By: Angela Gillaspie © March 2001

After three years of hemming and hawing about moving, my hubby, Paul and I decided that we would sell our house. The added bonus of finding out that child number four would be arriving in early fall made implementing our decision even more urgent.

For the past ten years, we have adored our large-windowed three-bedroom and two-bathroom house, but we have run out of room. There is no space for the nursery. Plus, my oldest child is nearing puberty, so she needs privacy away from her younger brothers' rude noises and comments about flatulence.

Nancy, our realtor, gave us all kinds of information about our neighborhood including the average selling price, the prices of other homes for sale now, and the average number of days it takes to sell a house. She also gave us helpful tips on what we could do when we show our house, like paint over the children's artwork on the walls, pick up the cat's hair balls from the floor, re-carpet the entire house, re-wallpaper the kitchen, hide the motion-detecting oinking pig, etc. Some of her advice we took (painting, cleaning, etc.), the other we just ignored due to lack of funds or personal preference (wallpapering, carpeting, and Paul's pig).

Hearing that it takes about 71 days to sell, we decided to go ahead and put our house on the market so that we could move when the kids got out of school at the end of May. Using Nancy's pricing information, we came up with an amount that was just slightly over the average selling price for the neighborhood.

The next weekend, Nancy visited us to fill out the paperwork and get our house on the market. She asked us all kinds of questions about our house and we were very truthful.

She asked, "What have you replaced recently that we can list on this sheet?"

Paul mentioned our new heat pump and furnace - new since April of 1999 - a definite selling point. I remembered something new and dear - "Paul's toilet is new!"

Paul patted my hand and said, "No honey, I don't think that would be a good selling point for the house. Besides, it's one of those low-water flushing crappers."

Nancy smiled and nodded (secretly hoping that this meeting would be over soon, I imagine), and asked, "Anything else?"

I mentioned that she should write down that we lived next door to CHESTER, the five-year-old stalker that always hangs out in our yard. She laughed (I'm sure she thought I was exaggerating), and went on filling out papers.

I continued, "Oh, it's a real treat living next to such a special child. He aerates our lawn by digging up pieces of sod, he cleans the windows with his tongue while he watches us eat supper, and he leaves most of his toys in our backyard."

She raised her eyebrows and politely smiled at me again, and I took that as a sign to shut up. A few minutes later, some movement from the living room caught my eye. I poked her and she turned to see what I was pointing to.

Standing on my azaleas and looking in the living room was a small brown face smashed up against the once-Windex-cleaned front window. A little steam moustache poured from Chester's snotty nose as he grinned to us looking out at him.

We continued with the paperwork and soon we had a "For Sale" sign in our yard.

A couple of days later, our house was listed in the paper and I received my first request for a showing. I cleaned, scrubbed, mopped, and gagged (from morning sickness), and soon my house was spotless. When the realtor showed my house, I had to leave because it would make the potential buyer uncomfortable. (I reckon Nancy feared that I would demonstrate our new $315 toilet or introduce the buyers to Chester, or something.)

For two days, I cleaned, gagged, and left my house to loiter at the church parking lot while potential buyers looked in my closets, tested the fans in my bathrooms, looked in my fridge, and pondered the color of my carpet.

On the third day, we received news that the first people that looked at our house wanted to make an offer. After a bit of negotiation, we accepted the offer and felt the spine-tingling fear that we just sold our house without finding a house for ourselves!

Nancy and I went on an immediate search mission and within two days, found the perfect house with acreage, more bedrooms, and no Chester. Yes, life is good. We'll be able to have a nursery for our new arrival and our daughter can enjoy her new hormones and pimples in the sanctity of her own room.

Since we are going to move three months earlier than we planned, Paul wondered if we priced our house too low. Heck, it's worth it to me to hurry up and get out now. Why? Well, I was thinking of seeking a therapist to help me through the trauma of being pregnant and keeping a small house clean during tax season and soccer season. In addition, those church ladies were just about to call the law on me.

What I really wonder is what the new owners will think of Chester.

Stay tuned for more SouthernAngel's selling points!