MIne is a different kind of funny---one that I still love to this day. We had looked and looked at houses and couldn't find anything that DH was pleased with that I wanted. So, I sort of gave up and stopped looking for awhile.

I love to go to Estate Sales and was actually looking for some cast iron cookware for the Scout troop, when I stopped at an Estate Sale. I went inside and after walking through, new that I wanted the HOUSE. I asked the ones running the sale and they told me that it was tied up in an Estate at the bank without any local owners. I called the bank and couldn't get any info. I called and called the man over the trust department and kept getting put off. I bet I drove by a million times. I even took DH buy and looked in the windows that were visible. Finally, one day the neighbor across the street stopped me and asked if I was really interested in the house. (she had noticed me numerous times looking around) I told her that I was and that the man at the bank would not give me any info, just the run around. She told me that the late owner was a good friend of hers and only had one distant older relative who lived in another town. She said that the relative had called her numerous times asking if there were many looking at the house. She didn't want it and just wanted to finalize things. The neighbor told her that it wasn't even listed yet. She gave us the relative's name and DH called her and made her an offer WAY below the value. (We had looked at the house next door and one two doors away the other direction)

She accepted it on the spot! We were so shocked. He was just throwing out a number expecting to come way up. The banker guy almost had a heart attack! When we called him, he said that there was no way it was being sold for that. My husband told him that he had a verbal agreement and that were were buying it for that.

The banker really dragged his feet and it took forever to close. But we got the house. After we moved in, some new people moved in a few houses down and told us that they were supposed to get our house. They were friends with the guy at the bank and he was "negoitiating" the price.

When we were looking for houses, I went out one day with our realtor's son, also a realtor. We were looking through neighborhoods and found a house with a For Sale by Owner sign, but with a realtor's sign attached to it. From the outside, it was a lovely house so I was interested in seeing the inside.

Our realtor's son called the listing agent from the car, and I was sitting next to him. When he got off the phone, he told me that the listing agent said that we should have an open mind. Apparently the owner had painted the house with "New York colors" and most buyers couldn't see beyond that.

Well, we were moving from NY so we thought it was perfect--until we saw what the realtor meant by NY colors. What an insult! It was as if a muralist had gone crazy in every room. Huge argyle pattern in the kitchen, faux marble in the halls, a pattern in the bedroom that can only be described as Phantom of the Opera, with painted gargoyle-like figures above the bed. Very creepy.

The realtor and I were trying so hard not to make any comments because the owner was in the house, but each room was more amazing than the next. I don't know why but what put us over the edge was the diningroom. It was painted in circus colors with a very strange chandelier. I commented that the room seemed dark so the realtor flipped one of the switches. In the ceiling were a bunch of high hats, each in a primary color. I still don't know why but the realtor and I just started laughing and we couldn't stop. We had to leave.

We returned with DH the next day. I really loved the house--but DH said he refused to buy a house from someone with that bad taste. We called it the Painted Lady house and I still think about it. She finally sold it after she whitewashed the interior.

OMG these stories are hilarious!

I looked at a property last night - a friend and I are thinking about buying a two-unit rental to live in for awhile, and then rent out later. It's not listed yet - we heard about it from a friend of a friend type thing. The owner met us there. He said "It looks a little rough on the outside, but the inside is great". Rough on the outside?? The paint had peeled completely off of the house in most places. Every piece of exposed wood trim was rotting. But we hoped that the inside was "great".

The owner knocked on the door to the first apartment and then said "OMG, the tenant is home!". The tenant opened the door, and was struggling to hold back a barking rottweiler. The owner asked if she knew that we were coming, and she said yes. She introduced us to Daisy the rottweiler. The place was a total mess. Dark, dingy, crowed, dirty. There was a cat walking across the kitchen counter and she commented that there was another one around somewhere. If you could have seen how TINY this apartment was...with 4 of us in there it was super crowded...I can't imagine having a huge dog and two cats in there too. And there is no dog run or even fenced area in the yard.

Then we went upstairs...the Death Stairs, a bit rickety. Owner knocked on the door and it was answered by a very ... relaxed, mellow, shall we say ... young man. Owner asked if he knew that we were coming, and the tenant replied "Yeah, man, but I thought it was for 7:30 *this morning*". Nonetheless, he gave us permission to come in. I have never, ever, ever, in my life, seen an apartment in that condition. I couldn't tell you what type of flooring was in there, there was so much junk on the floor. The place stank. I don't even remember the layout. I was too distracted by the condition of the place. This unit was two-level. We went upstairs to the bedrooms and had to climb more Stairs of Death. No railing. Steep. Scary. One of the bedrooms made me literally gag. The window was covered with something to black-out the room and there was no bed - just a pile of blankets against one wall with the imprint of where someone had slept. The smell was something else. There was something on the dresser that we can only imagine was some type of drug. It was cave-like, dark, low ceilings, and I couldn't get out of there fast enough. Oh, and did I mention that they had at least 4 cats - that's how many I could see anyway.

The owner didn't seem the least bit put off by what he'd seen. My friend and I passed on it. The price was fantastic, and I can see beyond alot of stuff, but not that place.

About 9 years ago I went apartment hunting for my (now)DH and myself. He had called up a company in Providence on Federal Hill called "Lifestyle Realestate" (it's still ther to this day, I shudder when I drive by it) and set up some appointments for me. I got to the office and met with a lady sitting behind a desk, smoking a black cigarette with a behive (no lie) hair-do. She was apparently the boss.

