So today, my parents sell our childhood home....

[Tommy_Carcetti]

It's quite a bittersweet moment.

The good news is that my parents are moving to Florida, only 4 1/2 hours away from me. Which means I can visit them on a much more frequent basis, as they can visit me. And they can be close to their new granddaughter, which means the world to them. My dad has always wanted to live in Florida and explore the state, and now that he's retired, he gets his chance.

But on the other hand, my parents have lived in their house in Maryland for 37 years. It's the only house that me and my sisters ever knew growing up. Our pets lived and died there. Our names are written in the cement stairs leading to the house. It's where we celebrated Christmas every year. Name a childhood memory, and inevitably, that house will be a part of it somehow.

My parents bought the house in the 1970s for a price that would buy a midsize sedan these days. It was a one bedroom, one bathroom bungalow back then. When each of us were born, instead of moving, my parents liked the house so much they choose instead to add on to the house. By the time my little sis was born, the house had grown to 5 bedrooms and 2 1/2 bathrooms.

It was a unique house, one that will never, ever be duplicated on any developer's floor plan. It grew almost organically to suit our needs. And sometimes it creaked at cold nights. Sometimes the basement flooded during heavy rain storms. And its location, in the woods and far from the neighboring house, would sometimes get a little lonely. But despite that all, it was always the best home for us. It was unorthodox but always functional, and never flashy. Much like the family that lived there.

There were no granite kitchen countertops, no fancy master bathroom (just a small half-bath), no spacious walk in closets, none of those "must-haves" which homeowners are told these days they must have in order to "increase their home value." But our home had more value than any realtor's showcase could even dream of possessing. It had the value of owners who recognized the importance of having a place to create many memories in.

I quite enjoy the house I live in now with my wife and daughter. Besides the amenities--the large closets, the updated kitchen and my personal favorite, the swimming pool in the backyard--I look forward to making that house a home as well. But being that it is on such a small lot, I fear that should we have additional children we will outgrow this house, and unlike my home in Maryland, there will be no room in which to add on, so we will inevitably be forced to move. So as much as I love my current house, I fear that I won't be able to create the type of attachment of my own family to the home that I had to our home in Maryland growing up.

But it's just as well. Perhaps there is only one true home in life. And yes, it can be silly getting attached to bricks, wood and mortar, but I really do feel as though I am losing a family member today.

So today I bid my childhood home adieu. The new owners actually know my parents and my parents seem quite optimistic that they will themselves take good care of the old homestead and create their own memories in it. But, still, it will be strange, having others grow up in a house without any reference to the rich memories we had growing up. I guess that's just life. But it is an odd feeling, nonetheless.

Goodbye, old friend. Treat your new family as well as you treated ours.

[Javaman]

1. I know the feeling well.

My parents house was sold one year ago. My dad passed in 2000 and it was just my mom. It was to big for her.

My hand print in the cement on the patio in the back. My two dogs, a couple of hamsters and a turtle or two buried in the back yard.

The beautiful white birches, my dads grape vines, my moms fig tree and azalea's in the front yard.

Life. Memories. A longing of something good now passed.

Peace.

[auntAgonist]

2. "it can be silly getting attached to bricks, wood and mortar'

That was no ordinary house. It was your home your refuge and where you learned the values you carry today. You are so very fortunate to have those wonderful memories.

Thank you for your eulogy of sorts :) :hug:

I'm glad your folks are moving closer. You have lots of love to share!

aA
kesha

[davsand]

3. I SO understand. We are in the process of doing the same thing.

My Dad died March 7 and my Mom is selling off the farmhouse they raised us in. I turned 5 in that house.

I understand it is the right thing for Mom to do--I have NO doubt about it. I fully support her decision, but this is just killing me to think that "home" is going to be sold. The Sycamore trees that I planted with my Dad when I was six are still there. The peach and apple trees are still there, the barn where I played with kittens--it is all gonna be sold and it feels wrong to me.

I have not lived there for 30 years. I have a husband, a child, and a home of my own. I have WAY more than many people and there is almost a feeling of guilt for me about not wanting to see this pass from my life.

I am turning 48 tomorrow, and I am still feeling like a little kid when it comes to selling that house.




Laura

[Tommy_Carcetti]

4. What is even more interesting....

....is that my grandfather built some of the additions onto the house. He passed two years ago, but his handiwork lives on.

[Jokerman]

5. My dad held on to ours for too long.

It was too big for just him and too much work to maintain it but he held onto it for sentimental reasons.

