A couple of months ago, my husband and I realized we didn’t have enough stress-induced stomachaches in our lives, so we decided to sell our house and buy another one. We’re always coming up with really, really smart plans like that. (See: Hooters Appalachian Resort time-share, 1998-1999.)
The first thing I had to do to make this happen was get our house in shape so someone would want to buy it for trillions of dollars. So I immediately enacted “The Tub Offensive” in which I put everything we own into plastic tubs from Target. That way, when a potential buyer opens up a closet door, instead of getting hit in the face with 50 pounds of junk, she gets hit in the face with 50 pounds of junk in an attractive blue tub. I know, it’s amazing I don’t have my own lifestyle show by now.
I also cleaned up by using Space Bags, which are the plastic bags you put your cashmere sweater collection into, then vacuum out all of the air until it resembles a 5-foot long piece of beef jerky. They actually work really well—until you need to open one up and suddenly find yourself in the eye of a Category F4 tornado. I still have wounds on my right arm from a couple of pressure-packed cardigans that smacked into me going 50 mph. And now I’ll probably have to wear my stupid swim skirt all winter long because I’m too scared to open up the jeans bag.
But the worst part about hiding all of our things away is that we have no f-in clue where anything is now. Ten times a day, my husband begins a sentence with, “What’d you do with…” At first, I really tried to give him the right answer. “Oh, the digital thermometer? Try the breadbox. The paint thinner? I think it’s next to the Children’s Tylenol.” But now I just roll my eyes and scream, “How the hell should I know? Happy hunting, suckerman!” while I reach into the toilet tank for a can of Diet Coke. I mean, is it my fault if he can’t figure out where I hid his inhaler? He’s a smart guy, he’ll find it before the ambulance arrives.
After a few weeks of this, our house was finally organized and our realtor sent over a “Professional Stager” to tell us what we did wrong. A stager’s job is to make houses look like they’re model homes, so they’ll give educated advice like, “Move that cabinet over to the left” and “Are you really married to that Manilow poster on your bedroom ceiling?” Luckily, she didn’t make us do too much besides put a modified shower curtain over the litter box to hide it from potential buyers. Now Miss Dickens feels like Johnny Carson every time she has to take a crap.
HEEEEEERRRRREEEE’S CAT PEE!
And speaking of crap, once the house was ready to go, we immediately had calls from people who wanted to come take a look. We had one showing the first night, then the next day we had a showing at 10 a.m. and another showing at 2 p.m. Luckily, this was also our school carnival day, so we had somewhere to be while people walked around our house and judged my taste in bedding. (“Look at that, Harold—she obviously didn’t get the memo that 200-thread count sheets are only for motels and correctional facilities. What a loser.”) Finally, after five long hours of being away from our house, we walked back in, tired and worn out, and were greeted with—two huge turds in the middle of the living room. Huzzah! Real estate’s FUN!
My visiting parents, husband and kids just stood and stared at the glowing brown lumps, so I immediately swept in with a roll of paper towels and a can of Lysol and cleaned it up like a Ringling Bros. janitor. Then I called our real estate agent and breathlessly told her what had happened. “I. AM. APPAWL-ED, Weendi!” was her reaction, and she quickly rang the two agents who’d been at our house to ask if they’d brought a dog inside. Both said they, of course, didn’t and would never have a dog with them, but had definitely seen the poop, and slowly fingers began to be pointed at sweet, little Miss Dickens. “No way! She’d never do that!” I yelled as I clutched her bony frame to my chest. “She’s 19 ½ years old and she’s never once had a free-range bowel movement! For the love of God, she’s not an animal. She watches PBS!”
“Well, okay, calm down,” my mom said. “But, um, what size were the turds exactly? The size of a small dog or a large dog? Or did they look more—human?”
My CSI parents then went on to tell me that I really should have taken a picture of the feces “for my blog thing” and it was even suggested that I actually pull the smelly evidence out of the trash to “get a better look” and compare it to the festering delights inside the litter box. Like some bizarre poop matching game they played in the Dark Ages before TV. Seriously, does this shit ever happen on House Hunters International? Does it?!
