A to scale drawn on graph paper floor plan may help you get advice.

Doesn't look like you have too many options. Maybe the Over/Under WD combo will work better in your case to gain more room. A plumber should be able to make a suggestion about what would work best. As the concrete sink goes, get rid of it most likely its worth nothing just takes up space, unless you see some sort of a "value" in it.

Broke and disposed a few of them during remodeling, nobody wanted to keep them. Try putting for sale on Craig list maybe you get a few $$$ and they will get it out this way you don't have to pay to get rid of it.

I need a to scale plan and I assume the car is not going in here .

I am very surprised that the tankless water heater doesn't save any room according to your plumber. Don't they mount on the wall? Doesn't the traditional HWH take up not only it's footprint but additional space around it for access? I'm not saying that a tankless is the answer, but that his response to you was enlightening as to his skillset IMO.

Thank you all for your responses.

It's unlikely the car will go in the garage since it would come midway of the chimney. I don't like the idea to have the car come so near to the "laundry room" for cleanliness sake. I'd still like to keep the area on the other side of the chimney open.

As for the plumber telling me me that tankless do not save that much space, he said that it would save roughly 4" from the wall protrusion and then with the piping, it would still get down pretty low down the wall. So that doesn't provide much space gain.

I'll work on a drawing to show the dimensions.

I'm not quite buying what the plumber is telling you. I've seen a number of tankless water heaters and they're relatively compact and can be mounted high on the wall. And the plumbing should be able to run up close to the wall, or can even be inside the wall if you are willing to open up the wall a bit.

You mentioned being in Cali; can the water heater be moved to an outdoor closet?

Unless you are in a high elevation area of CA with prolonged winter freezes, a tankless hot water heater can go outside here. It's also useful to understand the types of electricity interruption we are subject to in deciding how this might impact your hot water availability.

A brownout is not a complete loss of electricity. It is a reduction in voltage to your house to reduce overall system load. You still have power during a brownout.

A rolling blackout is a complete cut off of electricity performed when there is not enough electricity to service every customer. These are rare and generally take place in the evening peak demand period, not in the morning when you'd want hot water for showering.

A Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) is performed during periods of high wildfire risk to prevent energized power lines from starting a fire. These can occur at any time, although PGE is supposed to provide warning when this may happen. If you're in an urban area it's less likely, though not impossible, that you'll be affected.

Three additional points about power outages and gas water heaters.

First, since standing gas pilot light models were phased out years ago. Power outages will affect conventional (tank-style) gas water heaters the same as on-demand models (a/k/a tankless) models and hybrid gas models (smaller tank combined with on-demand capabilities). They all need household electrical power to run their ignitors.

Second, the water slowly cooling water in the largish (30 to 50 gallon) tank on a conventional model might give you reservoir over a few hours. Adding solar water heating panels on your roof could extend that. But, you can add a solar water heating system to use with a tankless water heater, too.

Third, you can get a battery back-up (a/k/a uninterruptible power supply or "UPS") to run pretty much any kind of gas water heater for a time. I know several folks with basic, conventional/tank-style gas water heaters --- no power vent fan, no recirculation pumps , no "smart" features --- who claim they can get hours of operation from even ordinary computer UPS units. There are higher capacity UPS units made specifically for running on-demand/tankless models with vent fans and such. Rinnai, for example, recommends a wall mountable model called a "HUGO" for use with its on-demand heaters.

When replacing a water heater tank with tankless, earthquake emergency water is lost. We have a couple shelves of gallon bottles taking up space in our garage. Our tankless is mounted on the wall outside the house. Works fine. Hard to tell if natural gas is saved.

Tankless heaters can also be mounted at point of use - under the kitchen sink and in the bathroom. I put in a 220v. Bosch that works well and is smaller than a shoebox.

Can you move the washer/dryer inside? I know it's popular in California to put them outside, but it seems indoors would be cleaner. Then your car would fit in the garage.

From the earlier requests ( @millworkman, @Patricia Colwell Consulting) , I've added a "drawing" of the dimensions to give more perspective of what I currently have.

Thank you for your input.

@Bloomingbug, that's good to know we still have some power during a brown out. I live in the "burbs" and power outages do occur. It's been mixed whether PGE notifies us ahead of time about a power outage. For example, the day after the first night of lightning storms, we were out of power for a couple hours with no warning.

@jwvideo, thanks for tidbit that newer gas tank water heaters require power to function. That's also disappointing for folks who live in older homes (like mine) that do not enough electrical outlets.

@socks, good point about lost of water in the event of an earthquake.

@latifolia, unfortuately there isn't a good space inside the house to put the washer/dryer.

Lander Lee, I have a traditional 60 gal electric water heater. It sits in my laundry space beside my stackable W/D. I want to get a smaller water heater and I have tall ceilings and was wondering could I gave it raised to the ceiling and use the old space to have side by side w/d and place a counter on top for folding are. I’m a widow and don’t feel I need a huge 60 gallon water heater. Not interested in gas. Do the make smaller water heaters that I could raise to the ceiling?