Went to touch a faucet at a luxury open house, left holding a folder

I've had six months of research and no deals, so to stay busy I've been going to open houses well above what I could ever buy, because I wanted to see what a finished luxury flip actually looks like in person. Photos flatten everything. I wanted to touch a faucet that costs more than my car payment.

So I show up on a Sunday in a decent shirt, no clipboard, trying to look like a person who belongs. The house had clearly been flipped, you can tell because the kitchen is the newest room by about fifteen years and the primary bath is the second newest. Everything else is nice 2008.

The agent walks over and hands me a folder. Heavy paper, the property on the cover, floor plans, a finish list, a sheet naming the appliance brands. Then she asks who I'm working with.

I panicked and said I was early in my search. Which was technically true, since I am searching, for a house about a fifth of that price.

She was completely lovely about it and then spent twenty minutes telling me about the flooring, because it turned out nobody else came the whole time I was there. Sunday afternoon, sunny, and I was it. She mentioned the house had been listed since the previous fall. She said it in the same tone you'd use for a weather report.

I took the folder home. The finish list is on my desk and I've read it maybe six times. Half those brand names I'd never heard of before that afternoon. What actually stuck with me was standing in a beautiful empty house on a nice weekend with one visitor in two hours, and doing the arithmetic on how long that had been going on.