Alice Stolz: Why it is impossible to top a home with a 'Batcave' garage

There seems no limit to what people can dream up to install in their houses when money is no object. Here are some of the maddest and most ultra-luxe additions I’ve seen in properties.

Batcave garage.
I’m yet to see any property that has topped the Batcave-style garage by Molecule Architecture. The baseline of the tennis courts can be automatically elevated in just one minute to allow cars to enter the LED-light car garage.

The big guns of materials.
The use of brass and marble literally adds weight to this house and the result is an interior that exudes style and substance. It might sound bling, bling, bling but it’s so masterfully used it actually feels understated and cocooning inside.

Marvel at a similar Batcave house at 7 Ottara Road, Toorak

At home day spa.
Having to leave your house to bliss out and have a facial is so inconvenient. Solution: a day spa within your own home. Mitch and Mark from The Block may not have started this trend, but they certainly helped propel it along when they renovated their house in Hampton that won them The Block. Steam showers, saunas and treatment rooms are increasingly becoming de rigour in prestige houses.

A designated spray-tan room.
For spray-tan aficionados, with this next door to your upstairs bathroom there’d be no more sticky drives home from the salon. This small room was the size of a double shower and tiled in mixed shades of copper and brown mosaic tiles – a perfect instant tan hue that means self-tanning at home would be a breeze.

Ballet room.
A wall-mounted ballet bar, slip-resistant timber dance floors and full-length mirrors. They’d no excuse for not mastering the perfect pirouette.

Browse Mitch and Mark’s Hampton from from The Block at 4 Bronte Court, Hampton

Funiculars.
How else can you expect to get from the waterfront to your house? Are you even living if you don’t have a funicular? This house in Lake Tahoe is completely overachieving with not just one, but two.

Basketball courts.
Pack away your tennis whites, basketball courts are making a comeback. But if you can’t choose one over the other (and let’s be frank, one of each even if this lofty territory might seem a bit OTT) take a leaf out of Omar and Oz’s book from The Block and use a multi-surface that can be used as either.

Omar and Oz created a slam dunk on The Block with 241 McGeorge Road, Gisborne

Glass-edges pool.
The allure of being able to see inside a pool is catching on, with an increase of glass-edges or glass sided pools.

Waterslides.
Yep, forget the childhood dream of a trip to the Gold Coast, one up the rest of us and have a waterslide in your own backyard.

Built-in pool lounge chairs.
I’m very much here for this one. If only I had the pool.

Perfect a pirouette in the ballet room at 93 Macquarie Street, Teneriffe