House #2: Finished

I'm finally finished with House #2 - well, almost. I spent 6 hours at the house Saturday and finished the rest of the cleaning and touch-up painting. After vaccuuming and steam cleaning the carpet, I've decided against replacing it. There were a coupld of stains that didn't come completely out, but they weren't so bad that it would require ripping up the entire carpet in the house. Man, was I exhausted afterwards. I not only finished vaccuuming and steam cleaning, but I also ...

... finished painting the trim on the baseboards and door frames,

... removed the 7-8 cement blocks from the fence outside (I guess their dog would try to crawl under the fence, so they put blocks in some areas to prevent him from going out),

... cleaned all the windows (inside and out),

... cleaned the outside rear door and siding,

... got on my hands and knees and scrubbed the linoleum in the kitchen, pantry area, utility room, and entry with Comet,

... cleaned the kitchen again, including the sink this time,

... went around and did some spot cleaning,

... gathered all my tools and supplies and loaded them in my car.

I'm sure there were some other things, but that's all I can remember. My back, knees, arms and fingers were killing me afterward from scrubbing the floors. They had a lot of scuff marks, etc., so I had to get down on my knees and scrub hard to get them out.

I'm still not completely done, as I left two large bags of trash and my ladder there that I need to pick up. Also, with carpet that has never been steam cleaned before, when you do it the first time, little piles of carpet fibers appear every so often. It happened with House #1 and it happened with this house. Unfortunately, the vaccuum I used to clean beforehand is old and they don;t seem to make bags for it anymore (I checked at Walmart and Home Depot beforehand). So I still need to go back and vaccuum the whole house again to get the little piles up and to give it a nice appearance.

My wife suggested having an open house next weekend, which I agreed. The weekend after that is Thanksgiving, and holidays (especially Thanksgiving) aren't usually a good time to show houses as people are too busy visiting relatives and/or out of town. So, I'll try to get things set for a showing this coming weekend at BOTH houses (different times, of course).

BTW, I haven;t heard back from anyone yet regarding House #1. I emailed the couple who came and saw it last week about the financing, but haven't gotten a response. I also expected the RE agent who called me about his dad to call me back, but he never has. Maybe the list price scared him off or something - who knows.