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We've got an unusally small home and lots of stuff. Agents were always
telling us to put as much as we could in storage. I guess the idea is to
have it looked "lived in" but not like a packrat's burrow. (-:

More precisely, they want it to looked lived in so people can see how
things
fit. It also helps hide the imperfections of an empty room. If there
isn't
furniture to look at perhaps it'll be a crack in the wall that grabs the
attention. ;-)

Ah yes, I can describe the many faults concealed in this house. First was
the giant hole, not just crack, in the wall and floor where the sellers had
torn out a half-partition to make room for the 17CF refrigerator. In the
basement the double ceiling should have been a tipoff (it will be NEXT time)
that something wicked was waiting behind (termite damage and wiring done by
a sixteen year old who didn't appear to have access to even the simplest "My
Home Wiring Basics" book. Wires wrapped with masking tape, grounds run as
neutrals, hot and neutral reverse on outlets, ground wires run off to places
unknown (and ungrounded!) and a host of grounded outlets without grounds or
GFI. When the walls came down in the basement, there was black mold and a
few collapsed cinderblocks and more evidence of old termite infestation.

Now my
wife wants me to get rid of the 20 or so PC's I've built starting with my
first IBM clone in 1985. They're lined up against the basement wall,
doing
nothing, so I suppose it's time but it's so hard to dispose of something
you've spent so much time on, even if it's worthless now. I've promised
I
would as soon as I've copied all the data off them. Ahem.

I still have my "first day order" IBM PC (from '82). I've pretty much
gotten
rid of all of the rest of the junk, after the last two moves. The next
won't
be any easier, though. I've added a ton (almost literally) of tools.
Preparing for retirement. ;-)

I have its brother. $5,000+ from Computerland and an extra $655 for a
second full size single sided(!) floppy disk drive. I remember upgrading it
to a POS CMS 20Mb hard drive a few years later (and a new PS after the
original smoked). That's when I learned the value of making constant
backups both on schedule and whenever there's new software to be installed.

I only wish we would come as far with solar power as we did with PC's from
that era. Oh, and I ordered 64K of RAM instead of the standard 16K soldered
on to the motherboard. I think the improvements in clones that I
appreciated the most was case design. Early clones cases were works of
art - holes could be anywhere, tabs didn't mate, and every one of them would
slit you up good if you made a wrong move.

We're still not 100% on where we're going. It *was* San Diego, but
both
the
city AND the state are in serious trouble so we're waiting until she
stops
working to get serious. Last two assignments have been abroad, next
one
might be, too. It's strange how much a bad market can change all your
plans
if it hits at exactly the wrong time. I guess there's never a right
time.

I thought '07 was a bad time to sell, until '08 and '09. I found a
regular
job in '08, so we moved to Alabama and bought a house. We probably
should
have rented before we bought but a year in an apartment was about all I
could
take. ;-)

That's what we're thinking. Renting before buying. That will give the
market time to recover but sometimes I wonder if it ever will.

You don't want the market to recover *before* buying! I'm sure it will
recover, but not soon.

Oops. We as sellers want the market to recover before we sell; we as
buyers want the market to tank further before we buy. And round and round
it goes. Part of the rut is that a bizarre equilibrium is in effect.
People are all waiting for a "negative crash" - an event so profound it
signals true recovery. The problem is, that only downward crashes produce
those big "marker" events. I think two or three months of strong new homes
sales might be the few drops that turn the half empty glass into more than
half full, but it's like a cake - rises slowly but crashes quick if you slam
the oven door hard enough. Remember, a lot of this recession is fear based,
not reality based, and people eventually lose their fear despite economic
indicators.

Housing demand is really "adjustable" in that kids can move back in with
their parents when they get in a jam. I know several folks whose kids
are
back in the nest and no one is happy about it, neither the kids nor the
parents.

Understandable. Ours is married, so that certainly wouldn't work out
well.

Oh, but . . . It's happening right next door. My neighbor feels she has to
take them in (kid, baby daddy and babies) but I can see it's killing her.
I've had the "tough love" talk with her, but they are her babies and always
will be and I could talk until I am hoarse - she's not going to toss them
out even if they hold parties when she's visiting sick relatives and her
kid's friends trash the joint and steal anything they can get away with.

I just read an article that said in NYC they have begun stringent
enforcement of partitioning laws to prevent people from taking apartments
and chunking them up into smaller units by dividing the LR into two more
bedrooms. The cause was the death of some firefighters whom the city
claims
died because they became disoriented fighting a fire in an illegally
partitioned apartment.

They have maps of every apartment? Seems lame. Not that I disagree much
with
the city.

Their version of Google "inner" earth. I think there's supposed to be a
floor plan on file for every place in the city. They have a pretty good
computer system for keeping tracking of the city's real estate because it's
their tax base. (-: I don't think the FD has a real time system to bring
up floor plans of buildings at fire scenes, but I'll bet they are working on
it. In the fatality case, they had violated some formula inspectors use to
figure out minimum floor space and emergency escape routes. What good is
having a fire escape if it's walled off and accessible only through a locked
door?

BTW, we bit the bullet and bought a new GE fridge. It's SO quiet
compared
to the old one but more importantly, it uses 1/4 the juice the old one
did.
We should have done it much, much sooner. I was astounded when I
compared
the Kill-o-Watt readings. Some of the reasons are obvious - the doors
and
walls are perhaps three times as thick as the old unit and I am sure that
the motor is much more efficient.

I was worried from reports on the web that it wouldn't cool as quickly as
the old one, but it cooled quickly enough for my taste. $600 (included
an
additonal two year warranty) but worth it - AND - we stimulated the
economy!
Got it from HomeDespot and I must say, it was pretty painless (except for
the $ part) once a salesman actually showed up in appliances - took 20
minutes! The guys they sent were pros - had to take the side door off
(which we never use and whose hinge pins had rusted). Thank God for
WD-40.
A two minute soak and that pin popped right out.

These two very small Hispanic guys managed to navigate some very awkward
turns by carrying it between them with just a big strap underneath. I
was
impressed - not a scratch or mark anywhere. Showed up two hours early,
too.
Took away the old box too, for free. Delivery and set-up was done by a
company called HBI - they also called three times after the install to
make
sure I was happy. Good deal.

We recently bought a Electrolux 'fridge from Lowes. Same deal, though
it's a
straight shot for us (this house is on a slab). We'll probably buy the
matching stove around Christmas. We're debating on whether we want to go
for
gas (dual fuel) or electric. I'd have to have gas piped around the
house -
another $400 if we went that way.

Interesting. Wife is 100% a "cooking with gas" gal. I don't care - I've
used both and have a slight preference for gas cooking-wise and electric
safety wise. I've never heard of a house being leveled by an "electricity
explosion" but we have several spectacular gas explosions a year around
here. One recent explosion at a shopping mall was captured on CCTV cameras.
Gas can knock down a whole structure in seconds.

We figured that we could be staying here for a while so why not be happy
and
cut the electric bill at the same time? Of course, now that we've made
the
purchase, we'll find the perfect real estate deal.

I doubt that a 'fridge or the $600 is going to make much of a difference
here.

It's the psychological value, not the real value. I just hate the idea of
not being able to stretch the old one to the bitter end and leaving some
buyer with MY refrigerator, especially after I've "automated" it.

--
Bobby G.