Stairway to Somewhere: Tacoma's Most Confusing Unfinished Home

Tucked among mature trees in Tacoma's North End, just blocks from the Proctor District, sits a 3-bed, 2-bath home with more than 3,300 square feet of what the listing generously calls "possibilities." The exterior is mostly done. The interior is a blank slate. And the staircase? The staircase is a whole conversation.

The Stairs That Broke Everyone's Brain

The star of this listing is a bright white staircase that climbs through a soaring, sloped-ceiling great room and, at first glance, appears to dead-end straight into a wall. It doesn't, but plenty of viewers needed a second look to be sure. Comparisons rolled in fast: MC Escher, the Winchester Mystery House, the shifting staircases at Hogwarts. Then there's the small, mysterious opening tucked beneath the steps, which has been called everything from a cozy nook to a fireplace that isn't. Its true purpose remains one of the home's great unsolved mysteries.

A House Built on a Hill (and a Few Bold Choices)

The layout makes a little more sense once you know the home sits on a slope. The kitchen and living room are on the main floor at street level, two bedrooms are upstairs, and the lower level holds the great room, laundry, and family room. Outside, cantilevered joists let one section of the house extend over the next, giving the exterior its stacked, treehouse-like look. Listed at $650,000, the property is pitched as a canvas for "a little imagination" and "a bold vision," and the seller suggests spending the winter finishing the interior. One Redditor even believes they visited as a kindergartner in the early '90s and remembers it as a giant playhouse where the stairs just kept going up.

The Internet Has Thoughts

Naturally, this listing caught the attention of Reddit's r/zillowgonewild community. See what people are saying about it here.

Ready to follow those stairs and see where they really lead? View the full listing here.