She asks me while smoking, "Honey, do you like wood paneling?"
I was about 21 at the time, and nervous, so I said, "It's okay I guess." In reality, then and now, I DESPISE wood paneling.
She says, "Cause I got this apartment, real nice, it's entirely wood paneling! And it has a yard for your dog."
So I agreed to look at it with her "associate" who could've been Joe Peschi's twin brother. He was wearing a grey suit complete with cuff links and drove a Lincoln Town car.
So we went to see the apartment.
The "yard" consisted of about a four by four piece of concrete fenced in with chain link. It was a huge six apartment tenemant house in the city, with a scary looking dog in the adjacent "yard". The apartment itself, left me speechless. It was, indeed ALL wood paneling. Every single room. Even the kitchen counters were wood paneling, which I didn't even think was possible. Then we went into the bathroom. It looked like someone had been murdered there. The most disgusting tub and sink I'd ever seen. The associate assured me, that this would clean up really easily. We went back to the office, and I told Mrs. Behive I'd give her a call. Needless to say, we didn't move there. (And my future DH got a MOUTHFUL for making that appointment).

Here's mine...and it's in progress now. We live in a village where garage access is through alleys. Directly behind our house is a home which is now under contract FSBO. The woman of the couple who are selling is absolutely fastideous to the point of being a bit obsessive about having a clean house, perfect yard, fence and garage. A couple of days ago I was out in our yard and the woman was hand washing her garage with a bottle of windex and and a pile of rags. "What are you doing?" said I. She replied with a perfectly straight and serious face, "The buyer's appraiser is coming in 1 1/2 hrs. I want to be absolutely sure that we appraise for the highest $ amt possible. I'm cleaning the siding of the garage."

I shrugged, shook my head and walked away.

We should start a spin-off thread about apartments - I bet there would be some good stories of apts that we've lived in.

printersdevil - That's a wonderful story!

What a great thread, and outstanding stories!

I have two...one about selling my home, and the other while looking for a home for my daughter. I'll start with the later.

My daughter called and said there was a house for sell in our old neighborhood and it had a fantastic price. The home was very large, so I just couldn't understand why a home in that neighborhood, with that much square footage, could be so low. Then I remembered that there was something that happened in the house years ago,,, a guy had placed his elderly mother in his car, turned it on, and let her die of asphyxiation in the garage. We looked at the house anyway, and it was beyond nasty! The old garage had been turned into a large studio, with a band stage. In the back yard, 2 large tree stumps had been surrounded and encased with 10" thick concrete slabs. Then the stumps were topped with concrete tables. We thought that very odd and they took up most of the backyard. It would have cost a fortune to remove that concrete and the stumps.

OK, when I was trying to sell a home, we had a "Realtors day", when all the realtors from the selling agent have a walk-through of your home. I let the 25+ realtors inside, and then picked up my excited Jack Russell Terrier, who proceeded to dump about a days worth of urine all over me and the foyer floors (and she had just come in from a potty break!). I was so embarrassed! Luckily, the floors were hardwood and could easily be cleaned up, but until then, I had to direct everyone around the puddle and wait until they went upstairs, so that I could put the dog down and clean the floor.

True to what i have read above, I have found that when my homes have not been at their best for showings, that's the say it sells.

Oh, I just remembered another story. We were looking for a rental apartment for another daughter. The realtor had just let us in an empty row house, when we started noticing our legs were itching. We looked down to see a black sheen all over our legs...FLEAS!!!

My husband and I own rentals in a little town about 200 miles away from us. Our realtor had called us to come look at a perfect duplex on the street where one of our other duplexes is.

Unfortunately, but the time we made it there(it took us 3 hours) an offer had already been accepted. We noticed another duplex just around the corner and asked our realtor if she could get us an appointment to see that place the next day, as we were planning on staying in town.

24 hours later, we drove up and started up the walk. From the street, it looked very nice, but up close, you could see where the owner had only painted the areas you could see from the street. Ahhhh, we could deal with that, it still looked like a cute place.

The current renters were well aware that we were coming, but when the guy opened door to greet us, I almost fell over from the smell of rotting food and dirty diapers.

The living room had been painted a muddy pumpkin orange and the carpeting was an odd shag of mixed purple, green, black and orange. Renter said it was **BRAND NEW**. He very proudly showed us the partition he had made between the living and dining room out of old paneling and 10 penny nails. Painted lime green.

As we came into the dining room, we met his wife and their 3 children. Wife is pregnant and it appeared that the children were about a year apart in age. Food everywhere on the counters, the table, the floor, and in the overflowing garbage pail. Kids eating spaghettios out of the can and mom looking on proudly at the fine meal she had prepared.

Furniture packed into every corner of the house, but most of it had no apparent use except as a storage space for dirty laundry and food containers.

The renter wanted to give us the tour and tell us about all of the wonderful "upgrades" he personally had done to the property, as he hoped that the new owners would hire him to upgrade the other side as well. My realtor graciously declined and said we would just take a quick walk through and be out of their hair.

We went upstairs where the main bathroom and the bedrooms were and stopped in our tracks. There were dirty diapers all over the floor in each one of the 3 bedrooms and on the floor and in the tub of the bathroom.

