I agree with Marc,
As a builder I'm used to what's involved with building a new house, and see time and time again clients ripping their hair out over the process of building a new house.  If you do decide to hire a registered builder please keep in mind they are the professionals on site and they're the one that should take the stress and responsibility of building the house.  If your a worrier I would buy an established property that is fairly new, to benefit from a decent deprecation.  At the end of the day get quotes, do your sums and if you decide to build use a registered builder. Sleep well.

This is a fairly common problem in a house of this age, especially if it has a tiled shower base set into the foundation. By the sounds of it though, if it's been renovated recently, it could have been a handyman job and therefore have no warranty. Depending on what the extent of the damage is and what needs to be replaced you could be looking at $500-$3,000. Please note this is a very rough estimate considering I can't see the bathroom. It could just be that the tap washers need replacing, take the information from the report into consideration and call all plumber. Hope this has been helpful.

I'm from Vic. and I'm pretty sure in most parts if not all of Australia you need permits to build an actual dwelling or change anything structural to an existing dwelling, and to get permits you need council approval. If he refuses to have a building inspector look at it, alarm bells should be ringing. If the council is aware of this property I don't understand why they haven't already dealt with it. This shouldn't happen, council approvals, permits and the building inspectors are there to safe guard purchasers from buying houses that have been "whacked up" by weekend hammer holders.  If your concerned with the workmanship of the house I would ask the owner as a condition of sale a building inspector must view the property and give you a report. If you do buy this place and in the future want to sell you may find it hard because of this very problem so why buy this owners problem? Look for as much information as possible, if you find a solution you can use this to your advantage by negotiating a much lower price because of the approval problem. Once the problem is fixed hopefully you could sell for a tidy profit. But that's another option. At the end of the day do what the local council needs you to, because they have the power to implement the law and 9 times out of 10 they have the last word.   

Alex23, just a few questions. I live in Mildura and was wondering where your property is?
Have you had any professional quotes done?
Is there rear lane access or could you include the garages with the frontage?
Be mindful of the delay with land titles in Mildura at the moment (Town planning is swapped). I know this because I'm in construction and our company has been waiting for a while to start building houses in a new subdivision.
Building two houses joined together means there will be fire proofing required on the dividing wall.
Don't let this deter you, just get as much free information as possible from council to make sure you can go ahead with the subdivision before spending money on plans, permits and surveying.
Hope this information is helpful, good luck.

crashy I agree with your reason for the post, but if we didn't need REA's they wouldn't be there.  They are a necessary evil the property market has to have to free up time for developers and investors. Sure their rates could be reviewed like anyone else's. I mean I'd like  $100,000p.a. six weeks holidays and public holidays as well, (at the very least). My problem is that for the amount of people that work on a construction site e.g. builders, plumbers, electrician, etc. The percentage of time spent on the project compared to the percentage of wage taken from the property, REA's come out on top. That's my opinion anyway coming from a construction point of view. This is debatable I'm sure on both sides so please don't send any PM's my way. At the end of the day if you can't beat'em join them, become a real estate agent. So to all those REA's out there, doing a great job.  I'll just go back and sit on this fence a bit longer.

emsypoo all these companies you've mentioned are all the same when it comes to building, so make sure you read the fine print on what your paying for, compared to what you need to pay for to get the house finished. What I'm trying to say is with these companies the advertised price is usually the base price for a base product. I know that  most of the sub contractors get screwed on their rates, which means the work has to be done fast to make any money and if you've had any experience with the technical side of building, it doesn't end well. Don't let this deter you as I'm only speaking as a builder from one town, which brings me to my next point, have you considered any local builders. Remember when building a house, " if you only pay  peanuts you get monkeys."  The best thing to do is get quotes from at least 3 different builders for the same floor plan and pick the one in the middle. To make it clear don't let me tell you what builder/company to use, because at the end of the day your the one paying for it.  Hopefully this gives you something to think about. ( I tried my best). 

I'm sorry to have come across a bit arrogant. I'm a builder and used to seeing many styles and sizes of houses, so I'm able to get an estimation of what a house looks like just by the discription, and when you build enough from scratch you can visualise what the house is going to look like at the foundation stage. Unless it's a luxury house, room size doesn't change drastically. Average bedrooms are around 3.6m x 3.6m, bathrooms 2.4m x 3m, living areas up to 6m x 6m, w/c1m x 1.8m and kitchens around 4m x 3m. To help people get a better idea about the size of a potential room I just tell them to get a tape measure and measure the rooms in the house they're living in this way they can visualise the size with furniture.

Devo76,
I left school after year 10 to become a builder. I started off like you, spending all my wages on luxuries, bought motorbikes, entertainment systems, etc. I'm now 29, I have a mortgage, new work Ute, near new car, 4 month old baby, fishing boat and wedding debt. Now  to be fair I have made money in the past from building houses, but what I have now are necessities, (maybe not the fishing boat). When I found out my wife was pregnant I sold my 2 year old honda cbr 600 roadbike, because priorities changed. My point is depending on your weekly wage and how early you want to retire you have to find a balance between saving & spending. Take it from me 17 years old to 29 isn't that far apart and if you blink you'll miss it. With hindsight I wish I started to be serious about a property portfolio when I was 21!