For Sale!!!!

A report on the house hunting....

Do people not realize that the minute they decide to put their home on the market it stops being a home and becomes a house. A house for sale. People don't live there any more. Take the family photos down, take the dream catchers down, put away the nic knacks and belly button lint collections, hide your medications, and for heavens sake, put some doors on your bathroom cabinets! (Somethings you can't un-see!)

The other day Ambo and I walked through a potential house and I thought I would share the experience with you. Not that we are realators or anything, but I am pretty sure that what we experienced was the very definition of what not to do.

Ambo and I pulled up on time, knocked on the door and were meet by the home owner (strike one). He invited us in, explaining that his realtor was running late. As we walked into the front room we noticed a man standing against the wall with a binder in his hand, we learned that he also had been scheduled to walk through with the same realtor at the same time as we were. (Strike two). The home owner invited us to show ourselves around, and we did so as he commenced bustling around putting clothes away and such. (Strike three).

The realtor showed up a short time later and he commenced playing catch up with us by showing us rooms that we had already been in and when asked how long the home had been on the market he won us over with his stuttered reply "umm, 60 to 90 days" (wrong, the house has been on the market for as long as we have been out of ours, that was over five months ago).

Unfortunately the tour only continued to trend downward. Some of my personal highlights include: The two or three minute pause while he groped in the dark trying to locate the light switch "that is around here somewhere". After patiently waiting the proper amount of time for him to make a complete fool of himself I pointed out the piece of string that was dangling down from the ceiling immediately inside the closet, exactly centered in the door frame, the same irritating piece of string that had been bouncing off his head as he feverishly looked for that dang switch! I then illustrated the proper technique by grabbing said string and with a praticed tug, filled the cramped closet with glorious light.

Next up was a tour of the Kitchen. Did you know that if you take your garden variety acquarium rocks and glue them to your cupboard doors in various shapes and patterns it will look exactly like you would image them looking? Yikes!

The home is a tri-level and true to form there is a hand rail separating the main level from the basement family room. Apparently the homeowners, yes the ones who are still flitting about trying to look busy, felt they would like more privacy between the two rooms, solution? A piece of blue foam taped to the baluster! More privacy, and additional sound proofing! So practical.

I could continue with things like the dog run with astro-turf, the muddy tour of the back yard, or the "immaculate landscaping" that includes a collection of various lava rocks, and a four foot Gargoyle that greats you next to the front door.

Before leaving the almost mute realtor really put the pressure on by informing us that traffic has really been picking up lately, they even had an offer, but they turned it down as it was too low. Imagine that.