In 1995, the year my mom died, he could have sold it for 150K and it could still be a home to someone's family today. Ten years later due to neglect, a changing neighborhood and a catastrophic failure of a poorly maintained heating system, it sold for less than a third of the peak value and was torn down to make a parking lot.

As cold as it may seem, sentiment is not a good reason to hold onto real estate.

Good luck to your parents in retirement and remember that "home" is much more than just a house.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

6. Yeah

As much as it pains me now, I'm glad that they are selling now instead of holding on, and then having to go through the grim process of selling it after they pass (which I hope will not be for years to come.)

[zanne]

7. I know exactly what you mean.

I bought my childhood home from my mother's estate and live in it to this day. It's also unique, but the special thing about it is where it's located. It's in a small city in kind of a noisy neighborhood, but there's a city park across the street that looks like this.



It isn't much if you're a world traveler and you've seen magnificent sights, but I practically grew up on that rock. It's also where my ashes will be spread.

In other words, I hear you!

[hedgehog]

8. Is that Mt. Pleasant in Lancaster, Ohio?

[zanne]

12. No, that's Rock Rimmon in Manchester, NH. nt

[hedgehog]

9. I've felt that way about my grandmother's house, my great-grandmother's house,

my uncle's house, another uncles's house (where my mom grew up, BTW) and my brother's first house! Oddly enough, I wasn't that attached to the first or second house my husband and I bought!

[Westegg]

10. Oh, do I know what you're feeling!

My brother, sister and I grew up in a big ol' rambling Pittsburgh house my folks bought in 1970. It was built around 1900. When they sold it about ten years ago, I was devastated. My God, the memories! But I understood why they did it-- their three kids had grown up and moved to other cities. It was a big hulk of a house with six bedrooms, and it was just the two of them, in the end. They were getting older, and the place was just too hard to maintain. My mother made certain that the house went to a young family who would give it the loving care it needed and deserved. This fmaily has in fact treated it well, and they did the repair work and landscaping it needed. For that, I'm grateful.

I live in NYC now, and for years prior to that I called L.A. home, but when it comes to "home home," there will only ever be 206 South Linden Ave. in Point Breeze. I gotta tell ya, I sometimes stroll down memory lane via Google Maps "Street View" -- I cruise around the Old Neighborhood on my computer screen, pausing always to admire that grand old house. The trees in front I used to climb, and in whose bark I carved my initials. The lawns I once mowed, every summer Saturday, for years. There's not an inch of that house, inside and out, I don't know intimately.

A swonderful "portrait" photograph of the house, taken about 1920, was left behind when the previous occupants moved out and we moved in (it seems a thousand centuries ago). Decades later, I have had that photo framed, and it now hangs on the wall of my NYC apartment. That old house is and will always remain as alive to me as the most important people in my life.

[BeachBaby]

11. Rec'd! Loved your story....

and I understand the sadness with handing over your childhood to someone else. My parents sold their house when I was 23 - complete with our 3 beloved pets that were buried in the backyard; the basketball court where I learned to throw a perfect lay-up and free throw; and the pink dogwood tree that all our Easter pictures were taken next to. At least, though, the couple who bought it have allowed me to visit it a couple years ago. It was really nostalgic. :)

My boyfriend, on the other hand, will soon be dealing with this as well, and in the worst way possible. His mother is 81 years old, and lives in a 2-bedroom rancher in the Chicago burbs. Five years ago, her house was one of the hundreds of ranchers in that neighborhood; but one by one, developers have been buying them, slamming a wrecking-ball through them, and hauling them away. For every rancher that used to stand, it's now replaced with a McMansion.

He knows that time is limited on how much longer his mom will be alive, or just no longer able to live on her own and care for the property. And once that day comes, his childhood home will soon disappear, and only live on in his memory. :(

[Bombero1956]

13. oh the memories

my house at 11 1/2 Maple St was torn down last year to make way for a courthouse parking lot. It was a 2 story wood and stucco house with a flat roof. My grandmother lived on the first floor and we kids would go downstairs in the summer for breakfast. Her oatmeal and farina were to die for. When my parents divorced in 1970 my Dad sold the house to a restaurant owner around the corner who turned it into office space. Every once in a while I would drive down the street to look at our childhood home. I never asked to go inside for fear of seeming like a nutcase and now that its gone I regret never having done so.

[applegrove]

14. When my parents moved "Home" became their new apartment the momment they moved in. Funny

how that happens. ;-)

[PassingFair]

15. Your parents are lucky that it sold...

sentimentality aside, my "family seat"
is stagnating in the real estate morass
that is Detroit.

My baby brother lived in it until last year,
when he decided it was a buyer's market and
bought himself a house in a nearby suburb...

sticking Mom with the house!