Any advice/stories re: showing a house with 2 young children

[lmintzer]

We are sad to be leaving Chicago this spring and are just getting ready to put our house on the market. We did a walk through with our realtor today who recommended some small projects. I know we can manage those, but my main concern is just how we can ready the house on a daily basis for showings. I am a pretty neat person by nature, but the reality is that 2 kids under 4 live here. Our living room is also our play room, and the toys tend to spread out. When dh or I are alone with the kids, we can't really clean up the kitchen as we go. It looks like a bomb hit it until either nap or bedtime.

Also, how do you work around naptime and bedtime? Joshua takes an a.m. nap, both take a p.m. nap, and both are in bed before 8.

Our realtor is our good friend's mom--so she's been very nice and helpful and has kids and grandkids of her own. But I'd hate for the remnants of a "child tornado" to ruin our chances of getting top dollar for our home. We live in a very desirable area, so we should have a fair bit of interest. But we will be selling in the winter, just after New Year's, and we will have to sell within about 30 days. I am so stressed! Not to mention the out-of-state house hunting and buying we'll have to be doing too.

[himom]

We did this and it wasn't easy even with just one under two!

I finally decided to put DS down for his naps when he needed them and not worry about showings. If people came during those times I would explain to them that they were welcome to see the room but I would appreciate it if they kept their voices down since the baby was asleep. I'd open the door for them, walk in with them, answer questions, etc. Just quietly. :)

We went to a showing where a baby was asleep and it didn't bother us at all.

As for the mess, we just followed up with toy put-away as best we could, but didn't stress about it. Scattered toys, while not ideal, don't make a huge difference unless the buyer is unable to see the floors at all, etc. The kitchen was harder -- we had a lot of fast clean-up sandwiches or take-out on days when we knew there were showings.

HTH!

Jodi
Mommy to Joshua, born February 2003

[StaceyKim]

I did this with one baby and it wasn't that easy! Luckily our house sold in 7 days to the first person who saw it (in Chicago). Everytime we had a showing I stressed out because I had to put all the toys away so it looked adult friendly.

It was September so I could take my DS for a walk while they did the showings. I don't have much advice for you with the 2 kids but I wish you luck.

[dowlinal]

Do you have any family close by? When we sold our house this summer with a 6 month old I spent the first weekend at my parents. We put the house on the market Fri morning and had an openhouse that Sun. I stayed away until Sun night. I left her toys and gear at my parents for the next week and just went there whenever someone wanted to see the house. We had a lot of people those first three days and only a handful the next week.

We also put in the listing that there was a small child in the house so we need 2 hours notice before showing.

[MegND95]

I just went through this and I will not mince words....it was terrible!!! (We just moved to a western Chicago suburb!). Anyway, we did like a pp mentioned and requested at least two hours notice for all showings. That will give you enough time to pick up around the house. But I worked very hard to stay on top of not only toy pick-up, but also the surface cleaning. Virtually every night, I would try to wipe down the bathrooms, and floors. It was stressfull for the entire family, because I felt like I followed the kids around the house all day cleaning! I may have gone a bit overboard, but I really wanted the house to show well.

We were also fortunate to have a neighbor across the street where we could go when the house was shown. And most often I was able to work around nap time, but I also had people walk through with all three kids asleep.

Good luck to you and I hope your house sells quickly.

[C99]

Lisa,

Omigoodness, you are leaving?!? I am sorry to read that. Did you decide on Pittsburgh or Milwaukee, or haven't you made the decision yet? Did I miss a post about it?

No advice on selling a house.

[lmintzer]

Thanks for the replies. I figured it would be hard. We could probably go to a friend's house locally or maybe to my mom's, but that is 45 mins. away. Not always convenient.

Caroline, yep, we're leaving. I am hoping for a miracle, but aside from that, it's almost a done deal. DH still hasn't signed a contract, but he has offers in both Philly and Milwaukee.

[ShayleighCarsensMom]

We just went through this...its very stressful!
I used baby gates and a lot of videos...
I would clean a section of the house and baby gate them out of it...so I would let them play and trash the family room so that the rest would stay clean. We also rented a storage unit and filled it full of everything that cluttered up the house (and about 3/4 of our toys).
When someone called for a showing, I would get a couple of empty laundry baskets, and instead of putting everything away, I would throw it all in the laundry basket and either put it in the garage or in my car!
Its not easy, but if you have people make appointments, it works best...also, the first week your house is on the market is the busiest...so if there is any way you can go visit someone out of town or stay with a friend for a few days, it is a lot less stressful (and your house stays clean)! I did this with the kids while DH stayed (so he would be home alone at night and at work in the day, LUCKY GUY!)
Good luck, and feel free to email me if you need more advice!
ETA:
I know this may sound gross, but When I had a messy kitchen and a quick showing, I would put all my dirty dishes in the refridgerator (or anything that was on the counter for that matter!)...whos going to look in there??? :) There, now all my dirty secrets are out!

