oooo, this is definitely part way there! thank you!!

some issues:

a) where there are NO dashes I get NULL i.e. 9 Winter Street --> Null

b) where there is one dash in a number I just get the first number, i.e. 9-22 Winter Street --> 9

c)where there are 2 dashes and none in the initial number i also pick up the room number, i.e. 9 Winter Street - Rm 101 - Auditorium --> 9 Winter Street - Rm 101

It works perfectly when I have something like

d) 9-22 Winter Street - Rm 101 - Auditorium

OR

e) 9 Winter Street - Rm 101

I was able to address the NO dashes issue (a) pretty easily:

IF ([Number of Dashes] = 0)

THEN [Building]

ELSEIF ([Number of Dashes] = 1)

THEN split ([Building],'-',1)

ELSE LEFT([Building],findnth([Building],'-',2)-1)

END

thoughts on b and c? maybe it's b/c dashes in the description have spaces but dashes in the initial number don't?

this version

IF ([Number of Dashes] = 0)

THEN [Building]

ELSEIF ([Number of Dashes] = 1)

THEN split ([Building],' - ',1)    <-- added space here

ELSE LEFT([Building],findnth([Building],'-',2)-1)

END

seems to work better.  

I still have the issue of (c) which isn't ideal but it's definitely an improvement!!

yaaaasssss!