My builder has put 14 lights on one switch in our new family room. He says that this is OK per code as it only matters how many watts run through the switch. It has a dimmer but I'm still concerned about the number of lights being on at one time using lights that I do not need and the plate gets hot.

I believe the solution is to split this into 2 switches... can you help me? Thanks

What sort of bulbs to the 14 lights have? Most standard dimmer switches can only handle 600 watts total, so your 14 lights would have to use 40 watt bulbs or less. They make dimmers that can handle 1000 watts, 1500 watts, and so on. Perhaps changing out the dimmer would be the easiest solution. Spliting the lights into two switches will depend on how they are wired. Do you have attic access?