Dumpster Divers Delight
by house fiend
(NC)
A rare house came on the market last year. Rare- because instead of a cookie-cutter vinyl box, it had interesting angles covered with rustic wood siding and was located on a heavily wooded acre. For people who like numbers, it was listed for 104K with a tax value of 135k.
We called our agent, who agreed to meet us out there. She showed up with her husband (a builder) so we'd thought he'd be a help in checking out the house. Wrong.
The place looked like the people had just walked out the day before, down to the milk carton in the fridge (though swollen and looking like it was about to burst). The floor was littered with bank statements. receipts, empty medicine bottles and school pictures. Clothes hanging in closets.
It was hard enough to get a perspective on what the house would look like after a couple of dumpster loads were thrown out, but I was trying really hard. In the meantime our agent's husband, who is quite a prankster, was entertaining my husband- they were tiptoeing through the mess giggling like four year olds. I decided I'd had enough when he chased them out of the master bedroom with a ragged pair of strange underwear on a stick. Sigh.
Anyway, it was soon purchased for 98k. The buyers took out nearly all the trees, killing the appeal of the lot. It's now on the market again for 157k.