I immediately went straight downstairs and to the front door. By this time, my realtor was laughing uncontrollably and insisted that I see the rest of the house. She knew I wasn't gonna buy it, but wanted to be able to laugh about the whole thing when we left, so she dragged me towards the stairs to the basement.

OMG!! We could not even get all the way down the stairs, as it appeared that the things to do was to open the door and throw dirty laundry down the stairs for about 6 months and then when you run out of clothes, wade down and do the laundry.

The clothes on the stairs were moldy and the stench was unbelievable. I just walked to the front door and went out to sit in the realtors car. She came out of the house laughing and we talked about that place for hours! I did not even bother looking at the other side of the duplex.

WHAT A DUMP!!!!!

These stories are so funny! It really makes me wonder about people. I'm probably borderline OCD and I think the house we are in now was a big contributor to that. It was a foreclosure, one where the owners left in the middle of the night with whatever they could quickly load in a truck. The woman had run a day care in the house and there were several animals from the look of the carpet. In the garage was a huge pile (at least 5' high) of bags of trash, bags of diapers, clothes, and who knows what else. There was also a nice-looking recliner in the garage.

After hiring someone to haul off all the trash, we stripped the carpet & spraying the foundation with disinfectant and something for pet odors. Then a neighbor told us about the recliner. The owners here had been missing a cat for a couple of weeks. Put up flyers, canvassed the neighborhood, but never found the cat....until they moved the recliner & found the cat trapped in the foot rest mechanism. From then on, that recliner was known as the murder weapon.

Another house we looked at (and bought) was brick, but all the wood trim & gable siding was painted bright blue. Inside, at least one wall in every room was blue. The cheap particleboard cabinets were painted blue, the washer & dryer they left behind were painted blue, the light fixtures were painted blue, and a badly made partition in the den (to divide it into bedrooms) was painted blue. In the backyard, there were blue handprints all over the fence. Turns out the kids had painted the house. The only thing worse (and that's debatable) was the backsplash in the kitchen which was that z-brick (fake brick) with wide black grout lines. We completely gutted that house.

So much blue. Sounds like a haint house. Must have been lots of evil in that house.

"We went upstairs where the main bathroom and the bedrooms were and stopped in our tracks. There were dirty diapers all over the floor in each one of the 3 bedrooms and on the floor and in the tub of the bathroom."

This story reminded me of a house we look at. A minister had just moved out the day before. The house was very nice, large and in the most desirable neighborhood. When we went upstairs to inspect the bathroom, there were dirty diapers in the bathtub. I could never understand that one.

We went to look at a house last weekend. We had been all over the house up and down and I was sitting on the fireplace trying to figure out if my furniture would fit. There had been a really large dead cockroach on the floor in the living room when we came in but we had all just ignored it. Well, as I was sitting there, it was like a slow motion horror movie as I watched my toddler bend over and grab the roach! I was screaming NOOOO, but it was too late. I had to drag him out to the car and disinfect him with a baby wipe and then later in the bathroom wash his hand again with soap and water. I was so grossed out. Later on the agent asked him to give her five and he slapped her hand. She said "I bet that was your roach hand, wasn't it." Next time we go house hunting I think we'll get a babysitter.

"Next time we go house hunting I think we'll get a babysitter."

Ha! That was my thought when my DD (then 2) and I encountered the naked teenage girls. Poor DD loved house hunting, but that was the end for her. :)

When I was looking for a house the agent showed me and said there was an addition that you had to access from the back yard, owner said the dobie would be there and not go see that part until they came home. Well the agent called the dog from the slider and no sign of dog. We went into the other part which was two stories and as we were upstairs the dog noticed us and started barking. Thank G@d that I had closed that slider. Dog barking and no way to get out past the dog. Did I mention that I am afraid of heights. Yes you guessed it there was an 8 foot ladder because the owners had just finished painting. We had to climb out the window and jump from the roof unto the ladder or else stay there until Monday. Somehow I did it because I was more afraid of the dog then jumping off the roof. I didn't buy the house.

Now I have to tell you about when I was selling RE years later. I called to get an appointment for a client and the other agent said the owner was eccentric. Oh OK. We go to the house and owner isn't there. Walk in and you can see cats everywhere and it smelled like hundreds of cats. As we are getting closer to the kitchen the smell is getting stronger and then we saw the cat box. As we get to the kitchen the owner comes in and said she just came from the pool. We go outside (beautiful back yard) and the pool is really green as you can even see the algae floating. She didn't buy the house.

I have two or three "looking for a house to buy" stories: We went with the realtor to one house. He knocked on the door, no one answered. He used his key and went in, only to find the owners' son and his GF "making hay" on the couch! LOL (ANOTHER one you didn't need to take children to! LOL) (We didn't buy that house.)

We were looking in the backyard of another house and were discussing the kinds of trees, shrubs, etc. there. The realtor said, "I don't know what kind of tree that little one is." To which my smartaleck DH said, "That? Oh, that's a dingleberry tree!" The realtor said, "Really? Well, I've had several people ask me what that one was!" ROFLMBO

We just pictured the poor guy telling everybody who asked that that was a "dingleberry tree"! LOL (We didn't buy that house, either.)

One house we looked at had a commode up on a wooden platform of a thing right out in the middle of the master bedroom. DH kidded me that as much as I go to the bathroom it sure would be handy for me at night! LOL (We didn't buy that one, either! LOL)

I guess I have funnier ones about people looking at my house instead of my looking at others.

