Gates and split levels?

What do you do about gates? The house we're buying is a split colonial and it has a lot of stairs. I'm at a loss for how to put up gates. You can kind of see in the picture from the foyer there's 2-3 steps up to the living room, then 4 steps up to the dining room. From the dining room there's stairs to the bedroom level and you can't see it in the pic, but from the kitchen in the back there's stairs that go down to the family room. I guess I have to put gates at the top and bottom of all the stairs? Some of the spots are kind of open so I don't even know what to do there. I think opening and closing these gates all day long is going to drive me crazy!

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Re: Gates and split levels?

you gotta do it....we have a 3 level split and we're doing swing gates at the top of both sets of stairs (we have dogs) and then one pressure at the bottom of the steps leading up to the bedrooms since she does not go to the bottom level (that's the laundry and spare room)

Re: Gates and split levels?

I would think you'd only need to gate in the room/rooms you expect to have the baby in. You shouldn't have to do every room. The baby is most likely not going to play in the dining room. so maybe just gate the entries to the living room if that's a room you can dedicate to being a play area.

Re: Gates and split levels?

You should see my house, it's like jail! gates everywhere... I will take some pics tomorrow and show you...

Re: Gates and split levels?

Re: Gates and split levels?

we have a split & only put gates at the top of two open staircases. our basement has a door. i'm not putting gates at the bottom of stairs.