Here it is, a Tuesday, and we actually had two showings today! One was 10 AM and the other was in the afternoon. We’ll find out by tomorrow how they went, but I’m blown away that we were probably someone’s first house seen today. Anyway, this is all just a whole lot of hassle until a contract appears.
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Kelly’s phone rang twice this weekend as we had two scheduled showings. We could see the first prospects had looked around but couldn’t see any evidence the second set had visited. It turns out they turned tail as soon as they saw the tracks. They never got a chance to read my “Tracks Facts” sheet which may have answered their questions.

On the other hand, on Sunday we showed it to a real estate friend who seemed to like the house. She suggested a financing move which may make it easy for our renting neighbors to buy the house – something we’d like to see happen.

We would be very happy to sell it to our neighbors even if we don’t get as much as we might otherwise. It would feel good knowing we helped give our friends a permanent spot in the neighborhood they already know and love.

In an effort to jump-start our home-selling experience, we’ve knocked a little off the top of our Great Raleigh Home. Kelly and I (and a friend in the biz) talked it over and decided we weren’t doing ourselves any favors by being the most expensive house on the market in our neighborhood. We pulled our initial asking price out of thin air, so perhaps we weren’t being realistic.

We’ll see if any of those close-but-no-cigar folks now turn into winners.

Update: Scratch that. We’re holding off on the price change. We may … may have found a buyer!

The talk last night at UCLUG about Zenoss went well, with the exception of finding the place a little after the meeting had already started. Fortunately I was the second act, so nobody noticed.

I was fired up about speaking and it showed. I was funny and engaging and improvised a few clever wisecracks here and there. It didn’t hurt that there was a familiar face in the crowd: my former Raritan coworker Wes Yates, a wisecracker himself.

I’ve got to find more speaking gigs, or join one of the Toastmasters groups here. Speaking to groups (and especially interacting with them) is a heck of a lot of fun.

My optimism over yesterday’s showing got the best of me. Close, but no cigar. Here’s the feedback we received:

My buyers liked the sitting area in the master bedroom and the smooth ceilings. They loved the gas stove and huge backyard. They were disappointed about seeing the train tracks in the rear. They felt this house did not have enough storage and that the cabinets needed refinishing. Thanks for allowing us the opportunity to tour this very nice property.

Hrmph. “Very nice property.” Like kissing your sister, isn’t it?

I suppose I should post the house ad on local train forums. Maybe I could post a sign at the next New Hope Valley Railroad riding day!

On another note, I have no way of really knowing who did what yesterday: whether the Bookmarker was our prospect or someone else. Or the Slow-Roller for that matter. We’ll just have to see. Kelly tells me we’ve had a dozen showings so far, which really ain’t too shabby. Eventually we’ll find The One.

I know I’m not supposed to count my chickens and all that, but today was full of very good signs. We had our first weekday showing today and it has been a very promising one! Kelly of course beat feet when the time came to show the house so she never saw how long they were here. She did, however, pick up on a very valuable clue: our guests had sat down at our table!
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I got an excited call from Kelly Friday afternoon, proudly informing me of a showing we had Saturday afternoon at 1. We scrambled to get the house in shape and get ourselves out to Marbles, only to get a call before we left telling us the client had to cancel due to a “missed flight.” I suppose the wickedly high winds from yesterday’s cold front disrupted air traffic.
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