We had decided to sell a house and we knew the area we wanted to move to. It was New Year's Eve weekend and I was going to get our house in order to sell. I had (oh, those were the days, my friend, we thought they'd never end) flocked red/gold wallpaper on 3 walls of my bedroom and a whole wall of smoked mirror on 1 wall. The bedspread was faux black fur with black antique silk draperies and red sheers, amber swag lamps with brass trim hanging on either side of the bed and since bed was sitting on angle, I had a tall black wrought iron plant stand with a fern and a large (metal) knight in full armour guarding it. I had removed the door to the master bath and in the passway between the master BR and bathroom, I had hung beads of black, gold and red to form a "divider," (if you will) and the bathroom walls were tiled with smoked mirrors, shower curtain in red and gold damask.

I knew I had to take all that down and re-do the rooms, but went ahead and put (my own) "for sale" sign on the lawn. Within an hour (while I was assembling tools with which to remove the wallpaper and paint to paint after the removal) as I knew it was not going to be a mess as back then wallpaper came off really good if it was expensive wallpaper and I knew there would be no repairs as our paper was good and I had hung the paper well, the doorbell rang and it was a lady who wanted to see the house. I started with a million explanations about how I was going to redo the bedroom, but she insisted on seeing the whole house. She WANTED the house, bad, wallpaper, bedspread, drapes and all. I told her I would have to find a house before I could sell it.

As fate would have it, her husband was a contractor and they owned a house in the area where we wanted to move. She insisted I see the house. We went around 11 a.m. New Year's Eve and I loved the floor plan, the area, the size,the lot, size, etc, but hated the decor. This house was worth about 3 times what ours was and had a significant amount of equity built up in it.

Before the night was over, we had exchanged houses and the day after New Year's, we signed the papers and everyone lived happily ever after.

I have had few strange experiences buying houses. I had used the same realtors through the years and sometimes we would drive by a house that was on her list, and she would say, "Nope, not going in there, looks like they probably have nasty baby diapers everywhere." Or, "nope, we are not going in this one, looks like they might have had a drunk party and everyone went home naked." She would always sort of scan the exterior and judge what the inside might be like.

I cannot believe these stories. They are so sad, yet hysterical at the same time. The dead person in the bed. OMG

I can't tell you how happy I am that we are building and not searching for a house. LOL

I'll never forget the time we went to see a home being sold by an elderly couple that was divorcing. The husband was eagerly showing us around while the wife kept yelling "I don't know why he's wasting yall's time....ain't nobody moving in here 'cause I ain't going nowhere!" I was horrified to be caught in the middle and at the same time thinking "you go girl!" LOL

Turns out the wife demanded that the husband either sell the business and give her half or give up his interest in the house. To this day she's still living there - alone!

This happened to me since I have been living here but not because I was wanting to buy a house but just wanted to look in model homes that were decorated (near same ages as ours) so I could get an idea about how decorators had handled the open floor plan, so we had been living here about a month and after church one Sunday, I asked DH to "let's drive around and look at model homes." He was in a mood to watch a football game so I took him home and struck out on my own. I got to a house that I knew had been done by a decorator and it was an open house but the realtor had not gotten there yet. (I love peering in windows). So I was going to walk around the house and just sneak a peak. When I got to the garage area (big driveway), there was water running from the house into the garage. I was curious as to what it was coming from so decided I would keep going. As I approached, I noticed the kitchen door was open and water was just pouring out. I chose not to go inside but got back in my car and called the realtor whose name was on the sign and went home and told my husband. He advised me to call the police department out of fear the realtor might think I had done the deed (I forgot to mention that I could see into the kitchen and the pendants were hanging as if someone had jerked them from their connections). So, I called the city police department. They came by to talk to me and I never heard anything about it until about a month later.

I read in the newspaper that some convicts had escaped, had gone into the house to live and (probably just because they were angry people), broke all the light fixtures, faucets, and left a trail of destruction behind them, even using the sofas for a toilet.

The story continued. The convicts had been captured. I was relieved to know it but a little afraid when I was told they had been living in the wooded area behind my house which, at the time, because of new development, the wooded area had been cleared out and they could see directly into my house. Even more interesting, during that same time period, I was receiving some nasty phone calls, which we tried without success to trace their origins.

Patricia43, wow, what a story..........scary to say the least!

Geesh I live a dull life! These stories get funnier and funnier (and more and more weird, too).

Patricia43 your story about the house exchange is interesting but the admission of your decorating choices had me crying I laughed so hard! You're a brave woman to 'fess up to that!

I'm in hysterics here, imagining the realtor pointing out the dingleberry tree to prospective buyers!

We just bought a house and haven't yet put ours on the market. I'm fervently hoping no one shows up on this forum with horror stories about this one. LOL

I just loved these stories so much! Please keep them coming! I only have sad stories to tell so I would rather laugh and read your stories.

