Incredible before and after split-level home remodel ideas. Revamp your space with these inspiring renovation tips for split-level homes

This split level exterior makeover created a refreshed, modern look for this 1970s home by carefully detailing spot alterations the façade, greatly improving its curb appeal. With some reconfiguring of the back deck, the backyard is now transformed from an under-used afterthought to a multi-level outdoor living space.

During the 1970's, split levels soared in popularity and today there are still plenty of them on the market, but most of us say we don't like the style or want…

The goal of this front porch addition project was to transform the lackluster 1970's split level into a more classic transitional brick style. A large front porch addition was added for outdoor living and entertaining.

This split level exterior makeover created a refreshed, modern look for this 1970s home by carefully detailing spot alterations the façade, greatly improving its curb appeal. With some reconfiguring of the back deck, the backyard is now transformed from an under-used afterthought to a multi-level outdoor living space.

House exterior makeover on a budget plans and ideas. Looking to make some changes to the exterior of your home? What colors and materials to use? What style - traditional or modern? Where to look for inspiration for a 1970's era ranch style home.

These are beautiful vintage house plans that are efficient, spacious and full of memories!! Vintage house plans! The house plans are from Home Planners 180 Multi-Level Designs 1977 You might…

Split-level homes, once seen purely as a retro real estate feature, are once again popular among some millennial homebuyers.

Completed in 2021 in Australia. Images by Peter Bennetts. Located in Modernist Caulfield, the original structure was a double-storey, the 1970s, split-level residence in need of reimagining. Referencing the...

Built in the 1970s, this cedar-clad home with its multi-gabled roof was typical of an era when split-level design was the height of architectural acuity. Und...

Image 6 of 33 from gallery of The Bridge House / Kister Architects. Photograph by Peter Bennetts

See the best split level house exterior makeover and learn the key components to transforming your exterior and increase home value.

This split level exterior makeover created a refreshed, modern look for this 1970s home by carefully detailing spot alterations the façade, greatly improving its curb appeal. With some reconfiguring of the back deck, the backyard is now transformed from an under-used afterthought to a multi-level outdoor living space.

During the 1970's, split levels soared in popularity and today there are still plenty of them on the market, but most of us say we don't like the style or want…

Learn how to update a split level entryway by removing the half wall and installing black modern balusters and oak handrail.

Explore SportSuburban's 2040 photos on Flickr!

This split level exterior makeover created a refreshed, modern look for this 1970s home by carefully detailing spot alterations the façade, greatly improving its curb appeal. With some reconfiguring of the back deck, the backyard is now transformed from an under-used afterthought to a multi-level outdoor living space.

During the 1970's, split levels soared in popularity and today there are still plenty of them on the market, but most of us say we don't like the style or want…

Learn how to update a split level entryway by removing the half wall and installing black modern balusters and oak handrail.

Explore SportSuburban's 2040 photos on Flickr!

Visit the post for more.

I bought a 1970's split level home, and in a four year span was able to modernize it with these 10 must-do renovations...

Image 5 of 33 from gallery of The Bridge House / Kister Architects. Photograph by Peter Bennetts

House with a Yoga Studio is private wooden house located in Redmond, Washington, designed in 2000 by Robert Hutchison Architecture.

Renovated Modern Home, Renovated Split Level, Seventies Home Remodel, Modern Staircase, Modern Fixer Upper, Remodeled Modern House, Modern House,

If you love a good before-and-after home tour, then you don't want to miss this one. Reston resident Carolyn Reams sent me photos of her family's renovations, and I was stunned by the transformation. She invited me to come in and see her beautiful house for one of Modern Reston's home tours.

Split-level houses were most popular in the 1950s. Are you considering purchasing a split-level house? Or do you currently own a split-level house? The idea of split-level housing might seem dated, but these types of houses can easily be modernized and re-decorated. We've looked into this and found some great ideas. In contrast to traditional […]

These are beautiful vintage house plans that are efficient, spacious and full of memories!! Vintage house plans! The house plans are from Home Planners 180 Multi-Level Designs 1977 You might…