[wagner36]

Hi Lisa!

I'm so sorry to see you go, but, as someone who recently bought a house in OP, and looked at probably about 150 houses here in two years, I don't think you should worry! Especially since I think I remember that you live on the NW side, and thus probably in the 60302 zip code, which is in crazy demand right now (especially if you're in Mann's boundaries) since that article in the Trib a few weeks ago. Seriously, though, when we were looking at houses that had kid stuff strewn about, it didn't bother us at all, since it gave us a way to picture our family living in a house. Most of the people moving to OP these days are young couples with children (or soon to be having children), so I think you'll find that your house is much more desirable to those families then the house of an older couple - because it is just harder to picture yourself there.

Plus, when we were looking at houses it was the deep dark dirt that I was looking at - not clutter. I swear, there are people who don't even wash their windows before putting their houses on the market! Clean windows and baseboards were the things that I looked for most - I hated the idea of buying a house that had a gzillion years of someone else's ground-in dirt. Clutter didn't bother us a bit!

You can always come to our house when you have showings! We have a dining room that is a playroom (with the previous owner's hideous wallpaper still - that's my next project after the bathroom remodel) and Charlie would LOVE help spreading his toys around our house!

[ellies mom]

When we put our house on the market DD wasn't mobile yet so that was a big help. Like a PP said we put everything but the bare neccesities in storage. Since DD wasn't mobile I had it a bit easier, but I would spend the first part of the morning getting the nursery, our bedroom and bathrooms in shape. We used paper and plastic everything to cut down on dishes (wasteful I know).

One thing to warn about though. Even if you ask people to call in advance, the majority of them call from your front step. Drove me crazy. I did notice that if you give the disclaimer "don't mind the mess I just finished feeding, bathing, etc", everyone totally understood. Which is good because they didn't exactly give notice, and when they did they'd be really early or so late that I'd be pulling back up to the house and they were still there.

Good luck, I hope it sells really fast.

[HGraceMom]

I invested in some kmart / target large opaque, not clear! plastic bins - one for the kitchen, one in the main bath, one for my desk, and kept a few covered rattan / wicker laundrey baskets in the family room for all of DD's toys & stuff...

Every time a realtor called with short notice, I swept the area contents into the bins & stacked them in the closest closet. No one would open the bins & see the mess, or peek in the baskets - you'd just assume they were toys, I guess.

Like a pp, I really tried to stay on top of the house keeping, doing a quick once-over every night after bedtime - it helped me from the panic attacks every time the phone or doorbell rang.

As for the naps, I tried staying home with her while she was sleeping, but our realtor said that's not ideal - we ended up taking many long walks. When she fell asleep in the stroller, I let her finish her nap there - it wasn't the best situation, but worked. Lookiing back, when we were house hunting, I absolutely hated when the home owner was present while we were looking at homes with our realtor - DH & I didn't feel like we could speak freely, and we tended not to spend as much time in those homes. When you're looking at older homes, the more time you can spend in it, the better.

[alexsmommy]

Mmm, another Oak Parker who uses their dining room as a play room? I told Lisa all the same things you did - I don't think the house will be on the market for very long. Heck, if we could afford to move this year, I'd be nagging DH about it right now - even though we really need four bedrooms on the second floor...It's a great house.
Any chance your DH took Charlie to Rehm park this summer? There was the cutest little boy named Charlie there who was close to Alex's age who was there several times at the same time as we were this summer...

Alaina
Alex 2-4-03

[wagner36]

It could have been them - DH takes Charlie to Rehm a couple times a week, I think. My DH is 6'4" with a beard and long auburn hair, so he's pretty hard to miss. He did say, however, that a couple of times when he was there with Charlie, there was another little boy there named Charlie too.

Do you near there? We live across the street from Longfellow Park...

[alexsmommy]

We're just north of the Eisenhower and west of OP Ave. It's a nice walk to Rehm in summer. Must have been the other Charlie - but I just remembered there was a Charlie there who was with his Dad on weekdays and I thought I had seen you mention in another post that your DH was a SAHD I think I'd remember long hair though. Hee hee, of course now I'll be looking for him this summer so you may want to warn him that a random woman may ask him if his wife is on the BBB...
Alaina
Alex 2-4-03