Selling (one of a few) Childhood Home

My parents had the foresight to sell their house -- where I grew up -- as they were getting older and less able to take care of it. They moved into a duplex a few minutes from where I live, and they actually spent less each month on rent and utilities than they did at their house, even though it had been paid off for years. No yard guy to pay, less electricity, etc.

And it crushed me a few years later when I drove by. The new owners had pretty much trashed it. I think it got repossessed, and it went on the market for way less than what my folks sold it for. Last time I saw it, it was in better shape than than, but not nearly as neat and clean as it was when Mom and Dad lived there. It made me sad.

 

My grandmother's family had been lumber millionaires in the 1870s-90s in Michigan. Her grandfather, the main guy in all this big money, built a 24-room mansion in Detroit as their family HQ.
Up in the Upper Peninsula, hard by the shores of Gitchee Gumee, he built a factory town in and around Baraga, where he ran a huge sawmill.
As part of the operation, on "company row," he built matching 12-room houses for himself and his five children.
My grandmother was born in 1896 in Detroit, but after she was born, the whole family packed up, got on the train, and headed up to Baraga. She lived there until she was 16.
The lumber business eventually petered out and the company town went away. My grandmother lived her life downstate for 70-some years when she went back for a visit. She was greeted like royalty by the local historical association, who gave her a tour of the town.
Most traces of the huge lumber operation were long gone. The football-stadium sized sawmill was torn down in the twenties.

Of the six family houses on "company row," the only one still standing was the one she had lived in.

She said it was now owned by hippies who were using it as a commune. "It looked like hell," she said. "It looked like a pig farm."

Somewhere Tom Wolfe chuckled.

 

Mom was divorced and she bought a two BR condo for $16k in 1972 and then they sold it in 2008 for over $250k; crazy. (dropped to about $60k in 2009, and is now back up to over $200k).

 

Good time to sell. Around here lack of inventory is getting 16 or 17 offers.

Makes it easier to realize it's just stuff.

 

I think if your parents haven't passed on, the sentimentality of clearing possessions doesn't hit as hard, but I am sensing the nostalgia of your childhood home in your post. We lived on a small farmette when I was growing up with 4 siblings. Free play, turkeys, pond, dogs... my Dad buzzing the house in his plane on National Guard weekends. My parents divorce had us move to the outskirts of Pittsburgh, but I think my brother's longing for that earlier life never left. When his first was born, he bought some land with a pond, built a house, got a couple dogs.

 

I would love to buy my childhood home. This is it with renovations like the tree in the middle of lawn, which wasn't there. That's the lawn my brothers and I and neighborhood friends played baseball on. These owners also added the fancy walkway. They redid the porch too. My grandparents owned house before my parents bought it in 1975 or '76 when I was 5. I lived there till 1989. Big backyard with an orange tree.

 

A year or two ago I told my parents just to plan on giving their house (not one I ever lived in) to my younger brother. They’ve been generous supporting me through the years already when I needed to get back on my feet and he’s the one who stayed around the old hometown, which I was never interested in doing.

At the time they seemed nervous about it, figuring he wasn’t up for the responsibility. Now that he’s freshly married with three step kids, my guess is they’ll decide to take me up on it.

 

During my childhood, we had something that wasn't a house, but an actual tiny hunters' cabin located in Manorkill, N.Y. (population about 300 at the time) where we went for frequent family gatherings and vacations.

Calling it rustic was an understatement. It was about 700 square feet, with two small bedrooms and a tiny kitchen area in which I still, to this day, remember once seeing a rat scurrying across the inside of the refrigerator when I opened the door. There was no indoor bathroom until much later years -- yep, we used an outhouse across the meadow that was the front yard, and unless you wanted to brave the dark outdoors, you learned to "hold it" through the many cold nights we spent there with only a front-room furnace, sleeping bags and blankets to keep us warm.

We all loved it, anyway, and have a lot of fond memories of that place.

