Home Ownership

Billy and I want to put our house on the market next spring ... which means we have less than a year to get it into selling shape.

On our list of things we must do:

-- Replace the floors. We still have the fugly linoleum and the wrinkly, loose carpet that the previous owners put down. Also, the lino in our bathrooms isn't level with the hallway floor. So we have to correct all of that. We're planning to use "floating floor" for the kitchen and bathrooms and either hardwood laminate in the living room or recarpet. However, we'd have to recarpet the whole house to match. Ugh!

-- Landscape the yard. When we moved in, the yard looked great but it slowly began falling apart ... and we realized that just because something looks good doesn't mean it was done well. Our yard was full of sawdust ... which left dead spots, and the front beds were a wreck. I can't even explain the weird humps they landscaped in the back. So we've already leveled out the back, now we just need to remove a rampant vole population and fix the front. But it has to be done!

-- Repaint the house interior. We chose a lot of vibrant, bold colors for the house, but I know not everyone will want them. We're planning to redo all the walls with the same khaki (or some variation thereof) color ... which means bye bye yellow kitchen, blue bedroom, taffy living room, and sage green baby room. Javi will be happy because he's always hated the landscape/sky pattern we painted on his walls!

-- Repaint the house exterior. We had big plans to put vinyl siding on the house, but I've decided I don't want to invest that kind of money when we have no idea if we'll make the investment back on the sell. With the market the way it is, we may barely break even! So, we're going to repaint the house the same charming yellow but change the shutters and doors to blue or maroon. Probably blue. I'm tired of the hunter green!

And presto-chango! We'll be ready. Just making this list made my head hurt, but it needs to be done. I'm happy that at least the attic's been cleaned out. That's one less thing to worry about!