Momentous, incredible, long-awaited, never thought I'd make it day yesterday. Mom's house is up for sale. Finally. It's been 8 months since Mom died. I think I spent more time in her house since then that I had spent visiting her since I left home when I was 18! I waited until after the holidays to get a cleaning company to come in to do the final deep cleaning and rug removal (couldn't leave that horrible 1960's era gold shag carpeting in there!) and I had to call them back twice to get the house cleaned to my satisfaction--not as thorough as I wanted them to be--banister not cleaned, couple of floors not swept or mopped, back porch not swept--lots of things like that. What we needed was one of those Russian or Ukranian girls that Michael's Aunt Eleni hires in Greece. Anyway, after I went back and cleaned up after them, we had the locks changed (they didn't work) and the roof cleaned (big clumps of moss on it), a landscaper came to get rid of the blackberry bushes (sorry, no more blackberry pies for awhile, but they'll come back) and then the pre-inspection. Met a very nice guy inspector. Collects all kinds of stuff from the 50s and he wanted the Borax dispenser above the laundry tub and the manual pencil sharper in the basement and a couple of old newspapers. I wish I'd met him before I cleaned the house out. I knew there were many people out there looking for old stuff, but didn't know any personally. We had Puget Sound Energy come to pick up the old refrigerator and upright freezer in the basement and take them away, too. I spent a couple of hours cleaning up where they'd been sitting for 40 years, ripping ugly green wallpaper off the basement wall and sweeping, sweeping, sweeping.
The garage is still full of my brother's furniture and "stuff". That's a loose thread. He still doesn't have anywhere to go, but he hasn't put any effort into finding a place either. Now he sees the handwriting on the wall, I hope. He's spending his money on cigarettes and pot--on the 18th of this month he told me he was out of money and food stamps. He's not handling his money any better than he ever has. I don't think I need to point out what lies ahead for him.
So the trigger has been pulled. The house is listed by Doug Hallock of Windemere Realty and Gerry Kearney of Dream Realty and you can see the listing here:
http://www.windermerekingston.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=detail&startrow=1&cfid=9563785&cftoken=21232495
If you know anyone interested in a fixer upper, this is it. The lock guy was interested in the shop and the big basement for more shop, so I'm hoping that will be a feature that gets some interest. As for me, I have to let go now. Just as I was leaving yesterday some people showed up to see the house. I instantly felt a protective feeling come over me. I wanted to be sure they had a real estate person with them and weren't just people who wanted to "get in". I knew I had to get out of there and LET IT GO. It's been my baby for so many months, my responsibility, being the one to get it ready. And now, like buying a daughter a lovely prom dress, overseeing a fancy hairdo, helping to pick out the shoes, inspecting the boy friend, I have to let her go and hope she has a good time. And hope she has a buyer who will take good care of her and appreciate her history.
