For Sale

Last night Scott and I visited with a realtor. The idea of the meeting was to get ideas of what needs to be improved on the house to get it market ready. We were thinking about putting the house up for sale next January. We figured six months would be enough time to sell. Boy were we wrong. The realtor said the market is still very bleak, especially for our area. It may take two seasons to sell. What I mean by seasons is the peak time to sell a house is between March and July. When asked about what improvements to make, the realtor had a long list of things. Not sure if we should do them just yet. So here is the plan. I have about two weeks to get it market ready as is. Clean, clean and clean some more. Oh and we also have to purge the house of about half our belongings. After the house is ready the realtor is going to show it to get feedback on what really does need to be improved. If we have no offers as is, then we will take the house of the market for a month and do the improvements necessary to sell. If at the end of the season and no sale then we will again take it off the market and start over next spring. Wow, who knew! Now I know you are thinking that we still have a year left of residency, where are we going to live? We figured if the house sold this summer than we would get an apartment. Worst case scenario, the kids and I would move to Iowa and stay with my parents. Then Scott would fly home when he had time. Yah, that totally sucks so we won't go there. So now we wait and see. I have been thinking about all that needs to be done before showing and I am feeling a little overwhelmed. Cleaning this house from top to bottom (like it has never been cleaned before) and packing 1/2 our stuff and storing it while still trying to maintain my family and job. Yep. Overwhelmed!!! Wish me luck:)