Our open house got pushed a week. The window instillation was delayed thanks to a myriad of issues. And there was a lot of clean up work to be done once all the work crews finished up inside and out. So we waited a week. Sunday I called my mother to see if she could come stay a couple days while I cleaned the old house. Miracles of miracles she was able to arrange her schedule such that she could come. I spent most of Tuesday and Wednesday at the house, late into the night, cleaning. Every wood surface in that house got rubbed down with Old English. It did wonders for repairing the scratches that the baseboards and mantel suffered during the remodel and before. So after many, many long hours and more elbow grease than I thought I had to give, Thursday the house went on the market and we had our Realtor open house. The response from the dozen or more Realtors who walked through, was really favorable.
Mom and GR (and a couple neighbors who came to the open house) are the only ones who have seen the "improved, depersonalized" inside of the house, so I've created a slide show of picture so you can see all the changes. I didn't photograph the basement ... it's no longer deep blue, but the same color as the bedrooms, and the floor got painted the same color as the coffered ceiling in the master bedroom (which is also the same color as the far wall (garage wall) of the dining room. It looks really nice with the bright white wood work down there.
Saturday afternoon we had a public open house, and again the response was favorable. A couple minor things that needed to be addressed, but they are simple fixes. There were lots of open houses in the neighborhood so we had more than a dozen interested parties walk through! Apparently of the 8-9 comps in town, ours is by far the best house for the price.
We know of one very interested family who came Friday, and spent an additional 45 minutes at the house Saturday. We'll see how this shakes out. We did have an offer after the open house ... it's rather telling when your Realtor closes his conversation with you that you have an offer on your house, instead of leading with that bit of information. Needless to say, we rejected it out right and didn't even bother to counter.
Mom had a cute story about Alex from her week with us. One night when he was sad that he couldn't say goodnight to us, mom told him that we were at the old house working really hard to get it ready to sell so a good family could purchase it. Alex looked at her and said, "Grammy, WE could buy it!!"
It's going to take a while for the kids to see Grandma's house as our house and home.
5 comments:
Are kitchen islands no longer a desirable thing?
We asked if we should leave the piece of furniture we were using as an island in the kitchen and the Realtor said it didn't really matter. So we're going to put it in the basement and use it as counter space in the mini kitchen downstairs.
I loved hearing how surprised the one family was that the house was inhabited by a family of 7. You should be proud of your home maintenance skills!
Since I had never been to your house I'm sure I can't fully appreciate all the work you put into fixing it up, but it looks awesome!
Awesome! Staging real estate is one of my hobbies. I loved reading this. You are wonderful!
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