When we were househunting prior to purchasing our previous house, we came across a couple of doozies. One that still stands out in my mind started out as an early-18th-century one-room cabin that had been added on to about half a dozen times. The teeny kitchen addition (late 1800s) had a collapsed foundation and the slant of the floor was enough to make you seasick, the seller's realtor was wearing smooth-soled dress shoes and she was SLIDING from one side of the room to the other! Let's not even talk about the "master suite" addition from the 70s that consisted of a tiny bedroom with a toilet in the closet and a prefab shower stall in the corner of the bedroom. *eyeroll* A totally contemporary 10x15 living room addition had been slapped right onto the front a couple of years before we looked at the house, I'm not sure you could have gotten more incongruous than this addition because it had an 18' cathedral ceiling (the highest ceiling in the rest of the house was 7') and the wall facing the street(!!) was all funky angular windows from floor to ceiling. It was like a chimney with windows. Unreal. The best thing for that house would have been a bulldozer.

The house we ended up buying had been owned by someone who had (rather unwillingly) relocated from way down South, and his children hated living up here, so the parents engaged in a great deal of "retail therapy" for their children. Two of the children's rooms were so crammed-to-the-ceiling with toys that we didn't know the actual dimensions of the rooms until they moved out the day before closing. The teenaged son's room reeked of pot and cheap incense, and you could scrape the residue off the walls with a fingernail - they also hadn't bothered to have him clean his room so we were treated to his dirty underwear, unmade bed, and Playboy magazines (we just chuckled, it didn't bother us one bit but we could understand someone more straitlaced being really upset).

I don't think we had any real weirdies selling that house, maybe our realtors just didn't tell us! Goodness knows we busted our butts cleaning and refurbishing and staging the place.

This time around I think the funniest one was the FSBO where a not-particularly-interested (understatement) family member was unloading the house of a very, very old relative who had died. He cheerfully told us that he was selling the house "with all contents"... and I guess that even included the food in the fridge because it hadn't even been emptied out! (Ew.) There were big bottles of certain medications lined up on the bathroom counter that would have enticed many people into theft so while he stood there looking like a stunned moose I explained to him what they were, opened the containers and flushed it all down the toilet... DUH. I offered to purchase a couple of small furniture pieces (which would only have helped clean out the place) and some tools in the garage but he was so insulted that we didn't want the house he refused. About six months later I saw the FSBO sign was down, a realtor's sign was up, the price was down about 20% and an enormous dumpster was parked outside. (It was big enough I didn't dare try to climb up and peek inside.)

My (now) DH had looked at over 100 houses before he finally asked me to sit down with him and make a list of what I wanted in a house. We made the list and then he "filtered" his searches by that list. The next Saturday he called and asked me to go look at a house with him.

When we walked in, I knew it had everything we were looking for (big yard, garage, 3 bedrooms with space for my office since I work from home). The downside to this place was that the entire house was crammed FULL to the brim with stuff. The master bedroom had a 1 foot wide path around the bed to the bathroom and the bathroom had bottles of stuff lined up in and on every possible surface.

One of the bedrooms was painted pink with white blotches all over the walls. The owner said her dd loved it, and, since the dd was mentally handicapped, I imagine that she did love the walls.

The living room was crammed full of stuff to the point that I wondered it my living room furniture would fit. And, I never saw what the kitchen counters looked like because of all the junk on them.

The shed out back had a V in the roofline. I didn't even realize it went with this house till I asked the realtor.

The worst part of it was that the woman only cleaned her house with ammonia. She also had an elderly dog with incontinence problems and, apparently, the dd had the same problem. Cleaning a house with ammonia when one is trying to eliminate the smell of pee is NOT a good idea. *GAG*

We bought the house anyway, mostly because it was priced at about half what any similar house that was clean would have been priced.

Sometime later I will post the clean up efforts and work that had to be done to get it livable.

Oh gosh, I can't believe I am telling this but... I hadn't been feeling well but didn't want to delay the househunting because we wanted to be settled by schooltime. As we were looking at the family room in a house tops on our list, I felt those dreaded pains - I am sure you all know what I mean. You need a bathroom, and you need it fast. My husband was talking to the realtor and while I would never ask to use someones bathroom, and too embarrassed to admit my "problem" I asked if my daughter could use it (she was only 7 at the time so I figured he would understand if a little girl had to "go"). So I took her by the hand and brought her into the bathroom with me, which of course just had to be right off the family room.

I opened the window, did *ahem*,I sprayed some yucky flowery stuff, but there was no way you could ignore the smell. I was horrified. Hoping that they had gone upstairs by now, I opened the door and they were both standing about six feet away. By the look of my husband's face it was obvious that my attempts to mask the odor were useless. I was mortified to say the least.

The first house we ever looked at, when we were shopping for our first house, was an adorable little Victorian. We entered with the realtor thru the back door, which led to the kitchen, which was huge. Sounds nice so far? The kitchen had one wall covered in mirror tiles. The metal Youngstown cabinets were spray painted white, and the metal countertops were spray painted PINK. (How did we know they were spray painted? because the paint sprayed onto nearby surfaces). There was a border of bright-green shamrocks stencilled on the walls. The sink had a steady drip from the faucet. Floor was horribly dirty white vinyl. The rest of the house was almost as bad. The funniest was that the owner had painted walls AROUND artwork, so when you looked behind pictures hung on the wall, the wall there was a different color. The entire house was carpeted in dark brown carpet which STUNK of dog pee -- neighbors later told us the owner would go away for days at a time, leaving the dogs home alone. And yes, we bought the house! We were young and foolish. I still vividly remember my poor DH pulling up every bit of that putrid carpet while I sat on the sofa, 3 months pregnant and so sick that I couldn't even LOOK at the carpet.

