In Limbo

Have I mentioned our house is on the market? I don’t know who I think I’m talking to, I’m pretty sure no one reads this blog. My own husband missed my entire 30 days of gratitude, and who knows what else. I keep telling myself someday my kids might want to read it.

Anyway, over a year ago, we made a difficult decision to begin the process to sell our house. Although we have realtors in our family who we love and trust, and actually helped us through the process when we bought the house, the legal process of a short sale is very distinct and complicated and using family would likely create disclosure issues and delays, potentially jeopardizing a sale, and probably not a wise decision. We chose an agent recommended to us. We first talked with him November 17, 2011, and he assured us we wouldn’t be “one of those short sale horror stories.” He gave us an example of a house that had just closed after almost 2 years. I was a few months pregnant with Avery and he hoped and expected that we’d be in a new home by the time she was born. We figured we would probably be moving the week she was due, knowing our life.

So we gathered mountains of paperwork, wrote letters, drafted forms, purged clutter, sent more clutter up to the attic, and made the decision to maintain a fairly aggressive showing schedule. We listed the house the first week of January 2011. We set up to allow for showings during the week day with no notice, by appointment on the weekend. This meant leaving the house show ready every morning, a massive challenge when battling an uncooperative toddler who leaves a trail of destruction behind him.

We had a few showings. Every day we came home, after an invariably chaotic morning, hoping there would be a card left on the table. January turned into February, which turned into March, and then April. I was growing increasingly exhausted as my pregnancy progressed and the pace of no notice showings became too much, so we changed the listing to appointment only. I think we got one call. In the meantime, my parents graciously put in a backyard for us. Our mounds of dirt and weeds are now a great patch of grass where Carter loves to play.

In May, Avery was born. A few weeks after she was born, an agent and buyer knocked on the door and asked if they could look around. I reluctantly agreed, thanks to the encouragement of my husband, and we shuttled them past the sleeping newborn in the master bedroom.

I went back to work in August and once we got our new routine down, we ramped back up on the housing front. The walls were closing in on us, and I wasn’t sure how much longer we could keep everything contained in our two bedroom house without a garage. I felt like the baby gear and toys threatened to overtake us at any moment.

We held an Open House in October. Still nothing. Not an offer, not a mention of an offer, barely a showing. We heard of a new opportunity through an investment company and a different agent that we felt we had to pursue. So we did, and after much prayer and consideration, we switched agents.

We gathered more paperwork, rewrote the letters, updated the forms. We felt a little exhausted to essentially start over, but cautiously optimistic and hopeful that it was the right decision. We met with the new agent, walked through the house with her, pointed out quirks and issues, and relisted it December 1, 2011, a Thursday. We took an emotional deep breath and braced for the somewhat grueling mornings, now trying to leave the house show ready with an even less cooperative toddler and an infant to get out the door.

That weekend we had our first showing! We cleaned like mad, shoved a few things out of sight (also, there are very few places “out of sight” considering buyers generally want to look in closets and cupboards), and crossed our fingers. Later that night, I got a call from the agent saying the buyer liked it and wanted to come back the next day and then make an offer. As it turns out, she didn’t come back and didn’t make an offer. The next week, we had showings on Thursday, two on Friday, and we got an offer over the weekend.

The week after, we got the official offer paperwork. We went back and forth and on the last round of counters, it stalled. We've had many other showings, and a few more potential buyers. Someone is coming for a second showing today, and there's one particular somewhat crazy lady who has come 3 times and continues to drive by. I saw her drive by four times over the weekend, and she also brought us Christmas treats.

Selling a house is a lot like dating, and this feels like speed dating. I really hope someone likes us before the bell dings and they move on to the next option. If we get an offer (and finalize it), we begin the next steps, which may take 60 days or 6 months, maybe more, and probably a 30 day escrow after that. Even if everything goes perfectly, it’s going to be a long time. Yet, we feel like we have to be prepared for a quick turnaround, in case we are caught by surprise. This trickles into so many areas of our lives. That’s the part that makes me crazy anxious. Where will we live? Will we have to switch Avery’s daycare? We’ve been planning to move Carter to preschool in January. Will we have to move him to a new preschool? Is it still a good idea to switch him, or should we wait? How will he handle the change, considering he is the most inflexible child ever? Those are the questions we’ll have to answer slowly as we trudge through this process.

Then there are other questions… Some of those are the ones we’ll never be able to answer, but we trust there’s a reason for everything and a lesson to be learned. Eventually, we’ll be on the other side of this. At least we hope so.