Aaaaaand we're back. So, if you've been paying attention, you may have realized that I just fell off the face of the Earth mid-renovation. Obviously, something went awry. Let's not beat around the bush. I temporarily messed up my floors. And, rather than divulge my mishaps as they were happening (Get. Real.) I instead spent a few weeks crying into Cheese's fur, planning my escape to Paraguay, and wiping pizza grease on my sweatpants uniform. Okay, I'm being dramatic. Kinda. There are far worse things in the world than messing up your floors. I've lived through a few of them. However, I'm still a human, I occasionally lose perspective, and I definitely spent a few days drenching poor little Cheese's fur with my tears. Here's what happened. I was determined to have dark floors in our house. I wanted them so bad. I looked at picture after picture of houses with dark floors, and I just knew that our house was meant to have dark floors. I imagined something like this: via Style Me Pretty Or this. via Houzz And then our flooring was installed. And since we used solid hardwood vs engineered hardwood, it was fully installed as unfinished wood (without the stain applied yet), and I had a chance to see what our house would look like with natural floors. And I loved it. It really made our 1970's house look light and bright and beautiful. But, then self-doubt and insecurity raced in and ate me alive. I felt like I should do what everyone else does, rather than do what works best for me, and it felt scary to go against the norm. Plus, my original vision was dark floors, and it was so hard to change course mid-race. In short, I could see with my own eyes that the light flooring looked really great in our house, and yet I ignored myself. I am woman. Hear me roar. So, anyways, I pushed forward with my irrationally dark flooring plan. I eventually settled on a dark brown stain called 'Kona'. In hindsight, I can totally see the doom that was headed my way. But, at the time, I was totally lost in the moment, dirty dancing on Kona's leg. It looked so great when we tested the stain on a small piece of our flooring. I moved it around into each of the rooms and stared at it for several days while the flooring was finished being installed. Again, in hindsight, this was a terrible way to make a decision. A tiny poptart of dark wood does not give you an accurate indication of what your ENTIRE house will look like with wall to wall dark floors. But, ultimately, I gave the go ahead for the stain, and when I came home that day, here's what our floors looked like. It wasn't the worst thing ever. But it definitely wasn't good. And it was just so gloomy. I knew I had made a mistake. I had inadvertently created a 1970's dungeon. The stain turned out kinda orange (which still baffles me), and it didn't take well to the solid hardwood at all. It ended up being blotchy and uneven, and basically, I hated it. When this all started, I had no idea about the differences between solid and engineered flooring, but I definitely do now. In a nutshell, solid hardwood flooring is higher quality, but it's really difficult to get that uniform color that you would get with really dark engineered flooring, because you have to stain most solid hardwood flooring on site. You can buy already stained solid hardwood floors, but that was not in my little budget. There's about a million more things you should know about solid vs. engineering hardwoods (and about a million more options) but my plan is to share that info in another post. Otherwise this post will take you 42 years to read. So, even though the stain looked terrible, there was a bit of a silver lining in the stain debacle...I was able to see once and for all that our house looked bad with dark floors. Because even if they had been a lighter brown, or even just a uniform color, it wouldn't have mattered. I love dark hardwood floors, but not in our house. So don't get mad at me if you have dark floors. Clearly, I wanted a set of my own. It just wasn't meant to be. It was around this time that Cheese's fur got soaked with eyeball secretions. Could I have phrased that any worse? I had no idea what on earth I was going to do. Do I apply for Paraguayan citizenship? Do I buy 800 rugs, admit defeat, and just pretend like none of this ever happened? None of those options seemed viable, so instead I just moped around for a few days and eventually mustered the courage to tell our contractor that we weren't happy. Okay, fine, Jesse