These stories are amazing!

This isn't about buying or selling, but about when I was looking for a room to rent during college. I answered an ad in the school paper for a place in a house near campus. The guy on the phone asked if I was open-minded, and I said, "Sure, I guess." So I get there, and this burly, hairy guy answered the door. He explained the house and the rent and so on, and then said that they were all nudists, and asked if I'd be comfortable with that. I don't remember what I said, but his response was, "I'd like to check by taking my clothes off now." I said, um, no thanks, and I left.

We just purchased a home by owner. Hubby and I went out for a second viewing, we sat at their basement bar drinking and visiting for 4 hours, hubby made them a verbal offer, couple drinks later, they made a counter offer. Certainly was a night to remember. With heel spurs in each foot hubby struggled in pain to walk upstairs, he couldn't remember where he left his shoes, he headed in to the house as if he was going to bed...too funny, he was drunk, looking for his shoes, which were at the garage door entrance. Couple weeks went by, we finally reached a sober agreement !! We move Nov 1.

This fiasco was more on the real estate agent than the listing...

One of the first houses we saw when we started looking in our current neighborhood was a four-story townhouse which had been owned by the current family for 80 years (translate from realtorspeak: Needs Serious Updating). The ground floor was a tenant's apartment done in aging frayed linoleum, asbestos-look ceiling tiles, awkward cheap kitchen. The second floor, which was reached by a grand outside staircase, had 10-foot ceilings and 120-year-old mahogany woodwork. Guess which floor the broker had set up with the sign-in sheet, floorplan and other handouts for the open house.

The basement had standing pools of water and was so damp I was looking for stalagmites and stalactites. Agent said with a straight face that it was a dry basement, no no, no problems when it rains.

The second, third and fourth floors, marketed as the owner's triplex, had no working kitchen, merely one room on each level with a hotplate and mini dorm-sized refrigerator. No range and no gas lines run to attach one. No sink except the bathroom sink. Of course there were key locks on most of the doors...um, was this a rooming house recently? we asked the broker. No no no, she replied unconvincingly. (NB: former single-room-occupancy houses, or SROs in NYC real-estate parlance, are a nightmare to purchase and clear the red tape for 1- or 2-family occupancy).

When we get up to the top/bedroom floor, there are water rings, cracked plaster and signs of serious water damage on the ceilings. There were two workmen on ladders plus some random relative of the owners working on what the agent said was some minor cosmetic work but we suspect is a ceiling cave-in from water - why else would they be there on a Sunday afternoon during an open house? The broker almost had a heart attack when my husband tried to access the roof (I'm sure there were tarps all over the place), then complained about how hard it was to take us all over the house while wearing 3" heels.

We laughed and laughed when we left.

lynn_r_ct - I "feel your pain", lol!!!

These are all too funny :)

We decided to do "open Houses" without an agent...saw a sign, knocked on the door and when a woman answered we told her we were there to see the house. She opened the door, we walked in and started looking around. My father-in-law was opening closet doors and I was looking in the kitchen cabinets. The woman asked again why we were there...I told her there was an open house sign in the front yard. She said "my house isn't for sale, some kids must have moved the sign". For 30 years we have laughed about her letting strangers walk in her house.
After that day, we decided to only go in with an agent and of course the very first Open house we went in had about 20 people sleeping all over the floors furniture, etc...no one even knew who the owner was and when the agent asked if I wanted to see the upstairs bedrooms, I walked out the door...

these stories are fabulous! I especially love Michelle's story about escorting some potential homebuyers to the door...while naked! I laughed so loud I woke the dog up with a start!

michelle_phxaz (My Page) on Thu, Aug 14, 08 at 20:16

When we sold our house in St. Louis we had a very strict "by appointment only" showing clause because we worked nights and slept until mid afternoon.
One agent called our house in the early morning, left a message that they would be there in a half hour (of course we didn't hear this) and showed up. They opened up the bedroom door (Asian family of about 12, most with video cameras) and walked on in. I screamed, yelled "getoutgetoutgetout!" and the agent said "but we called!". I was not wearing anything and stayed naked as I escorted them to the door.

That family ended up buying the house

ONe that I do recall was when I lived in Michigan about 14 years ago. AT the time, we were thinking of moving to the Clevland area for a job transfer and a friend at work hooked us up with her uncle who is a realator in Clevland. We were young at the time - 24 or so and when the realator called us to make contact we didn't know enough to provide him with more than just the basics - 4 bedrooms, 3 baths, etc. We always heard nice things about Clevland and when we got there to meet the man he started taking us out to places in the middle of no where. Not subdivisions, back roads types of places. On the last house of the day, seemed kind of promising. Farmhouse style that I love, etc. As we were checking out the backyard my husband found railroad tracks and we asked about them only to be told it was a non working train from many years ago - no longer an active path. Sounded ok. We were not even back in the house when you could feel the distant rumble and then see a train go thru the backyard. The man said NOTHING. Like maybe I didn't notice it?? So on the way back to the office and to call it a day, I commented that I was just surprised that Clevland was "so rural" where I lived in Michigan was full on Malls, plazas, activity. He turns to me and says " That is the entire other side of Clevland. I didn't show that to you b/c I can't imagine who would want to live near a mall. I only go to the mall at Christmas".... Ok then....needless to say we didnt' follow up with him again.

