In the end we found this house near the bay, the one that I sit in right now as I write this, this place with newly painted walls, with our spices in the kitchen cabinet, with fire in our wood stove, and with the cat that wanders from room to room still trying to figure out why she is in this new and exciting place. We never would have found our ‘home’ if Debbie had tried to push us towards that first ‘house.’

Towards the end of our sale, Debbie asked us to choose a charity where she would donate 10% of her commission. We chose Habitat for Humanity, and in my response to her I wrote the following:

"I think that it's wonderful that you do this, and I am particularly impressed with the level of charity that you choose to give. I do a small part with various different charities. Beth and I plan to make charitable donations in lieu of wedding favors, and I've been sponsoring a child in Guatemala for the past six or eight years. I believe that if everyone does at least a little bit, just picks up even one small corner of the burden, then together we can lift the weight."

Both Beth and I are grateful that we made Debbie our realtor. We didn’t just feel comfortable with Debbie, we truly liked her. There were only two bad things about the closing: first, we had to sign our names a bazillion times, and second, we knew we weren’t going to be working with Debbie anymore.