When we toured the house before we bought it, the living room looked like this (listing picture)
The laminate flooring was popping up at the joints so we removed it. And behind that wall on the left was a "hidden" hallway that required you to walk through one of the bedrooms to access the bathroom. So we took out some of the wall.
Then came the patching and painting. Yesterday I laid the last piece of laminate in the dining room. After cleaning up a little I could see light at the end of the tunnel.
The bathroom door is coming out and we're installing a sliding barn door. The wall and door will be some kind of reclaimed lumber look but much lighter than the floor. I stopped the flooring over to the right because that's were the next phase of construction starts.