The one I remember the most vividly is when we were looking for rural property on acreage. We went to a small house with our realtor, and the owner was there for the appointment. When we walked in, he handed us a three-page typed and stapled list and said, "Here's a list of things that aren't up to code. Do you still want to look?" We had driven 45 min to get there, so we said we did. The place was sort of pieced together, and our realtor was doing a pretty good job of keeping everything together. The owner attempted to show us the upstairs, which you accessed by way of incredibly steep, rickety stairs that were almost ladder-like. The owner went up first, and my realtor just looked at me and said, "I'm sorry, but I am NOT going up there!" He was sure the entire second story would collapse, if he even made it up the stairs!

Cheryl217, that made me seriously laugh out loud! Strangers opening cabinets, etc. and the lady wondering who you were -- sounds like a Candid Camera episode!

When we were selling our last home, we had appointment for a showing on a Saturday morning. As luck would have it, the night before the showing both of our kids started vomiting *everywhere*! Their bedding, their bedroom floors, our bedroom floor and the bathroom floor -- we spent the entire night cleaning up puke and spraying Lysol everywhere! I thought about canceling the showing, but since it was scheduled for 9 in the morning and it was then 2 a.m., I knew it would be difficult to get ahold of anyone.

So the next morning, I bundled them up with lots of blankets and "puke buckets", put them in the van and drove a few houses away so I could see when the showing was over. As soon as the prospective buyers left, we went home and, thankfully, the kids recovered very quickly. Good thing I didn't cancel that showing because those were the buyers of our house! I've wondered if they could smell the "aftereffects" of the night before and bought it anyway or if we did that good of a job of cleaning the messes up!

These stories are great! It's amazing what kinds of conditions people will live in, though . . .ugh!

This is sort of a sad story-- the only funny part is how naive DH and I are. We were looking for our 1st house when the market was at its peak, so prices were crazy. We'd only been looking a few days, but when we visited an open house w/o a Realtor, we were both smitten . . .it had a porch (that was falling apart), a virtually non-functioning kitchen (but ohh, had a skylight), a basement that was absolutely stuffed to the rim, holes in the walls (huge ones), and a locked room . . .the teenage daughter was gone and apparently locked her room when she left with a deadbolt. The seller's Realtor was begging us to make an offer, basically telling us she knew it was way overpriced.

Silly us, we DID make an offer (even w/o having seen a room), but while we were in the middle of negotiations, the seller stopped responding. Apparently the woman was in the HOSPITAL because of domestic violence from her DAUGHTER. Sad, sad . . .DH and I shudder to think what we would have been getting into!

We went to another open house a few weeks later. It was a great price, and the owner was very enthusiastic about what work he was going to complete. We knew it was a good deal, so we put in a full-price offer immediately. We wondered why we did not hear back, when we found out that the owner told his wife THAT DAY at the Realtor's that he wanted a divorce. The house wasn't really back on the market for months.

The house we ended up buying had much better karma. The couple was celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary on the day we had the inspection. Nice!

I used to work with a man who got quite ill while at work so he left early and went home. He went to bed with chills and a very high fever. At one point he began having hallucinations...he thought strangers were walking through his bedroom.

Turns out they were. His house was NOT on the market but an eager agent, to whom he'd remarked that he would sell his house if he could get a great price for it, took the liberty of showing some prospects (who wanted to be in that neighborhood) through it! The agent knew where the "hidden" key was and figured no one was home.

It worked out in the end. Co-worker sold the house to the lookers and moved into HIS dream house that had just come on the market that week.

Only in a small town!

This is about different thinking buyers:

I went to look at a FSBO and they told me that they just sold it to a couple that not only wanted the house, but expected them to include the above ground pool. Okay.. That's reasonable...AND they wanted the very large RV...what??? AND they wouldn't even think about buying the house without the seller leaving the family parrot.. WHAT??? Yep, you guessed it! The seller really wanted to sell so the buyer got it all! Guess I don't know how to negotiate.

"AND they wouldn't even think about buying the house without the seller leaving the family parrot"

HAHAHAHA

Good thing they didn't ask for one of the children!

I have a story from selling our house. We had already bought another home in another state and returned to Texas to sell our home. (It took almost 16 months to sell at that time!) During that time, my daughter was born. When she was about two weeks old, my hubby was out of state doing some work on the new home and I was home alone and couldnt leave the house. The realtor was aware of this before they arrived. It was a large house and when the realtor and prospective buyers showed up I told them I would be in the breakfast room off of the kitchen which was out of their way.

I sat in that room watching TV while my newborn daughter slept next to me in her carrier. Suddenly, I heard voices talking right behind me  Startled, I turned around and then saw that the receiver for the baby monitor in my daughterÂs room was there! I had moved it into the breakfast room earlier  and they were coming through very clearly. They were all in the babyÂs room and talking about how adorable it was. Apparently they decided to stop in this room to discuss things. I heard every word they said which was all very nice about the house  but then they started discussing my WEDDING DRESS in a photo in the hallway! The lady buyer actually said it was very plain and completely unflattering on me  and then proceeded to say "wow, she REALLY gained some weight with that baby! SheÂs so thin in her wedding photo but sheÂs HUGE now!"

I didnÂt know whether to cry or laugh -- and later on after they left I was doing both!

Right after they left, I took all personal photos down from the wall!