But I have to say that all of the drama, hard work, sore muscles, $200 worth of Space Bags and intense carpet shampooing were worth it because the next day, we got a full-price offer on our house. Less than 72 hours after putting it on the market and to the wonderful people who were able to overlook the poop. And in this economy, with so many people struggling to sell their houses, that’s something just short of an absolute miracle.
We’ll be moving into our new house that’s just across the road next month and we’re very, very excited. But until that chaos begins, we’d really love to just sit down, relax and toast our good luck.
If we only knew which tub held the corkscrew.
Congrats on the sale & new house! Maybe the “surprise” was from the people who liked and eventually bought your house. No better way to mark a house and ensure no one else will bid on it.
I was worried there about your UFT (unidentified floor turds). Glad you figured it out.
Maybe you should start a “poo is the new rabbit’s foot” trend.
Sell your house in Three! Days! with our Lucky Crap!
That is wonderful, and you are WAY lucky! Good luck with the new house!
My guess is that the people who put in the offer are the ones who left the poop – to make the house less enticing to those who came after them. Keep an eye on them until you close.
It’s never the cat!
Congratulations on selling the house – even with poop on the floor! In today’s market, that really is lucky.
Could you come to my house?? I have 6 people crammed into a three bedroom. The mere thought of all the stuff I have to do to get it on the market makes me collapse on my couch and down a bottle of wine while watching Sister Wives and My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding.
Oh and Congrats!
congrats to you for selling it even with the poop! pretty cool 😛
I’m so happy that the sale went smoothly (aside from the poop and all the tubs, of course). I can feel your relief from here. You can just shove the corks down into the wine. But then you have to drink the whole bottle. (ha ha, like anyone WOULDN’T drink the whole bottle!) or buy screw top. Oh my god, you know you’re just drinking box wine anyway so what’s with all this “I have a corkscrew” bragging? The only thing bad about the box is that you don’t know when you’ve drunk a bottle’s worth of wine, you know, a serving.
“Seriously, does this shit ever happen on House Hunters International?” Well probably not that exact one, you know, but I bet there’s some on an outtake somewhere. Tears in my eyes from laughing so hard and congrats on the houses!
I have the lovely blue (and green) boxes hiding stuff on the other side…after we moved in. My husband can’t find anything either and I still say “Good Luck” to him if he really needs whatever it is among this stuff. By the way, any suggestions for a twelve year old boy who can’t fit all 20 crates of Legos into his new room and yet can’t find it within himself to let go of them?!
Next time I’m looking to sell, it’s good to know all we need is space bags, plastic bins and poop. Thanks for the tips!
My favorite real estate ad of all time had this little gem of a typo: “….huge dick for entertaining…”. I think EVERY house should come with one of those.
It doesn’t end there… we moved in August, and I want to tattoo “It’s in a box in the basement!” across my chest.
We’ve talked offline (that makes me important to say words like ‘offline’) about all this moving biz. It’s so shitty. And in your case…actually shitty.
So awesome on the speed with which it all got done, though.
The more I read about your parents the more I love them! Your mom is my hero! I totally would have asked if the poop was from a human.
I spoke to Miss Dickens and she pointed her paw at one of the real estate agents.
72 hours? That’s awesome. Unheard of these days too. We sold ours to the first person who looked at it. But that was back in 2007.
At least your stuff is in tubs in your house. Mine is in boxes and large black trash bags in my FIL’s basement. Hunting around for a winter sweater involves a half-hour drive and an asthma attack.
Tights and leggings are very in this year. Throw a pair under the swim skirt, slap a belt over that skirt – perhaps one with a flashy turquoise belt buckle – and some Tami Taylor boots. No need to brave the Space Bag of Jeans.
You’re welcome. I’m always available for fashion advice.
Congratulations on the house sale and purchase. Does Miss Dickens get to take the shower curtain with her or did it convey in the sale?
But…but…but…(butt…)
Inquiring minds must know:
Who pooped it???
Congratulations on the quick sale, hope the whole process goes that well for you guys. Also, as a buyer’s agent, I have to tell you that for the rest of the day, the people who didn’t buy your house referred to it as “The poop house”. Sorry, but that’s how it works 🙂
I gotta agree with the very first comment about where the poo came from. I was just thinking that if more people behaved like squirrels and domesticated animals it sure would be more peaceful.
