I like this one

Posted by E-George on May 15, 2009

It’s the butter bean in the soup of lentils that is the selling process. Which is to say, it’s the ugly obnoxious part of a much better set of surrounding circumstances. The house went on the market on Tuesday, and being that I am of an irrationally egotistical mind I assumed people would be clawing the screen door off its hinges to get into the house to see it. Needless to say, that hasn’t happened, so my careful tending of the stOOpid white carpet by making sure that Evelyn’s spit-up is containerized onto a blanket has felt a little overbearing because no one has made so much as a pass by the house to throw a rock at the sign.

All that may be about to change, though, as today there was a showing, and tomorrow another is scheduled. I have high hopes. We opted out of doing an open house right away, but since I’m really good at doubting my own decisions I wonder if that was the right choice. The thought is that if the house doesn’t sell in a month’s time, or see any activity that would indicate that it might be on the path towards selling, we’ll re-evaluate the price and have an open house then. We’ll see.

Since we started the discussion of selling the house and buying another, I’ve been glued to the MLS like it was the delicious nougat and caramel center of the internets. The bonus of being thus enraptured is that I’ve lighted upon several possible new homes. The bummer of being so thus obsessed is that even though we could go see them, we’d have to sell our house first before we could buy another one.

I know I’m risking deep disappointment and maybe even a little heart break if we go looking for a house, find one we like, and watch it sell out from our fingertips before our house gets sold. But, last night my top house pick dropped its price by $40k, and we learned it was a short sale house. WOOHOO! Ok, I know you’re reading that as, “Gaw, George. Could you be a bigger cold-hearted harpie-cow?” But you already know the answer. Of COURSE I can, provided the correct motivational fodder. As a result, I emailed our our realtor(and my long-time friend) a list of five houses and she kindly obliged by getting us to see three.

House 1 (Montgomery, east of Tramway): Holy 1960s, Batman! The house hadn’t seen an update in easily 35 years. The carpet had permanent furnidents, and the cavalcade of various linoleums, while delightful, was a little rough on the visual senses. It was a split level house, but the odd part was the installation of two glass paned doors at the top and bottom of each stairwell, almost like it was a type of hermetic seal to keep out the cooties from the main floor living spaces. The bathrooms were the size of postage stamps. Not the current ones that are kinda big and rectangular, either, but those perfectly square $0.02 stamps. And, the master bathroom had seen the decorative addition of cartoon lady bugs the size of dinner plates pasted all over the shower door. The best part was the lighting fixtures. The entire house needed a remake, but the lighting fixtures absolutely were required to stay. At more than $150/sq ft, this house was grossly overpriced for the amount of effort (read: cash) it would take to eradicate that musty basement potpourri that graced every room and bring the house into a more modern, less mumu condition.

House 2 (Universally referred to as Garage Majal): Hm. $197/sq ft. And, for what? High ceilings and a 6-bay garage set up. This alleged 4-bedroom house is really a 3-bedroom house with an odd triangular room off the living area that was classified as a bedroom because it had a closet. All the bizarro designer paint choices in the world couldn’t really make this house better. I especially liked the water dish in the kitchen that had a thick layer of slobber floating on top from that pony the home owner called a dog.

House 3 (Thermal Envelope House): Say it with me: GORGEOUS! At around $125/sq ft this was an ideal house from the front door (that sticks) to the back door leading to the hugantic backyard (which, granted, needs A LOT of work to bring back into submission). The house had been redone, but done beautifully. The first floor had hardwood floors throughout. The pantry was big enough to host clog dancing lessons inside, and the 600-square-foot enclosed sun room could be quickly converted to a lovely Berta quarters with the addition of a closet and a bathroom. The kitchen was lovely, well laid out, but in need of some appliances updates. The upstairs was equally gorgeous with renovated bathrooms and new lovely carpet. Along one side of the house was a thermal envelope for passive heating. This space, assuming it doesn’t get to bread-baking temperatures, would be ideal for Matthew’s office. Loved it. Loved it loved it loved it!

House 4 that we’ll see next week sometime is the short sale house, and the number one pick on my personal list, even though House 3 is nearly stealing the crown in the Pretty House pageant. I liked the pictures of House 4 for several reasons: it has 4 bedrooms, a large flat backyard that is already grassed and landscaped, and it was within a block of open space and foothills hiking. Allegedly, it has fruit trees which I’m not a huge fan of unless they are peach trees in which case I’ll cheerfully tend to its every whim. It also has a pool. Now, as soon as I say that, everyone I talk to furrows their brow and either mutters something about the work to maintain it, or the inherent safety risks of having a pool. I like the idea if for no other reason than I wouldn’t have to go to take Evelyn to the over-chlorinated pee, fart, booger, and spit receptacles known as public pools to get a watery respite. I also like the idea because it would help make my home the centroid of family and friendly activities, allowing others to not have to take their kids to the public pools, either. Besides, it would be a mild expense to fence it off safely while the risk to small children is so present. I also liked it because it was inexpensive, and if we could buy the house for cheaper than we budgeted to buy a house for, then we could use the remaining cash to do any updating or fixing that we would want to get done.

Of course, it’s easy to find a house to buy. Which made me come home after touring the three today and stare meanly at our garage door and demand of the house, “Why don’t you sell?! Don’t you want to sell?! SELLLLLL D(ARN) YOU, SELLLLLLL!”

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