The Long and Short of It...

Marketing and selling your home stinks.  Period.

We had four showings this past weekend.  Yes, you read that right, FOUR showings in three days.  That's more showings than we've had in the past three months.  (Well, that might be a slight exaggeration... but whose counting, right?)  The point is back-to-back showings meant a weekend of picking up, wiping down, vacuuming incessantly, and basically threatening my children within an inch of their lives not to touch, disturb, or breathe on anything that had been tidied.

All accounts are that our house had great reviews - one couple indicated they have narrowed their potential home choice to ours and one other while another couple had narrowed down to ours as one of four.  One group our realtor couldn't 'get a good read on' and the last set of potential buyers have yet to provide any feedback, although they specifically contacted our realtor via the internet with a request to see our house.  Now, two of those groups (the one that narrowed our home to one of four + the one that had yet to provide feedback) spent an absurd amount of time in our house.  And that is NOT an exaggeration.  The first couple spent nearly an HOUR AND A HALF while the last group nearly an HOUR.

What in God's dear name were they doing in our house for that long?  Making themselves at home?  Watching movies? (By the way, our remote is missing...) Helping themselves to snacks? (Did I mention that a previous house viewer from early December took it upon themselves to help partake of nearly an entire plate of Christmas cookies I had sitting out - FOR MY CHILDREN?) Digging around in my unmentionables drawer?  I dunno.  All I know is somebody better bring an offer after kicking us out of our home for that long - because as much as I want to sell the darn thing - it isn't really convenient to be out of the house for long periods of time, on a weekend, with three little kids, and a whole host of stuff to get done (including what is now five loads of laundry.)

I know - I'm being bitter.  I should be happy that there is so much activity and that people want to spend that much time in our home to 'test' it out or see if they can get whatever 'vibe' they are looking for in a new home.  And I am... I'm just tired of constantly picking up and cleaning up and barking at the kids to keep their crap picked up - and not allowing them to be kids and freely make messes (like cutting out paper snowflakes) without cringing and adding up in my head just how long it will take to clean up the remnants of their creativity.

So the long and short of it is... I'm tired.  And I'm over this.  It's time to get ourselves an offer and get this show on the road.

Literally.