Home > Blogs > Joel Weihe > Making Your Real Estate Daydreams into Reality! Wichita KS Real Estate

Bi-Level, Tri-Level, Quads in Wichita, KS - What's the difference?

By Joel Weihe

Real Estate Agent with Realty World Alliance

August 28, 2008 01:27 PM

Bi, Tri, and Quads are more than just modes of transportation (Okay, that was a stretch - bicycle, tricycle, um... quadroped?)

They happen to be distinct styles of Split-Level Homes! All are available in the Wichita, KS and surrounding areas marketplace and each brings its unique features! Many people when buying their first home have been confused as to the difference and unsure about whether they would like or not like the various styles. So I thought it'd be a neat exercise to go over the 3 splits and how they lay-out and how to recognize them from the exterior!

The most common is a Bi-Level home. This means that there are two distinct living areas and both are accessed by stairways. When you walk in the front door, you typically have the option of going up, or down. The front door area generally has a small landing area, and sometimes a coat closet or garage access as well. Typically the main living areas are upstairs - the kitchen, dining, living room, and main bedrooms. The lower level generally includes, if finished, a family room, maybe another bedroom, bath, etc.

Pros: Privacy for the lower level - great for the teen who wants to come home and head straight downstairs and not see the rest of the family, for roomies, or to keep guests into entertainment areas without them having to pass thru the main living areas (then you can leave dishes in the sink and noone will know!)
The lower level generally has view-out or daylight windows as it is raised up higher than a finished basement on a traditional ranch. So it is more of a bright living space similar to being totally above-ground.
Bi-levels often have a lower number of basement issues as there is less of a below ground aspect compared to a traditional basement. Only 4-5 feet of the room is under ground level, so there's less ground pressure and generally more stability.
The stair-running keeps you in shape, right?!

Cons: Get home with a full load of groceries and you gotta go up with them all. Same thing after a long day of work, up you go!
The view into the home front the front door = stairwell (except in some sideways bi's).
Generally more stress cracking as the back half of the house is twice as heavy as the front home, so you'll tend to see signs of drywall cracks around the stair areas.
In the event of a physical handicap or injury, the stairs could possibly leave you sleeping in the garage. For this reason, bi's are sometimes hard to sell as it limits the buyers to those who are more physically capable and don't mind their own personal stairmaster.

How to tell a bi-level home from the outside:
If you look at the home and the front door appears to be in between the two levels - that's a clue! Here's a typical Bi-level style home. Note that due to the position of the windows, the front door appears to be set in between two levels of the home.

Another bi-level style And One More Bi-level