That’s what the Saturday morning maid service is for.
Then there’s the couple last night who were searching for a home (in St. Louis?) on a relatively modest budget. The woman was completely preoccupied with fitting her large, run-of-the-mill, mass-produced dining room table into the house. They loved the house but complained over and over that the dining room table wouldn’t fit, and what a sacrifice it would be.
Who searches for a $200M item around a $2M item? And who is emotionally invested in their dining room table, unless it was, I don’t know, late grandma’s or George Washington’s dining room table?
They ended up buying the place and the woman said that her old dining room set is in storage until they can afford a larger home. :smack:
This was the same couple who walked into a first-story bathroom that didn’t have frosted glass on the window. They complained over and over about how the people on the deck would be able to see right in. I guess they’ve never heard of blinds. Or maybe installing them was just too much for them to handle.
Finally, we have the Asian couple who didn’t want stairs for safety reasons because their daughter was 2. And she might fall down them!!! They ended up in a ranch home that had no stairs, but did have an unfenced pool in the back yard. Oooookay.
Since moving from right around the corner from Drain Beads not-exactly-expensive town to outside of cleveland, I figured I’d check the same search.
There is exactly 1 (one) house under $1M with 7,000 sqft, and the last one on the list, with its price reduced, came in at $5,995,000:eek:
'Course, if you are willing to look outside that zip code, you’ll find a few more options (including a church!)
But, if I send my husband in here, I can’t TALK about him here! Or about interesting stuff I might have done before we were married! 
As for cleaning the house, I figure I can just spritz the kids and dogs with Endust every day, and take care of a lot of messes!
I would love to do a show about all the freaky houses I saw when house-hunting.
My wife and I gave them nick-names. There was:
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The Cliff Dwelling: the house was okay, but the backyard was visibly eroding into a fifty-foot cliff - down below were some neighbours yards. The fence was mostly over, and the backyard garage was - held up by a couple of cinderblocks awkwardly wedged in. Looking left and right, the neighbours all had serious concrete revetments like something out of the beach defences at Normandy on D-Day. Obviously, something like that was necessary, at who-knows-what expense. Pass.
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The Cigarette House: owned by one of those old ladies that beat the odds and survived smoking two packs a day until she was ninety - the last four decades of which, in this house. The place was thoroughly permiated with tobacco tar - the walls were brown and sticky. I suppose if one tore out all the carpets, painted everything, and changed the duct-work, it would no longer smell like an ashtray, but who knows? Pass.
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The Boo Radley: place had a rough, unfurnished basement - except that in the back, furthest from the stairs, there was a bedroom with ensuite bathroom - and a heavy-duty padlock on the outside. WTF? Considered, then passed for other reasons.
Buyer: “What’s up with these bathroom faucets?”
Realtor: “Well, the house was built seven years ago, so the fixtures are going to be dated.”
Buyer: “Yeah, well, those would have to be replaced.”
SEVEN YEARS??? Seven year old bathroom faucets are “dated”? So dated they would have to be replaced? What is up with these people?
I had to laugh at the woman from Houston tonight. She asked if a very nice countertop was granite. When told it wasn’t, she said she didn’t like it.
I’ll bet if the realtor had said “It isn’t granite, it’s a newer material and more expensive than granite”, the buyer would have been fine with it.
And if you don’t know what granite looks like, why would you care?
Heh - that is funny. I think the updated things in our bathroom are older than seven years (our house is about 40 years old).
Middlebro used to work for a stonework company. You wouldn’t get him to have Travertino Romano in his house in a million years… but it’s the marble everybody wanted for the bathroom, and often with a treatment that’s completely inappropriate for humid environments.
When asked about granite countertops, he starts ticking off reasons why it’s a PoS and runs out of fingers: I don’t remember them all, but there’s things such as “too pricey for its real worth; you’re unlikely to crack a slab through, but dropping a metal pot on it can crack it, that crack can’t be fixed except by replacing the slab”.
exactly why I would prefer a good butchersblock countertop, I have a beautiful slab of marble that came off a marble top table I bought at auction for candy and pastry work.
Add to the list you can seriously fuck up knives by not putting a wooden or plastic cutting block down and just chopping on the counter [like i have seen people doing in the several months after shots]
You can spall the stone if you pot a hot wet pot down on cold marble travertine is pourous and fragile.
Yeah, granite looks really great when it’s new, and presumably when it’s old if it’s properly cared for. But I care more about whether my kitchen is functional, which means I don’t have to ‘babysit’ my everyday tools like counter tops! I want a counter top I can just spray down with bleach-based cleanser, wipe up with a wet sponge, dry off, and go!
Plus granite is so hard that if a dish slips out of your hands, it seems a foregone conclusion that it will chip. Laminate or Corian/Staron/whatever are a lot more forgiving.
I have granite and I wipe it down every day with Windex and a paper towel. I also put hot stuff from the oven right on it. People tend to forget that it’s just a polished rock and is extremely durable. After 10 years, it still looks as good as the day it was installed.
That being said, I did switch to Corelle dishes because it liked to eat my Pfaltzgraf.
Thanks for the info. After Sattua’s post, I was wondering “In a fight between a granite counter top and Corelle dishes, which would win?”
We have Corelle because we have an overactive 11YO!
i always thought converting a church into a home would be fantastic! when i see churches for sale i revist the dream of converting it to a house.
in my neighbourhood there was one for sale for 3 million; church, rectory, convent, and school. they ended up knocking down the whole thing and are building town houses for 700,000 each. i’ve toured the model town house when they were done. i was not impressed by them and thought it was way too much money for them.
a few blocks away from my house; there is a church and convent for 1.5 million. hopefully i’ll win the lottery soon.
Another thing I noticed-- if you were to go by House Hunters, you’d believe that 98% of the US is married, 49% are gay married and 30% of the straight married couples are interracial.
We’re in the planning stages of a kitchen renovation, and the countertop material is a concern. We’re worried that granite will end up looking dated, but it’s very pretty. I’m also looking into recycled glass countertops, which are gorgeous and eco-friendly.
I like quartz. I just saw a magazine article with a kitchen with soapstone countertops. Nava, what does your brother think of those?
We just had a desk custom made and I was thinking about a slate top, but it was too hard to get information about it, and we just went with oak.
On my iPod so excuse the iPodiness of my posts.
Can you make pithy comments like “oh yeah, that’s right. Surround-sound showerhead system look awesome.” and “What are you smoking? Full length funhouse mirrors are all the rage!”
Then you’d be perfect for Bang for your Buck.