Selling a House

We have never sold a house before. It's been quite the roller coaster. Listening to people's ideas about houses has been quite crazy. People wanted more land, some said this land was too much. Location wasn't great. But they all loved the actual house. We have another house that just went on the market in our neighborhood, which we thought was great. It would bring more traffic and our house would show better. We walked through it during an open house and it didn't show very well. They had our old carpet in it, which was nasty. Our house is about 10 years old and they didn't put great carpet in it to begin with. The rooms were smaller and the landscaping was non-existent. Plus, their house is $6,000 more.
We had someone come in on Wednesday, unannounced and then came back with an appointment on Thursday. We were really excited about then because they had already sold their condo and came mortgage pre-approved. They really liked the house and also went through the other house. Our realtor talked to theirs and she told us that if they bought in our neighborhood it would be the other house, because of the sprinklers....THE SPRINKLERS! Our lot is less than 6,000 square feet. Do you know what kind of sprinkler system you could buy for $6,000? One that is run by computers and features a pond with fountain. Hubby told our realtor to offer them $1,500 in a contract for a sprinkler system.
We got an offer today. They were coming by for a second look this afternoon. They made an appointment for 3:15 and we had an appointment, for another showing, at noon. We ate lunch with hubby at his work while the first one came through. So, I decided not to spend too much time at home between so I didn't have to reclean the house. Buttercup gets out at 2:15, so I figured I would pick her up and we would play at the park and come home after the 3:15 appointment. She called about 45 minutes before and said they got a late start and wouldn't be there until 4:30. Entertaining the girls that long is painful! I do refer to myself as head of the Entertainment committee. We ended up at the library with the girls surfing the internet. I figured it would be safe to head home around 5:30pm. We ended up across and down the street from our house for over half an hour. During that time, I got a call from our agent saying they were there writing an hour. They were taking only $5,000 off of the asking price and asking for $5,000 for closing costs. Their house is California is pending sale right now, which gives us pause. It's pretty easy for a house sale to fall through and we really need the money in hand. They are coming over tomorrow to officially offer. Our agent is going to call everyone who came through and let them know we are going to be receiving an offer.
So, that's where we are at. Having an offer, any offer, on the table is quite a bit of relief. Hubby and Buttercup are leaving in two weeks! Fiona and I leave 3 weeks from today.
One nice thing about sitting across from our house for over half an hour was that we bought a new magic school bus this weekend. That's what the girls call our van. We first had a 2000 Honda Odyssey. We upgraded over the weekend to a 2005 that has to be the coolest car I have ever been in, much less owned. It has the DVD system with wireless headphones. Awesome! Where we sit in the driver's seat feels more like a cockpit. I also bought a GPS navigator for Hubby to drive half way across the country and not lose my Buttercup and new magic school bus.