why do people put coving up in their garages here :confused: What on earth is the point :confused:

Re: Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

speed ramps for huntsmen - Have you seen how fast huntsmen run ? if the ceilings were at right angles they wouldn't make the corners and you'd have concussed huntsmen on the floor all of the time.

Re: Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

And the problem with that is :confused: :rolleyes:

Re: Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

No planning app required. Possible construction issues (depending on the age and construction) with termite management, waterproofing single skin brickwall and waterproof membrane under floor slab. A typical QLD alteration though.

If house has bracing walls that need to be removed, you need to get a engineer to design a solution for insurance purposes in the event of storm damage. If you have damage the insurance company may look for resons not to pay out if they can associate the alterations with the damage.

Depends on size and expectations. $8-12k

A straight swap will be cheaper than a relocation of the sink and stove. $15-20K

WW

Re: Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

Hi
We looked into getting our garage converted and obtained our house plans from the council for about $35 (WA). As we suspected, the concrete floor isn't the true slab, it's not the right thicknesss and doesn't contain a membrane so we're unsure whether to progress - at some point we'll get some quotes for an extension or try and see if the slab can be put down without it affecting the structure there already.

Re: Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

Alot of people just build carports for cars don't they. The garage is then just the workshop.

Re: Costs for rennovating houses + garage conversions in Aus
 

Oh and dont forget that a lot of garage walls are closer than 1.5m to the boundary as they were constructed as non habitable rooms and can come into about 900mm. If you were then to change the designation of that room to habitable then I think you could end up with problems.