did it. But, anyways, our contractor was wonderful about the entire thing, and he agreed to sand the floors back down to the natural wood. He didn't know I have a blog (not that that necessarily would've mattered...I'm not Beyonce). He's just a nice guy who wants to make sure his customers are happy. Of course, we were already at week 5 in the renovation, and this new phase of sanding/sealing tacked on 2 more weeks. Oh, joyous day. So, the sanding began. Again. I was feeling pretty panicked at this point, and searching for yacht-sized rugs online, but I did my best to remain patient and hope for the best. After about a week, most of the stain was sanded off, I began to see the natural wood again, and I remembered how to breathe. There was still stain all over the walls (which will all be repainted and covered down at the bottom with trim anyways), and just a tiny little bit still in the wood grain, but I could definitely see a light at the end of the tunnel. Still though, we were going into week 7, and I began to feel a little meltdown-ey. My fridge and oven were outside on the front deck with a tarp over them. The washer and dryer were next to my bed. And I was still basically living at this place. At one point, I replaced my floor vents and just left the old disgusting ones on my kitchen counters for a week. Full of bugs and dust circa 1975. It is what it is. Luckily, right around the same time as my meltdown, we had plans to get out of town for a week. We drove to Charleston to watch my little brother, Mathias, graduate from the Navy Nuclear Power School, where he's studying to become a Nuclear Engineer. I'm so proud of him, he's my favorite creature on the earth, 10 years younger than me, and it basically healed my soul to spend a little time with him. I know he's just some random dude in a dapper sailor suit to you, but trust me, to know Mathias is to love Mathias. I have yet to find the exception. Jesse almost loves him even more than me, which is demonstrated by the above picture. They intentionally posed that way, and even barked at me to get out of the picture so that they could capture this celebratory day with a prom photo. This is my life. When that was over, Jesse and I headed to Myrtle Beach so that he could attend a work convention. He worked, I slothed on the beach. Then on the last day, Mathias and Meredith (his girlfriend that I also love) drove down from Charleston and Myrtled it up with us for the evening. They all ate oysters. I did not. It was glorious. Just so you know, I will eat anything. Unless it resembles a loogie. I just got really sidetracked on a brother/beach tangent. So sorry. Anyways, I came back with a new zest for life, which is good, because I was really fading fast. By the time we came home, our floors had been sealed with several layers of satin topcoat, and were finally finished (at least on the main level). I jumped up and down for a full 42 minutes. Just to really hammer home what an improvement this really is, here's our house when we first moved in: And here we are today. It's a floor mini-miracle. And, luckily I captured the miracle when we first got home. Because the very next day, it was filled back up with stuff for the entryway. And it kinda still looks like this. But the good news is that I finally have floors that I love, and we finally have lift off in the entryway pit. It only took 8 little weeks to get to this point. We're going to laugh about that one day. I laughed a little bit while writing that sentence. Too soon. I have a lot more to share about the entryway, and the stair rail is being built today, but we'll talk about all of that soon. Today, we have floors. FLOORS, ya'll. And I might actually have my house back this weekend. Can I hug you? Before we go, I don't have any slightly nauseating life lessons to share with you. But, I will throw in a picture of Cheese, who refuses to look me in the eyes lately. Who can blame her. Just a few more days, girl. And then you can Risky Business yourself all over the house. I'll even get you 4 little white socks. That's all, ya'll. 'Til we meet again. P.S. The other posts in the House Makeover series can be found here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10 UPDATE: This story was FAR from over. We ended up having to redo these floors entirely. Only a year later. You can read why here. Follow my blog with Follow my blog on or or Subscribe to LiveLoveDIY with email! Enter your email address: -->

