A few weeks ago my wife and I decided to put our home up on the market. The process is incredibly easy: find a real estate agent (there's one practically living in everyone's home already, waiting to pounce), sign some papers, have someone bang a sign out on the front lawn, and voila, your house is for sale. So what's next? Anticipation? Excitement? Nervousness? Nope. Cleaning. I've never cleaned so often and intensely before in my life. We've had at least seven or eight visits (including one open house), and before each one you have to clean up like a madman. With a kid (almost 2) tearing the place up like it's a playground, it doesn't make things easy. Well I'm sick of cleaning. Vaccuuming. Dusting. Picking things up. Hiding things (or as people call it "staging".) Every time there's a visit all of my bathroom stuff (toothbrush, razor, etc.) gets tucked away somewhere. Of course, I can't find it the next day, so I end up rushing off to work dirty, unshaven and with bad breath. Oh, you wanted to dry off with an actual towel after your shower? Sorry, those are hidden cause they don't match the wall color. Welcome to the life of someone trying to sell a house. Forget even trying to look for another place...we're too busy cleaning, we don't have the time. So when someone eventually does buy our place I'll be dirty, unshaven, tired and homeless (oh and don't forget the bad breath.) On a side note (or on a less sarcastic note I should say), if anyone does have "staging" advice or funny story selling or buying stories, I could use the pick-me-up! And my entrepreneurial mind can't help but think there has to be a business in "emergency cleaning & staging", where someone would rush in at a moment's notice, clean up, stage the place with flowers, accessories (maybe ones that you don't even own), etc. I know there are staging consultants but I'm talking about a combination of cleaning + staging, where I could call you and say, "Fix the place up, there's a visit at 3pm!" (Technorati Tags: selling your house, cleaning, staging a house, open houses)