When I put my house on the market in mid-May, everyone – my real estate team, my friends and neighbors, even I – expected the house to sell quickly. “Your house shows so well. And it has great curb appeal,” one agent proclaimed. “It’s the beautiful, mature garden that will sell this house,” prophesied another. “Be careful what you wish for,” said their manager. “This house will go immediately. You’re planning to move in mid-August? That’s not soon enough. We only need 60 days for settlement.” Also anticipating a quick sale, several of my neighbors told me how sorry they were to see me go – “your house is so gorgeous,” they said, as though my leaving would somehow diminish the value of their own property. One of the officers of our association even called me a “traitor,” for abandoning him. And as for me, I’d already talked myself into my new apartment, readying myself to leave a house I’ve loved for 20 years, willing to give up my fireplace and some of my beloved art, begun picturing myself living in a smaller, newer, less complicated space. It’ll change my life, I thought, and give me new direction, not a bad thing as I approach my 75th birthday.
A professional photographer came to document the spaces in my house with an extreme wide-angle lens that helped produce a beautiful brochure that made the rooms seem huge. My agent scheduled an open house for other real estate firms, and a day when home-seekers themselves could inspect (or curious neighbors see how I live). I put away all the objects that proclaimed my house “mine,” so that prospective buyers could imagine making their own memories in their new rooms. I had the carpets cleaned, the windows washed, planted new flowers in the pots in the garden. But after an initial mostly desultory response – only one agent came to the agents’ open house and no prospective buyers flocked to the Sunday my house was open to all, the carpet-cleaner guy who seemed enthusiastic about owning the house couldn’t raise the necessary cash, the single lady doctor with a child and a live-in nanny thought the house too dark and the ceilings too low, the mixed-race couple frowned and passed, the young couple who want the house have to sell their condo first – the interest and action so optimistically predicted has trickled to a halt, like water from the end of a hose that’s recently been turned off. The timing hasn’t helped: first it was Memorial Day, then Father’s Day, then the Fourth of July. And the weather here, breaking records at over 100 degrees for each of the last ten days, is not conducive to house-hunting. Even our mayor, in daily phone calls, is urging everyone to stay at home.
While I’m not yet desperate, I am discouraged. A house across the street, similar to mine but smaller and listed for slightly less, sold after only 30 days on the market. A house in my own complex, built exactly like mine but with some interior alterations and listed a week after mine for $15,000.00 more, sold in three days. Odd that It was purchased by the doctor who found my ceilings too low. And two townhouses in a complex just south of mine sold immediately, one in the same day it was listed. So I know there’s activity. And I’m convinced there’s someone out there in the world just dying to live in my house; we just have to find him, which brings me back to my agent, whose job it is, I feel, to rustle up that person. But the agent is back-peddling, giving me all the reasons why “this is a bad time, a tough market, a very particular house, needing a very particular buyer.” I’ve suggested that I send a personal email to all the real estate agents – some of them friends of mine – listed in the back pages of the gay paper. Maybe I could feed them lunch, or dinner? No; not a good idea, says my agent. Well how about a sign outside advertising my house for sale, even though our association bylaws prohibit that? You wouldn’t want to upset your neighbors, my agent tells me. I’ve even schlepped to the Catholic book store in Towson, parking illegally while I purchased a St. Joseph medal to plant upside down in my garden. But so far, none of these efforts has paid off.
At the beginning of this quest to sell my house I talked myself into moving, imagined living in a new space, looked forward to a major change in my life. How odd it now seems that I find myself moving in the opposite direction, preparing myself for the now possible letdown of remaining exactly where (and how), at nearly 75, I already am.
Stay tuned.
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