Enter the Sewickley

Our sales rep, Michael calls and tells me that he has good news. At this point, my wife and I have moved on and are back looking at existing homes. I ask if there are wider lots, now. No. He explains that they have a sales meeting every Monday and today they announced that they added a new option to the Sewickley model, an attached garage, which would allow for a level entry like we wanted. The only models that we considered were the Fox Chapel and Oakmont, which is slightly larger than the Fox Chapel. The reason is the dining room. My wife had fallen in love with the 13' x 13'+ dining room and couldn't imagine settling for anything smaller. The Oakmont and Fox Chapel are currently the only models with either builder that have a large dining room.
You see, my wife is a great and considerate hostess. As we have been looking for a new home, we have realized that it will be the largest home of anyone in our immediate family. As such, we will likely be hosting most large events, like Christmas and Thanksgiving dinner. There is no way that we will be able to fit a large dining room table and buffet in a smaller dining room.
So, we look at the Sewickley floor plan and, sure enough, it has a smaller dining room. Then it hits me. Do we really need a larger dining room? When we have a big event, like Thanksgiving, there is no way half of our guests will fit into even a 13'x13' dining room. That's where having the large morning room will be so useful. I talked it over with my wife and she agreed. So... we are back in the Cobblestone game!

First glance - Love the Fox Chapel

I grew up in Fox Chapel. For those of you unaware, Ryan Homes is a Pittsburgh-based company, so many of the models are named after areas of Pittsburgh. So, when we visited Cobblestone and toured the Fox Chapel model, we thought that it was kismet, because we loved it! It is a great plan, especially with the morning room and 4' family room extension, which creates the nice open floor plan that we have been looking for.

There are problems, however. First of all, the model, as presented, is approximately $430,000! That is way out of our price range. We don't need everything shown, however, so it looked like it work out. It essentially came down to the elevations available. They were all integral front garage options. Because the current phase V lots are too narrow, there is no way to accommodate a side or rear garage door. This meant having a full flight of steps to get to the front door. Although this is Pittsburgh and lots of steps are common, it is not what we are looking for. We have several relatives who have problems with steps and understand well what an issue it would be for them, and for us when we get older.
We are at an impasse and cannot find a resolution, so it seems like Cobblestone is simply not going to work for us...