Wow, way to revive a thread that is almost 8 months old. Alisonn, I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that you are referring to my posting regarding split foyer homes. As I've been living in mine for almost 5 months I will tell the OP (as I did before) that this home works wonderfully for my living situation and business. If it works for her, she should go for it. There is NO other home layout that would have worked for me within my budget. Several real estate agents have asked to see the interior of our home since it was finished because they had heard through the grapevine that it was an interesting and unusual layout...every single one has fallen in love with it as I have. If I am the person you were referring to I was not "offended" by anyone's opinion that I would not be able to make a profit of the resale. In fact the majority of the thread had very little to with talk of resale and much more to do with certain individuals' personal dislike of that house style. I WAS annoyed by a poster or two trying to tell me that they knew my lifestyle better than I did when they insisted that a split foyer would not work for me or insisting that I was heartless if I did not build a handicap accessible home. But nowhere in my thread did I imply that I was offended by people's opinions of the resale value of my home. I readily admitted that I was not a real estate expert by any means but that there were plenty of split foyers in my area that seem to sell just fine as it's a fairly common house design around here. Personally, I hate cookie cutter McMansions. I'm also not a fan of town houses, studio apartments, mobile homes, yurts, or log cabins. But there are people who love all of those and happily choose to live in them. And to each his own. Where does it say that a split foyer is the least desirable home? I'm fairly sure that there are homes that many would consider much less desirable than a split foyer. And again, if you're not referring to me, I sincerely apologize...but considering my original post regarding building a split foyer is the one that comes up when you search for split levels I'm fairly sure you're referring to me. I do resent having someone reference me and my situation incorrectly. This post was edited by sparkler39 on Sun, Jan 26, 14 at 2:15

wearybuilder, thank you for your post and rec. I feel as you do about the houses of this style feeling closed in. I live in a suburb that was mostly created in the late 60's and early 70's so there are many, many split entries. Even though I realize they are not very desired, the fact is that they exist in an EXCELLENT school district and often on yummy lots. When building, in the case of my style, they crammed 5 bedrooms and 2.5 baths to make the house SOUND big, but the bedrooms are really small and the bathrooms were so tiny they were barely functional. We have already combined a miniscule full bath, a teensy master powder room and small walk-in closet to make one large main bathroom. With a window! What is it about these houses that the bathrooms don't get windows?? The little "nursery" next to the master is now our closet. Effectively, we turned the three bedroom 1.5 bath upstairs into a 2 bedroom 1 bath, but it is so_much_better. Downstairs, the two bedrooms on the "garden" level, we are making sure they get more closet space and more windows. In the end, it will be a "smaller" house but I think it will feel and flow much better. Now if we can just find a way to make the outside more attractive :-) Can't wait to open up the stairs! Joanna

Hi, Good to see some ideas going on this style of house. They are tricky to work with. I love the idea Lavender posted (Bob Vila). I can't open the pinterest link posted by rocky bird, can others open it? We are in the throws of building an addition on our split-foyer. We did add a little bit to the foyer, wish it could have been more. However, our foyer after the build is complete will only be a guest entrance. Our family will enter via the garage man door and into a generous sized mudroom. All family coats, shoes, knapsacks etc. will be in this basement mudroom. I don't even plan to give the kids a key to the front door, so they are forced to enter via the garage to the mudroom LOL. Here are my thoughts on split entry foyers for what is worth from a person who has ripped hers apart and is rebuilding it. 1) Avoid having family enter through front door and having their stuff dropped in that tiny foyer. Try for another family entrance (maybe through garage to basement level? or a side or back door) 2)Consider an extra wide staircase going up (ours is 4 and a half feet) and a narrower one going down (ours is 42 inches here). This way the larger staircase invites company to go up. Also with the wide staircase a person can sit on the stairs, and put shoes on, while another can pass by. 3)Consider putting an extra tall door (8 foot) for those foyers that typically are a floor and a half in height (12 feet). It fits the space better and lets extra light in if you have a transom above or glass in the door. In our case, the door draws more attention to itself as the garage protrudes and partially conceals the front door. 4)Consider beefing up and beautifying the exterior steps. Our new steps are concrete stringers, and soon to be installed stone risers/threads. The landing is also stone resting on a concrete platform 5)Put a forgiving flooring material on the interior steps so you can walk on it with boots, etc and it becomes an extensions of your foyer space in a way that a carpet can not. We will have hard wood steps. 6)Open up the wall between the living room and staircase wall. Also, endeavor to have the top of the stairs going down open to a railing. This way there is an illusion of more space I would love to hear your ideas on how to use trim to bring down the height of the ceilings in these tiny, tall ceiling spaces. I keep thinking something creative like chair rail or something might make the wall heights more in keeping with the tiny space. In other words, anything that makes the interior foyer space look less like an elevator shaft would be good. Best of luck all split-foyer owners. Carol

Would you husband be opposed to a tandem garage? With a good architect and builder and of course $$$ you could build on and have a side facing garage. The garage would still fit 4 cars, but just tandem through the new garage into the old garage. They can fill in the current garage door and make it look like it is part of the house and not just a filled in garage door. Remove the old driveway and re-landscape. And your house would not look like all garage.