The do-manzla 5 marla is Pakistan's most built house — for a good reason. A single storey on 25×45 ft is tight. Add a first floor and you nearly double your living space without buying more land. This guide shows you exactly how to split rooms, place the staircase, and avoid the layout mistakes that haunt owners for years.

The numbers before you design

A 5-marla plot is 25 ft wide by 45 ft deep (standard dimensions across DHA, Bahria Town, and most housing schemes). After mandatory setbacks — 5 ft front veranda, 2.5 ft on each side — your buildable width is 20 ft and your buildable depth is around 36–38 ft.

That gives you roughly 720–760 sq ft per floor. Two floors means 1,440–1,520 sq ft of usable space — enough for a proper 4-bedroom family home with dining, kitchen, and a TV lounge upstairs.

Quick maths

Plot size: 25 × 45 ft = 1,125 sq ft

Ground floor buildable: ~20 × 38 ft = 760 sq ft (after setbacks + car porch)

First floor buildable: ~20 × 38 ft = 760 sq ft (car porch roof becomes a terrace)

Total usable: ~1,400–1,500 sq ft

The proven ground-floor layout

The ground floor handles everything that needs an outside connection: the car, visitors, and the kitchen (which faces the service lane or side). A parent or guest bedroom on the ground floor is the most requested feature — it means elderly parents or guests never climb stairs.

Car porch — 9 × 18 ft (fits one car; doubles as covered veranda space)

Veranda / entrance — 8 × 6 ft (covered, faces the road)

Guest / parents room — 12 × 10 ft (attached bathroom is worth the space)

Attached bathroom — 5 × 7 ft (stacked above foundation plumbing)

Open living + dining — 14 × 12 ft (combined saves 40–50 sq ft)

Kitchen — 9 × 8 ft (L-shaped counter, back wall cabinet to ceiling)

Staircase — 8 × 4 ft (side wall, not centre — see rule below)

The proven first-floor layout

The first floor is the private zone. No visitors come up here. This gives you flexibility to spread rooms and create a proper family lounge — a dedicated space where children watch TV and study, separate from the formal ground-floor living room.

Master bedroom — 13 × 11 ft (attached bath is non-negotiable for master)

Attached bathroom — 5 × 7 ft (above ground-floor bathroom — shared plumbing shaft)

Bedroom 2 — 11 × 10 ft (kids or teenager room)

Bedroom 3 — 10 × 9 ft (smaller — study or smaller child's room)

Shared bathroom — 5 × 6 ft (serves bedrooms 2 and 3)

TV lounge / landing — 10 × 8 ft (at the top of stairs — informal family space)

Roof terrace access — — (a small door from the landing to the roof slab)

The staircase: the single most important decision

On a 5-marla plot, where you put the staircase determines whether the house feels open or chopped up. Most bad 5-marla designs have this wrong.

✓ Best

Against the side wall (recommended)

Place the staircase along one of the 25-ft side walls. This leaves the full width of the floor available as one connected space. Rooms on both floors stay rectangular and easy to furnish.

✗ Avoid

In the centre of the ground floor

Common mistake. A centre staircase divides the ground floor into two narrow halves — one with the bedroom, one with the kitchen. Feels like two separate flats, not a house.

✗ Avoid

At the back wall

Works if the back faces a lane. The staircase lands upstairs at the back, which forces a long corridor on the first floor. Acceptable but wastes 15–20 sq ft.

Bathroom stacking: save money and avoid leaks

Every plumber in Pakistan will tell you the same thing: stack bathrooms directly above each other. The ground-floor attached bath should sit directly below the first-floor master bath. The shared ground-floor bathroom should sit below the first-floor shared bathroom.

When bathrooms are stacked, all drain pipes run vertically in one shared chase. When they are offset, horizontal pipes run through the ceiling slab — every joint is a future leak, and fixing it means breaking the slab.

Five mistakes owners regret

✗ No store room on either floor

Fix: A 4×5 ft store under the staircase adds 20 sq ft of storage. Gas cylinders, suitcases, seasonal items need somewhere to go.

✗ Master bedroom without a window on the outer wall

Fix: If the master faces the internal stairwell, it has no natural light or cross-ventilation. Orient the master to an outer wall even if it is slightly smaller.

✗ Kitchen with no window

Fix: On a 25-ft plot, the kitchen often ends up at the back. It must have a window — to a courtyard, over the back wall, or onto a light shaft. A sealed kitchen fills the whole house with cooking smells.

✗ Two-car porch on a 25-ft-wide plot

Fix: A two-car porch needs 18 ft of width — leaving only 7 ft for the house width, which is structurally impossible. Fit one car properly. The second car parks on the road.

✗ Bathroom door facing the dining or living room

Fix: In a compact plan, bathroom doors sometimes end up facing the main social space. Rotate the door to a hallway or passage, even if it makes the bathroom slightly harder to enter.

Design your do-manzla 5 marla in minutes

Describe your plot to MakaanPlan and the AI will generate a double-storey floor plan covering both floors — with room dimensions, staircase placement, bathroom stacking, and door/window positions.

Try: "5-marla plot, 25×45 ft, double storey, road facing east, 4 bedrooms total across both floors, parents room on ground floor with attached bath, TV lounge upstairs, car porch for one car."

The plan comes with a Bill of Quantities — bricks, cement, steel, and tiles for both floors. Download the PDF and hand it to your contractor.

Double Story 5 Marla House Plan: What Goes on Each Floor and Why