Sale Intervention
About 20 years ago, my father-in-law, who lived in Mazkeret Moshe, an old neighborhood in Jerusalem built by Moses Montefiore in the 19th century opposite the Machane Yehuda shuk, decided to sell his house, despite all the memories and history his family had in that neighborhood.
My husband Haim and I suggested buying it, figuring we could fix it up as a vacation home during our trips to Israel. But he refused to even consider it, saying it wasn’t worth anything since it was an old pile of rocks and would eventually collapse. It was hard on Haim since this was the place he grew up in and the neighborhood where he had played with his friends, not to mention the convenience of the shuk across the street. There’s always something special about the house you were born and grew up in, but rather than fight his father, he accepted the idea, figuring that we Jews are still crying over a house we lost in Jerusalem two thousand years ago, but that’s another story.
A few years ago, we were discussing that our house was too big for just the two of us now that all our children had married. Climbing the stairs would eventually become difficult as we aged. So, we considered selling our house and moving to an apartment closer to town and began looking for a new place.
When our oldest granddaughter heard, she called her cousins and siblings and told them that a disaster was about to happen, and they needed to meet urgently to discuss how to do an intervention to prevent this catastrophe. They set a date, and since some of them were abroad, they all met via Zoom.
They unanimously decided at this meeting that there was no way they would let us sell our house and they had to make us understand that we could not do this to them since this house was too important to them and held too many memories to give up, and they were not ready to part with it so easily. They understood the house’s meaning, but were they in the position to preserve it?
One of my granddaughters, acting as the family representative, came to us and said, “Papi, please wait with the sale until we can organize the money to buy the house from you.” (Mind you, they are all still in school and where they thought the money was going to come from, I didn’t have the heart to ask them.)
Of course, the upshot of our brief attempt to sell our house went out the window. How could we sell it with 12 grandchildren telling us it would break their hearts if we sold it with all the memories the old house still held?
We told ourselves that even if we sold the house, none of the memories would disappear since they were engraved in our minds and would stay with us forever.
In the end, we decided there was no reason to move, and with our children and grandchildren always coming to visit, there was no hurry. As to the stairs, well, these days there are beautiful small elevators that can be added to any home—if we should ever need it!
Anessa Cohen lives in Cedarhurst and is a Licensed Real Estate Broker (Anessa V Cohen Realty) with over 20 years of experience offering full service residential, management and commercial real estate services in the 5 towns of Long Island as well as the tri-state area. She can be reached at 516-569-5007 or Readers are encouraged to send any questions or scenarios by email to anessa@avcrealty.com.