During the 1970's, split levels soared in popularity and today there are still plenty of them on the market, but most of us say we don't like the style or want…

Hey ya'll! So, remember a month ago when I debuted the new stair rail? Well, I truly thought I would be able to get everything painted in a week or so. And then it basically took me a month to get it all finished. It's ridiculous, I know. I've come to accept that this will never be a blog that makes things look quick and easy. Welcome to the opposite blog. Take off your shoes. Stay awhile. Enjoy the disaster that unfolds in every post. So anyways, let's rewind a little bit and remind you what the new stair rail looked like after it was first built. A few of you suggested leaving the railing as the raw wood and just adding a topcoat, but we built the stair rail using wood that wasn't all uniform, knowing that we wanted to paint it to match the trim. Here's a close up of the railing to show you what I mean. So, knowing that it had to be painted, I decided that I wanted to paint the stair rail using our new paint sprayer, thinking that it would make the painting process a total breeze. Welcome to my worst idea ever. Also known as that one time I turned my house into the set of Dexter. Since I had never used a paint sprayer before, I had no idea how much overspray was involved. When I took the sprayer outside to test it for the first time, we quickly realized that I was going to have to cover the entire first floor with plastic. So, I used this stuff called Tape'n Drape (affiliate link), which is basically a bunch of plastic sheeting attached to tape. It made things so much easier, but it still took me about 3 hours to tape everything up. Only because I tend to turn into a fly stuck on a fly strip whenever tape is involved. So, we played with the paint sprayer for awhile outside, making sure we had a general understanding of how to use the thing. And then it was time to tackle the stair rail. I applied the first coat of primer to the area near the stairs, and frankly, it wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. Jesse witnessed me struggling and offered to help. And that's when I handcuffed him to the paint sprayer. Luckily, I came up with a nice plan to hold a sheet of foam board on the other side of the rail while spraying to stop some of the overspray. This sped things up and eventually the entire railing was covered in a coat of primer and 2 coats of semi-gloss paint. For those of you who like specifics: First I used wood filler on all of the nail holes and then sanded them flush with the wood. Then, I caulked all of the gaps in the wood with DAP. Then, we used Kilz primer and Behr Premium Plus paint in Ultra Pure White with a semi-gloss finish. And I sanded the entire thing with 220 grit before priming and then again after the primer had dried. So, if I'm being honest, Jesse basically just painted the whole thing. I mostly ran around like a crazy person checking for overspray evidence. And I think the below picture best sums up my usefulness during this time... Wearing oversized man pants and a mask, staring at a flip flop. Eventually, the stair rail seemed to be adequately covered and the job seemed done. It was dark at this point, but as far as we could tell, everything looked great. So, we pulled up all of the plastic sheeting and went to sleep. And here's where the plot thickens. I woke up the next day and it was incredibly evident that we should have applied one more coat of paint. I wanted to run away. And never return. And since there's no way I was going to recreate the taping and draping incident, or ask Jesse to enjoy another fun-filled day with a paint sprayer, I spent a few long evenings with a paintbrush and tiny foam roller applying one last coat. There were a few moments where I felt a little Britney-with-umbrella-crazy, but in the end, fine tuning the last coat wasn't the worst thing in the world. Eventually the stair rail was totally done, it looked great, my sanity somehow survived, and it was time to move on to the door. The door was a total disaster after the stain debacle, and definitely needed a new coat of paint. I realize how gross that is. So, I set up my shower curtain dropcloth, wiped down the door, sanded it a little, and started testing out some black paint colors. I eventually settled on Sherwin Williams Urbane Bronze, a really great subdued black that goes really well with just about anything. And then I also replaced the old hinges, door knob, deadbolt, and door sweep with upgraded satin nickel ones. That alone made a big difference. And here's the finished product. In case you're wondering, the walls are Benjamin Moore Simply White and the trim is Behr Ultra Pure White. And yes, I very much want to replace the 1970's sliding glass door with some double doors that don't require floppy vertical blinds. Baby steps. :) Now all that's left in the entryway is to install trim around the floors and stairs, find a rug, and re-assemble the nook. But for now, I'm just so happy with this little space. I've questioned myself a lot during this renovation, so it's a nice feeling to just love something right from the start. Plus, all it takes is a tiny little glance at this before picture to remember just how far this little area has come. We've painted the walls, painted the door, replaced the floors, replaced the stairs, built a new stair rail, upgraded the light fixture and door hardware, replaced the switch plate, and converted the closet into a nook. And soon, there will be brand new trim. I swear. And I have one more before picture that's totally embarrassing, but kinda hilarious. And it reminds me that I'm going to fail a lot before I ever succeed. And that's how it's supposed to be. This is a picture of the entryway nook from about 4 years ago when I first decided to take off the closet doors. I remember thinking it was brilliant, and I remember Jesse mentioning that it would make a nice puppet theatre. So, anyways, to those of you who write me and say that you don't know where to start....the answer is somewhere. Start somewhere, make mistakes, keep going, and you'll be surprised at how much you can do! And that's all for today, ya'll! I'll be back soon to share whichever one of my ongoing projects I finish up next! :) 'Til then! P.S. The other posts in the House Makeover series can be found here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10 Follow my blog with Follow my blog on or or Subscribe to LiveLoveDIY with email! Enter your email address: -->

Split-level homes were most popular in the 40s and 50s. As time passed, they became less popular and almost undesirable in the real estate market. However, as with many things from the past, split-level houses are making somewhat of a come-back. Before purchasing a split-level home, it is important to note that not all split-level […]

Incredible before and after split-level home remodel ideas. Revamp your space with these inspiring renovation tips for split-level homes