Congratulations on the sale. My favorite visual is you and your family carrying furniture out of one house across the street to the new one. I may smile for days.
Nice going, smartie! Now the buyers will read about the poop in your “blog thing” and take their offer back.
Can’t wait to read about your perfect 1-hour moving experience!
I love HEEEEERES CAT PEE!
Congrats again on the new house and esp on selling the pooporium!
Teehee’s all the way through. And congrats! What a miracle, for sure.
Next time I’m selling,I’ll need to borrow your lucky cat turds, m’kay? Oh, right, not that it was Miss Dickens. Surely not.
Boy…did I need this laugh tonight! If you were smart like we were when we moved a few years ago, you didn’t label ANY of those snazzy blue tubs. I’m not sure if that would have done any good anyway since they would have been adhered with signage like, “Crap,” “More Crap,” Misc. Crap,” “Random Clutter,” and “Debris Collection.” Congrats on the home sale!! AWESOME!
And to think that I went to all the trouble of securing, then burying, a St. Joseph statue in my yard (patron saint of real estate!)…when all I really had to do was take a lucky crap on the floor. Next time I’ll know!
I just got a horrible flashback to carting all our stuff to our neighbors apartment everytime someone wanted to see our place. This is hilarious.
Though I laughed out loud with your “tub offensive,” (needs to be in the urban dictionary) I’m dying here.
WHOSE turd was it???
Brava!
You might want to lay in a little more chardonnay when it comes to time to move and you realize that you will have closing utility bills from one house and new utility bills from the other, and “moving expenses,” which occur when the Man of the House declares that HE can do the moving. (Don’t believe him.)
Congrats, Wendi! But I’m pretty sure it was the buyer’s poop–marking their territory.
I always suspected those Sweater Bags had fine print and were ripe for class action lawsuits. Now I feel justified in keeping my clutter — it’s the safe thing to do.
congratulations!! And, your new house is across the road, you say!? So you have ample opportunity to spy on the new owners and confirm that they do indeed have a big dog!!!
Must have been some Occupy Austin protestors making some political protest about the outrageous fees that real estate agents command. I’m guessing.
I bet it was Miss Dickens. I bet she does not want to move and saw a way to stop it from happening.
It’s hard for me to say this definitively, but I think this is your best ever. Though I am TOTALLY picturing two looky-loos who couldn’t afford the price range taking a poopy-poo when the realtor’s back was turned, out of sheer bitterness.
BTW whenever we sell a house here in the Bay Area, where the home staging craze really found manure in which to blossom, I refer to it as “tarting up the joint to look like a French whore.”
Wow! I’m a REALTOR, I’ll have to tell my sellers about cat poop!! you don’t read about THAT in “How To Help Sellers Sell Their House!” Great news — getting an offer so fast! no stress lately, eh??? yeah, right.
congrats!
I will double that offer! As long as the litter box curtain stays, I mean.
Congrats! I’m sure it wasn’t the cat.
I’m potty training my daughter, so I frequently find myself in a game of “whose shit is this”. Did the dog do it, or was it the baby? Then I realized if it is on the floor, it belongs to the dog. Because he eats the baby’s turds.
Very funny post. Congratulations on your new house and the sale of the old one. You are indeed very lucky.
That reminds me of the mysterious unflushed poops in my friend’s apartment–that she thought were her mother-in-law’s. Turned out to be the cat’s. Who knew the cat used the toilet?
Congrats! You think the buyers marked their territory like polar bears?
[…] The first thing I had to do to make this happen was get our house in shape so someone would want to buy it for trillions of dollars. So I immediately enacted “The Tub Offensive” in which I put everything we own into plastic tubs from Target. That way, when a potential buyer opens up a closet door, instead of getting hit in the face with 50 pounds of junk, she gets hit in the face with 50 pounds of junk in an attractive blue tub. I know… continued […]
hahaha, what a great post. It just goes to show that a bit of poop does not harm!! Well done on the sale!
CJ xx