My son and I bond over real estate TV shows. They spark great conversations and help us add to our travel wish list.
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Courtesy of Kristina Wright
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- My son and I love traveling, and whenever we do, we look at real estate listings.
- This has turned into a love of reality TV about real estate.
- We love guessing which house buyers will choose, and keep adding new places to our travel wish list.
My son inherited one of my favorite odd little hobbies: looking at real estate listings when we travel.
Whenever we go on vacation, somewhere between finding restaurants and coffee shops, one of us inevitably says, "I wonder what houses cost here?" Sometimes, before we even get home, we're scrolling through listings, imagining what our lives might look like if we happened to live in our vacation destination.
We're not moving anytime soon. My son is heading into 10th grade, and our family of four has lived in our current house for more than a decade. Our home holds years of memories that are hard to imagine giving up, but exploring other possibilities is simply something we enjoy doing together.
That may be why, a couple of times a week, I find myself sitting on the couch next to my son and asking, "Where do you want to go tonight?" His answer is usually somewhere in Europe, though every now and then I can persuade him that New England or the Caribbean deserve consideration, too. We aren't planning vacations when we have these conversations, though — we're deciding which real estate show to watch.
Armchair house-hunting is more fun than the real thing
I was never much of a fan of house-hunting television, perhaps because as a military spouse I've done enough of it in real life. My son, however, loves to travel and daydream about where he might live someday, and these shows help him do that.
Whether we're watching the original House Hunters, one of the many beach-house shows, or his favorite, International House Hunters, real estate television allows us to travel together without ever leaving our living room. More than that, it gives us opportunities to talk about places we might someday visit.
The shows have also taught us that our tastes are surprisingly different. Left to my own devices, I'll choose the ocean view every single time. My dream property probably sits in a small town in Maine, a weathered shingle house with a wrap-around porch and plenty of big windows.
My son, on the other hand, consistently chooses spacious apartments in European cities. He wants to be at the center of the action, with a walkable neighborhood and a café just around the corner. Given the choice, he'll happily trade my oceanfront porch for a flat overlooking a square in Edinburgh or London with history just outside the front door. For all our differences, we agree on one important piece of real estate philosophy: a house should have character.
We get invested in the houses — and the home buyers
Watching the shows has also turned us into amateur judges of both houses and home buyers. We pick favorites early and defend them passionately. By the halfway point in an episode, we've usually each decided which house we'd choose and started predicting what the buyers will do.
We've also become remarkably confident in our ability to interpret reality television body language.
"She doesn't like this one at all," my son will announce.
"How can you tell?" I'll ask.
"Because she's been making that face since they walked in."
Those observations inevitably lead us into conversations about filmmaking itself. My son loves movies almost as much as he loves travel, so we'll end up talking about editing choices and the stories producers are trying to tell. We know we're seeing only a tiny fraction of what was actually filmed. Maybe she really did love that house, but the editors needed to tell a different story.
We discover new places to add to our travel wish list
The shows have also influenced our travel wish lists in unexpected ways. More than once, we've finished an episode and added the location to our growing list of places we'd like to visit someday. A beach town in California, a fishing village in Spain, a bustling neighborhood in Dublin — all of them become possibilities. And if we eventually make it to those places, we'll almost certainly do what we've always done while traveling and look at a few houses while we're there.
I know there will come a time, sooner than I'd like, when my son won't be interested in an evening of armchair house hunting. He'll be busy with friends, college visits, jobs, and eventually homes of his own to choose from. Maybe one day he'll actually buy one of those European apartments he loves.
If he does, I hope it has character. I hope it has quirks, history, and a story worth telling. And I hope he invites me to visit just as soon as he gets settled.
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