Stresses of Selling a House

Who knew that having a house on the market could be so stressful? I'm sure a lot of people knew this already but for us this is all new so the last 22 days with our house for sale have been busier than we imagined, which is both good and bad. The day after we listed our house we had two showings scheduled which sort of just started us off on the wrong foot. We had done a lot of moving things around and cleaning when our realtor did a walk through and took pictures but it was no where near clean enough for people to start opening closets and cupboards. This put us in a rush even before anything really happened. After the first showings I thought I would have time to get more cleaned up but the fact is that we are now on showing number 6 and not much else has been done. I am certainly not going to complain about the amount of traffic coming through our house because its been great to have so much interest so soon but, having a 5 month old and a dog do not make this easy! Here is what happens when someone wants to see our house:

• Realtor's errand boy calls and asks if its ok if so-and-so realtor shows the house between time A and time B today
• Erin panics but always says yes because in this market, why say no
• Quickly think through the morning routine and figure out what could potentially be on the floors, on the counters, on the kitchen table, etc...
• Make time to get home to pick up said items, throwing baby toys and dog toys in various hidden places and wiping down all exposed surfaces and vacuuming if there is time
• Get Ella into the car and take her over to Karl's parents
• Get back to work and pray that nothing major was left out like bras hanging in the laundry room or dirty diapers near the changing pad
• If its a weekend, just hope that all this can be done and everyone can get out before people are at the door (this Saturday we failed because the people were early...booo)
• After the showing pick up Ella, go home and mess it all up again

I know that a lot of these little things probably aren't going to make or break a deal but I've watched a lot of HGTV over the years and they make a big deal out of everything so it causes me to panic every time. I would like to think someone can get past our dirty carpets and the baby toys that are too large to hide and see the house for what it could be for them. I would also like to think we could be better organized and keep things cleaner so I don't have to go through this routine every time but obviously that's unrealistic.

So far we have gotten good feedback from everyone that has been through it and in all honesty, we didn't think we would have much interest this early on. Our neighborhood was hit hard by foreclosures over the last year so that has hurt resale value a lot and there are also a few other houses for sale in the area. Like I said, I really shouldn't complain because we know several people that have had houses on the market for 9,10, 11 months with no luck. I am praying that we don't have to go through that and with the amount of time I have to spend hiding toys lately, it seems like we may not have to. If we do, posts about our house selling adventures may take a more serious and desperate tone.