The official Blurb:

Great location! Only five minutes’ walk from the Joy Elementary School playground and five minutes’ driving from Fairbanks’s largest shopping district, this well-maintained home features laminate flooring, fresh paint, and a double vanity in the master suite. Along with extensive counter space and generous cupboards, the kitchen is equipped with a glass-top range and a brand new dishwasher. The kitchen island is perfect for including children in culinary adventures or entertaining guests in the adjoining living room and dining area. The double garage includes a workbench and lots of shelving. Outside, the lawn is well-established in a fully fenced yard and a small garden plot is waiting, with irises already beginning to grow.

~ ~ ~

They kept trying to use the cheezy, Location, location, location, and I said I’d rather have an exclemation point than repitition.

And the kitchen was described as “functional.”

I can’t speak for every woman, but for me that is a red flag word.

Anyway, I feel about this type of blurb as I do myself: even if it isn’t the most attractive, it’s honest and accurate.

“If I’m to be hanged, let it be for something real.”

So We’re keeping him.

And life goes on.

Dad’s observation was “It’s only money. And even thousands are small-scale in God’s economy, and He will protect you.”

It was good to hear. I hadn’t gotten that far.

“It’s only money” is one of several lines attached in my mind to my dad.

“Money is just really important to some people,” he said. “Just let them have it, and get away.”

And that, I guess, is what we’re doing now. Lord-willing we’ll never have to sell again, but if we do we know what we’re doing differently.

The fight-or-flight surge that flooded my system hours ago seems to be dispersing, so I hope to sleep soon. In the meantime, I’ll leave you with the descriptive blurb I wrote for our house.

(The end result makes me think of those sentences I used to have to write in elementary school, proving I knew how to use each word properly, that I knew what each meant. The idea was to write one sentence per word, but that wasn’t the letter of the law, and I remember the subversive thrill of creating– usually with my dad’s help– sentences crammed with required words. All used correctly, of course.)

Our house (hyperbolized, for the market):

Five minutes’ walk from the Joy Elementary School playground and five minutes’ driving from Fairbanks’s largest shopping district, this well-maintained home has everything: oversized two car garage with workbench and extensive shelving, fenced yard with established lawn, well-lit and open living space with laminate flooring. Along with extensive counter space and generous cupboards, the kitchen is equipped with a glass-top range and a brand new dishwasher.  Home is full of natural light and fronted by a garden plot with perennials already beginning to grow.

There. Don’t you want to come visit now?

I mean, buy it?

On Again, Off Again

Our house is “listed” and we have one, maybe two showings this afternoon.

But I felt my “professional pride” personally assaulted to see what “the best in town” actually looks like.

And

Notice the bowing? The distortion? The “stitching” of pictures that doesn’t match the very obvious point of the window?

And the blurb was cheezy.  I mean, well, I suppose all real estate agents must write enough of these to be inoculated by familiarity against noticing certain things, but currently there are two !Exclamation Points! in two sentences.  And three ending our total of five sentences.

Not forgetting the numeral 5 being used to begin one of those sentences, which feels hugely tacky to me.

Yes, none of these thing *really* matter. But when I found out (at the table) last week that I’m being charged an extra $695 on top of the standard 6% (because this team is so! awesome!), my critical/evaluative nature was engaged. And not impressed.

Really, I can’t say with confidence I can do better. What I will say with all assurance is:

I won’t do worse.

I know that statement usually the original is actually *bad,* and I’m not trying to say that. I’m just trying to say that when I pay some to do what I can do, I expect them to do better than me. How much better depends on how much more they charge.

For example, I will buy fancy dresses. But usually only at discount

And I won’t be taking a huge chunk away from our already limited capital.

Signing papers

On Thursday we’ll be going to the realty office to sign papers that should get us represented.  We’d like to get our house on the market by the weekend. Friday would be even better, because then we could (maybe) have a family-out day most of the weekend to let folks stack up to look at it.

You know this is part of my fantasy don’t you? All the looking bunched together (to get the inconvenience out of the way all at once), multiple offers insuring a full-price sell.  Add a non-critical buyer as well, because we really have done a huge amount of work here.

ETA: Listed the following Wednesday. A few showings Thursday, but no feedback yet.

Holding on till Tuesday

Up before 4a.m. Making a list to untangle it all.

  • Tea Committee meeting this morning
    • Supposed to proof a doc before then
  • Trying to finish getting the house show-ready this weekend
    • It’s coming down to me now:
      • Bathrooms
      • floors
      • windows
      • dogyard (the timing on that one is tricky this time of year 😉 )
      • curtains/window dressing
        • that I just spent what seems like a fortune on: Solid $80
  • Started Shadow of the Bear (Doman) to get away from it all and ended with the hungry ache that returning to fiction gives me lately (“The smallest taste of a long-missed meal.”).
  • Still numb/reeling at the Idea we’ve submitted an offer on property that represents a *total* life-change
    • distance from town
    • how we’d spend our time
    • entrepreneurship
    • building
    • unbuilding (both structures on the land are *temporary*. One more so than the other)
  • Second writers’ group meeting on Monday– with 3-4 people expecting thoughtful feedback on submitted work
    • And I’ll cut myself on sleep before I renege. This is so early in the forming of our group I can’t bow out– there’s no “understanding” yet built up to withstand any testing.
  • After that I’ve got an “allergy consult” (whatever that means), where I’ll be the guinea pig before I consider submitting the rest of my family to it.
  • Then is the walk-through by the Realtor, when we hope she says, “You’re ready, let’s start the paperwork.”

That’s all by Monday.

Our offer on the land get’s opened that morning, and I have no idea what will be hapening after that, or how fast.

But I don’t have the energy to look past Monday.

Oh, right. That didn’t even include the two family dinners for Easter. Both of which I’m looking forward to, but both also being One. More. Thing. to suck at brain cells.

Sometimes I think Tuesday is my favorite day of the week…