Parents have many obstacles to overcome while traveling the crazy road of parenthood. One of my obstacles was when we put our house up for sale.
My obstacle was… my family.
Attempting to move from New Jersey to Connecticut, our first step was to put our NJ house up for sale. At the time, I had 2 small kids… one was a baby, and the other was a toddler.
I should add that I also had a messy husband, a dog, and a cat. And a realtor who came over and told me, “It would be great” if I could keep all the doggie nose prints off my window and the toys hidden. Oh and “Don’t be home when someone wants to look at the house”.
That may sound easy, but if you are a parent, you know it’s not.
I did my best to keep the house as neat as I could.
More importantly, I prayed that we would sell the house QUICKLY.
Soon after we listed the house, I received a phone call from my realtor, saying that a prospective buyer wanted to come look at our house… right now. “Is that okay?”, she asked.
Wanting to do everything I could to get our house sold, I answered, “Of course”.
But that was a lie! It was so NOT okay. Both kids were napping, I was folding 3 baskets of laundry in my pajamas, the breakfast dishes were still out, and there were definitely a lot of doggie nose prints on my windows.
So I immediately went into frantic mom mode. All you moms and dads know that mode well!
I ran around the house hiding all evidence we lived there (as was recommended by our realtor as well). Thinking back, I’m guessing she didn’t have kids because she clearly didn’t understand what it was like living with them!
I then raced to my toddler’s bedroom where she was sound asleep. I woke her up gently, explaining we had to go out. I brought her downstairs to our living room and plopped her on the couch. She was still half asleep.
I finished straightening up the house, then grabbed my dog and put her in the car. I also quietly picked up the baby, who was still asleep and put him in his car seat.
I checked my watch. The people would be here any minute…
So I lifted up my sleepy daughter from the couch to bring her out to the car, and…
OH NO!
There was a huge wet spot was on the couch.
In the chaos of waking her and putting her in a new spot… she had fallen back asleep and accidentally peed ON THE COUCH.
I can’t remember, but I may have begun to cry at that moment. Or maybe I just laughed loud in a hysterical sort of way.
But then I pulled myself together. I needed to do something.
First of all, it reeked like pee. So I changed my toddler, wiped the spot as best as I could, sprayed air freshener on the couch. Then I put a throw blanket on top of it. I hoped no one coming over would actually SIT on the couch!
Then we left.
Having nowhere to actually go, I drove aimlessly around the neighborhood with both kids who were groggy and crabby because I had woken them up. I drove for the whole very slow, long, hour. Not fun.
After an hour of driving in circles, I went back home. And as I pulled the car in the driveway, my cell phone rang.
It was my realtor… telling me that the prospective buyers had canceled! No one had come to our house. She said, “I’m sorry, they may come tomorrow”.
So… I had scrambled around… for no reason!
The giant pee stain settled for an hour on my couch…. for no reason!
My kids were miserable… for no reason!
I was miserable… for no reason!
It was a tough lesson learned. But I learned it. From that moment on, I decided my house would remain as “lived-in” as it really was! No more added chaos needed! Babies, dogs, messy husbands and all. Take it or leave it. If you want to come look at my house, you’ll see it as it is.
And guess what? Our house sold in two short weeks. So I guess those doggie nose prints and couches full of pee-pee and kids’ toys, were actually all okay!
Do you have house buying or selling story to share?
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