House hunters, libertarians, sexists, nudists, and brownies

A Thanksgiving story about real estate, weirdos, and love.

Two years ago this month, Christina and I bought a home. We didn’t mark this anniversary by doing anything special like baking our home a cake. Instead, Christina said, “I can’t believe we’ve been here two years!” Then I said, “You better believe it, and if you don’t, we have the mortgage payments to prove it.”

For those who don’t know, buying a home in Los Angeles is a complicated process that involves too much money and zero sanity. We began looking at homes around 2011. By looking, I mean we’d scan real estate listings, check out bank account, then fall into a pit of despair.

Around 2016, after five years of “looking,” I wrote a silly essay about my HGTV obsession and the futility of saving for a downpayment in Los Angeles. I don’t recall what I got paid for that essay, but in all likelihood I blew the two-figure sum on avocado toast, rather than putting it into our house fund.

Around 2017, Christina got a new job and a new salary. All of a sudden, our house fund began to make up ground on the Los Angeles real estate market. By 2018, after seven years of saving, and let’s be honest, Christina’s badassery, we had the money. We hired a real estate agent named Jeff, fired up the Redfin app (for real this time), and went house hunting.

It took about two months, but we finally found a home we loved. It had a park-like backyard with a pool that would be great for entertaining. It had an office for me, a spare bedroom for guests, and a mid-century aesthetic that Christina could “work with.” There was just one problem: the owner.

Folks, I don’t want to get political here, but you really don’t want to enter into a real estate contract with a libertarian. How do I know the owner was a libertarian? Well, he told us so, explaining that he had chosen to list his property without a realtor because he didn’t want to give up value to a “rent-seeking” middleman. He also had a lot of Ayn Rand posters in his living room.

“I really want this house,” Christina said. “We need to write a kick-ass letter with our offer.”

So, we wrote a kick-ass letter, one that would appeal to a libertarian Ayn Rand fan (redundant, I know). I wrote about the incredible “value” he had created with his home. I praised his decision to forgo the “rent-seeking middlemen,” even though Jeff was still our agent. Then I closed by paraphrasing Ayn herself: the question isn't who is going to let us buy your house; it’s who is going to stop us?

As it turned out, the lender stopped us. The libertarian had accepted our offer, but the house didn’t appraise. The libertarian fired off an email about “the market setting the price.” Jeff graciously pointed out that the contract had an appraisal clause which meant that we’d pay the appraisal price, and not a penny more. The libertarian sent a nasty email calling us cheats, but in closing, he wrote that he’d be happy to sell us his home if we’d cover the difference between the offer and the appraisal. For about a week, we went back and forth. We’d explain that he had signed a contract with an appraisal clause. He’d call us names, insist that he had “multiple” cash buyers waiting to step in, and then offer to let us have the house if we’d just fork over cash we didn’t have and weren’t obligated to pay. Ultimately, we fell out of escrow. (Months later, he sold the home for less money than the appraisal price. So, I guess the market did decide after all).

“This is like a bad break-up,” Christina said. “I don’t think we’ll find our house.”

Jeff told us to lick our wounds and then get back out there. We took is advice. One Saturday, we scheduled six showings.

The first one was meh.

The second one was meh.

At the third showing, the owner was there. That house was meh too, but the woman who owned it thought we weren’t comfortable with the price. “Honey,” she said to Christina, “if the price is a stretch, maybe you should get a waitressing job.”

Or, I could wait tables, I thought. My wife brings home the vegan bacon, and I fry it up. So, you can keep the house and your gendered assumptions, lady! Jeff said something innocuous about the decor, then he executed our escape from casa de sexism.

Over coffee, Jeff told us that you meet a lot of “crazy people” in real estate and that those crazy people often say “crazy, insulting things.” But, he insisted, you don’t have to like them to do a deal.

Hashtag truth, Jeff.

The next stop looked promising. Jeff opened the lockbox, grabbed the key.

“It’s stuck,” Jeff said as he struggled to unlock the door.

For the next minute, Jeff fiddled with the lock.

Suddenly, the door opened from the inside. This was a shock, since the house was supposed to be empty. Even more of a surprise was the sight of the owner standing there in the doorway, naked as the day he was born.

Jeff blustered something about a scheduling error. The owner said something about missing that message from his realtor. What went unsaid was why the naked man hadn’t bothered to put on some clothes before answering the door.

But like the saying goes, all is fair with nudists and real estate, so we toured the house. We low-key liked it, but to be honest, the experience was a little weird. I mean, you want the seller to be an open book, but not literally.

“I’m sorry guys,” Jeff said after we left the house. “I’ve seen some weird shit selling property in LA, but I’ve never seen a naked owner.”

“At least he had a decent body,” Christina said.

“Yeah, he was kind of cute,” Jeff said.

Then, sensing that we were lukewarm on Naked Guy’s house, Jeff suggested we drive around the neighborhood.

“OK.”

A few blocks away, we saw a sign for an open house. We vaguely remembered seeing the house on Redfin, but couldn’t recall why we hadn’t scheduled a tour.

“I know we have more houses to see and we’re running behind, but let’s do a palate cleanser,” Jeff said.

“OK.”

We got out of the car. Jeff grabbed a flier.

“Uh-oh,” Jeff said.

I grew tense. Was it another Ayn Rand fan? Another sexist who would make gender-based assumptions about our household income? A flasher who gets his kicks showing unsuspecting couples his house and dong?

“There’s no price on the flier,” Jeff said. “That’s a bad sign. Whatever you do, don’t fall in love because it may not be in your budget.”

Famous last words, Jeff.

We fell in love. And miracle of miracles the house was within our budget.

“We need to write a kickass letter with our offer,” Christina said.

Right! One kickass letter coming up. But how to connect with these people? The sellers seemed normal. The husband was a photographer, and we had bonded over that freelance life. The wife really loved mid-century modern homes, and so she was happy to hear that Christina dug her style.

“I think we just need to speak from the heart with this letter,” I told Christina. “You know, tell them why their home is special to us.”

“That’s why they pay you the big bucks, honey.”

So, I wrote a lovely letter about how a home is where friends and family gather to make memories. That felt a little saccharin, so I got more specific. I wrote about the big Thanksgiving dinners my parents threw, how the door was always open to family, friends, and anyone who needed a place to go for the holidays. I explained that Christina and I really wanted to carry on that tradition, that we saw a home as more than just a place to live or an invest, that a home is a place for sharing community.

The letter worked. The appraisal went through, too. About ten days before escrow closed, we asked if we could stop by to take measurements.

“Sure!”

When we arrived, the sellers were packing and getting ready to move. But they had baked us brownies just because.

“We really liked your letter,” the husband said.

“We loved living here,” the wife said, “and we really wanted it to go to nice people.”

“But there are so many crazy people in LA,” the husband said.

“Tell me about it,” I replied.

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A few weeks after we moved in, we threw our first Thanksgiving dinner for about 20 guests. Great people, good times.

We did Thanksgiving in 2019 too. The oven was broken that year, but we made it work.

Thanksgiving 2020 will be a little different. Our home will be empty, but thanks to Zoom and Operation Turkey / Tofurky To-Go, our hearts will be full.

Stay safe, and have a happy Thanksgiving! ❤️