Throughout our life together, the General and I have both purchased and sold ten homes. Of the ten homes purchased, five have been new-builds. Consequently, we didn't anticipate many surprises.
Before putting our last home on the market, we contacted a realtor to do a walk-through, suggest for us the best guess at what price the home and property should be listed for, and point out any changes that we needed to make for the home to show better.
I was shocked when the realtor said: “You need to move a lot of things out of your home before we put it on the market. She cautioned: “Less is More”. As we walked from room to room, she pointed out the furniture and artwork that needed to be removed”.
I didn’t offer a rebuttal, but I did have the thought that this is not our first rodeo. As I shared, we have bought and sold many homes, and we have never mostly moved out of a home before the house could be put on the market.
The realtor did consent for us to move things out of the house and into the garage. We carefully, and perhaps grudgingly, followed every suggestion that had been made.
When we were done, our oversized garage was packed full of stuff and much to our surprise, both my wife and I, liked our home better. We saw with our own eyes that “less is more”.
Though I didn’t verbalize it, I had the thought, “I hope our house doesn’t sell. This place looked awesome.” I had to have been delusional to think it was time to move.
Within two weeks, our home sold and we made arrangements to have everything we own moved into a climate-controlled storage unit while we build the next house. We are now living like a millennial – we have nothing, absolutely nothing at our disposal.
Did you catch what I said: “We moved everything we owned into storage. That included the stuff in the garage that we had moved out of the house. Why didn’t we take the things in the garage to Goodwill or give them away to someone we knew? Why did we choose to hang onto stuff after we saw with our own eyes that less is more?
There are several answers to that question. Perhaps tomorrow I will reveal more.
All My Best!
Don