My parents were house hunting. I went with them to see one that was currently occupied by a renter.
Soon as we walked in we loved the house and I was like "This is it!"
Had the open floor plan, huge lot with plenty of room to park their RV .. etc. Also was a great price on a cul de sac. Location perfect.
So the renter began telling my mom that the house used to be a church and was turned into a house. She also told my mom that there had been undesirables around lately and a drive by shooting out front.
The agent was so mad.
None of it was true. The house was a tract home .. lol. It was the same model as others on the street.
The renter was happy there and just did not want to move out.
What a nut cake! Yes my folks bought the house and lived in a great neighborhood with no troubles

Glad to see this thread come up again. Some of these stories are hysterical. Too bizarre to make up. Better than watching House Hunters on HGTV!!

capcapia, that woman sounds like my sister. She'd be one to comment on something like that. Me, I wouldn't even notice. LOL

When my husband and I were selling our house last year, we went through a string of bad luck. We staged our home and put a lot of stuff in his office (he had his own business). Needless to say the building the office was in burned down and we lost a lot of pictures, but mostly just junk. We finally sold the house only to have the first buyers back out 4 days before the closing, but we were locked into buying our new house. We then put our home back on the market and prayed we would sell it in a newly SLOW market.
Anyway we had many potential buyers come back and view the house 3 and 4 times but after 5 weeks still no offer. With the stress of holding 2 mortgages we were desperate. One day when my husband was commuting home from work it just so happened he was sitting next to a realtor. They got to talking about our house and she mentioned to him when ever she needed to get a house sold she would burn sage leaves to ward off evil spirits. That weekend we were holding an open house. Unbeknownst to me, as we were leaving the house my husband ran back in to "get something." He was taking a really long time so I ran in to find out what in the world he was doing. I saw him running through the living room with a smoking piece of aluminum foil and the overwhelming smell of burning herbs which smelled very illegal! I wanted to kill him. At the same time our realtor arrives and was nearly knocked back at the smell. At the time I didn't think it was funny and I was fuming. Needless to say, we got an offer that day, and we closed in 4 weeks. The ironic thing was our buyer was a Drug Enforcement Agent. He must of knew it was sage and not something else.

Hands down, it was the place we looked at that had a functioning hot tub and toilet in the living room. No walls, no stall, no sink - just a toilet attached to the living room wall.

I'm so happy to see this thread being revivied again. The stories are all so great! With many of them, I've had tears running down my face from laughing so hard!
Lynn

capcapia and polly929 - Your stories have me in stitches. That's not so great, because I am just getting over a stomach bug, and my entire torso is sooooo sore from getting sick, that the laughing hurts.

polly929 - You fire story reminded me of our moving story (which I cannot believe I forgot! Must be a good sign that I am moving on. :)) I am sorry that happened to you.

The day we were moving out of a rental, into our brand new home, our rental caught fire. We lost many things, but mostly paintings of my MIL's, fragile things that we wanted to move ourselves, sentimental items, and a whole garage full of stored items that we could not fit into the rental. The movers were on their way to pick up that last load, when I walked in on the burning house. Luckily, we - at the last minute that morning - decided to board Riley and our other dog, Oreo, because they had run out of the house when the movers came. I had to chase them all over the neighborhood before catching them. We had planned to leave them locked up in the house, but felt they would be in the way.

Just a quick reply...

*Viewed a house in an "old money" part of town. It was a beautiful Southern home from the outside. But inside, someone thought it would be a good idea to redecorate with a modern flair. For some crazy reason, they opened the master bathroom up to the master bedroom. My (then) husband and I cracked up. He could have pooped on the pot and talked to me in the bedroom at the same time. I don't think so!

*Moving story: I woke up flustered with all the moving and such (had a 1 yr old and a 3 yr old at the time). I started looking for my purse and it was no where to be found. I went nuts. I was convinced someone had broken into the house. Called the police...filed a report, etc. Went to dmv, got new license, canceled all my credit cards, etc. Went on my way to try to move some things into the new house...Later that evening (in old house) I closed the pantry door which had been standing open all day...there it was...my little lonely purse! My dh and I fell out laughing (then I cried).

I'm a Realtor...
showed a home with 8x10 framed pictures on the coffee table of the naked seller and his naked wife standing in a park.
A house built by am engineer that you could only access the master bedroom by going thru the bathroom. His son's house next door that he helped remodel that had a finished attic, but you opened a door in the middle of the room, went up 2 steps to a toilet. The room the toilet was in was approx 3x4.
Went to home inspection on a home my husband and I were buying to flip..it was filthy and outdated, but we figured it would work. The seller knew of appt time for inspection. When we arrived, there was a used condom on the kitchen floor and bottles of lube on nightstand. Ewww. We gutted the house and scrubbed walls with clorox cleanup before even painting or starting.
Seller of a home wouldnt allow me to see a home without my husband. (We buy and sell our personal homes every 2 yrs, plus buy more in between to flip. Most homes we bought, my husband never saw until after we were under contract.)
I love animals and have a way with them. I showed a house where there was a cat. My client pointed it out sitting on a dining room chair. The husband went to go in and said " You need to come in! That cat is MEAN! The wife laughed and said he is scared of cats, so I said, I'll go in first. That cat was SATAN! It glared at me with the eats flattened to his head, growling at me. Then it charged me! We had to go thru dining rm to leave, so I distracted it while my clients ran past. It was crazy!