Houses played a very important part in the daily life of the Byzantines. The factors that determined their form was the economic status of the owner, the morphology of the ground and of course the available space. The coexistence of luxurious mansions and humble houses did not occur rarely in the cities, while great were the differences between urban and rural houses.
 
The byzantine house combined ancient greek, roman and eastern elements. The rooms of the older houses were built around a courtyard. The most important room of all was the triclinium that served as a dining room for banquets. This type of dwelling with the spacious rooms that were lavishly decorated was obviously indented for the aristocracy of the period. The middle class lived in modest versions of the aforementioned houses, while the majority of the urban population dwelled in multi-storey buildings.
 
After the 6^th century, the formation of the typical byzantine house began. Especially in the period between the 9^th and 12^th century various rooms, such as the chambers for men and children, the apartments of women, the dining room and the restrooms were all arranged around the triclinium, which remained the main room of the house. The byzantine houses were also equipped with balconies, peristyle courtyards or gardens, while the elaborate masonry and the decoration with mosaic and frescoes complemented their form.

However, the majority of the population lived in one-storey or two-storey houses made of cheap materials. A series of rooms arranged around an open courtyard, where normally a well and an oven were found, was the most common house type.

The interior courtyard was an element that repealed over the centuries. Mystras, where the best preserved examples of late byzantine houses are found, generally had rectangular two-storey buildings; the utilities room are found on the ground, while the triclinium that seemed to incorporate all prior separate rooms is found on the floor. Well preserved noble houses of Mystras are the so called palace of Mystras , which is the oldest surviving house, the house of “Frangopoulos” and the mansion of Laskaris .