That's because it also had a large front/living room with a thick, solid oak table around which we ate and played many family games together, a good-sized screened-in porch that was great for playing with cards, Lego, marbles and tops, as well as eating barbecue-grilled hot dogs and hamburgers. Under that porch were frequent wildlife visitors like deer, turkeys, and even a peacock that were always welcome. The little cabin sat on two acres of child-height grassy meadow-land property that was all ours, and had to be mowed and cut down during each visit so we could use it for all our station-wagon car rides with the tailgate down, go-kart races and sled rides down the hill with each other, and so we could more easily maneuver around to the many tall pine trees that were on the perimeter -- a few of which we cut down for use as Christmas trees during the holidays.

Grandparents and close friends made regular treks up there with us, minding us kids and going along as we all took daily walks along the dirt side of the one road through town to the one nearby convenience store for pickles, candy and cola and visits with the friendly shopkeeper, who always knew all the few people came through his door. (Picture Opie Taylor and his dad ambling along with their fishing poles in the opening credits of "The Andy Griffith Show," and that practically could've been us).

Later on, after our last move to California, my dad took one of my teen-aged brothers back there, the two taking the 3,000-mile car trip and spending three weeks alone together, fixing up the place in hopes of my then-troubled brother straightening out, and then the place being sold. He eventually did, and it was, ironically, to one of my mom's high school friends' sons, for a measly $2000, because by then, we were across the country for good and my dad was just looking to unload the property.

We all still think about that place, though, and it has been immortalized both in photos and in some grainy old family films that my oldest brother broke out for us to look at a few years ago. That was a trip, almost as good as all the ones we always took from Long Island to upstate N.Y. to get there.

 

My grandmother had a yard like this. She lived at the very back of the neighborhood, and her unfenced backyard opened onto huge grassy area that led up to a huge 19th-century mansion. Napoleon's brother once lived there, and in more recent years it was the home of a local Ukrainian-American group. We were always told not to go near it, so it seemed a mile away and spooky as all hell. Later on, I realized it was maybe 200 yards up a gravel road and historically fascinating.

Grandmom's house was where all the big family gatherings happened, even though the house itself was probably only about 1,000 square feet. I have no idea how 15 or 20 of us moved around that place at Christmas. She and my grandfather might have bought the place new in the 1950s and somehow they raised four kids there.
After my grandfather died, my aunt bought the house from Grandmom and moved in to take care of her. The first thing my aunt did was give the place a needed renovation. They added a second story and doubled the size of the house. By the time the renovation was complete it was essentially a brand new house — something that wasn't lost on Grandmom.
I remember visiting her a few years later and at one point she just looked sad and said, "This isn't my house anymore." She lived for about 10 years after my grandfather died, but I'll always think that remodel took a few years off her life. You could tell she was just heartbroken about all of those memories evaporating and the tangible connection to my grandfather being gone. She was just living there until it was time to die.

My aunt, now getting up in years herself, sold the house last year and moved to Florida. It's hard to imagine driving up to that house, in whatever form it's in, and not being able to just give one courtesy knock and walk in the door.

 

My folks bought their house in Orange County around 1973 for (I think) $27k.

Zillow says it's worth $760k now. They'd get that easily... and it's two bedrooms, one bath. It's a hundred year old bungalow in immaculate shape. They have a big lot (by OC standards) in a great neighborhood. I suspect whoever buys it someday tears it down to put up a McMansion.

 

I love the house where I grew up. I still remember the call from my mom telling me they decided to sell it. I sort of seriously suggested my parents include an easement in the sales contract that would allow me access to at least my old room.

One of the three things I’ve asked my siblings to let me have from my mom’s house is a drawing of the Red Cedar Lane house.

Closing on the sale of the house my mom lived in for thirty years is scheduled. House went to contract in a couple of days after listing. None of us lived there. It’s sad to see the contents sold for next to nothing, much of the furniture etc is stuff we grew up with in the old house and my mom had beautiful stuff, but it’s not stuff that works for any of us.