Hi Ehwee,

I am planning to renovate my old house of more than 30 years. I am doing the space planning myself because my budget is a bit tight. My house is an intermediate double storey house and its measurement is 22 x 75 feet. I wish to extend the back of house, which include the kitchen and study room on the ground floor and 2 bedrooms on the first floor.

My ground floor layout is a bit tricky. The line where you could see separating the living hall and the dining is actually elevated 40 cm above the living. And this is extended up to the kitchen/wc/study area. The yard area is the same level with the living.

I have 2 options in my mind but I have some concern on the budget. Option 1 is to hack the wall of kitchen and study to fully extend to the back, while the wc remained as it is. I shall move the dining table into my extended kitchen. So that I have more space for living room. Since I am on tight budget, I do not wish to install a cooking hood yet, I am thinking 2 units of ventilation fan may do the trick. Do you think is sufficient or will it get greasy? Also, the extended area will have to be elevated 40cm above. This option, my kitchen and dining will look more spacious I presume.

Option 2 is to hack only the wall of study, while the wall of kitchen and wc remained. This option I can have separated dry and wet kitchen. And I am thinking since the kitchen wall shall remain, the wet kitchen floor area will not need to be elevated 40 cm above to match my dry kitchen (at the same time I also prefer to have higher ceiling for my wet kitchen). As for my study room, do you recommend to elevate the extended area 40 cm to match the rest of the floor in the study or do you think is ok to maintain the floor level as it is?

Also, cost wise, do you think option 2 will cost less? or they are more or less the same cost?

Hi Ehwee. Many thanks for your advice.