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Houston homeowner hopes to sell house with essay contest

Houston homeowner hopes to sell house with essay contest

Want to live in a 1920s Houston Heights bungalow but can’t afford the $400,000 price tag?

One homeowner is giving potential buyers a shot at winning their dream home — for just $150 and a 200-word essay about why they’d like to live there.

Texas realtor Michael Wachs is using the unconventional method to sell his family’s 1,056-square-foot, two-bedroom, one-bathroom home as a way to give more people a chance at the place Wachs calls “a great place to live.”

“This is the only method that we can think of that we could get our money back and also give a chance to someone to start a new life or build a home right in the city,” he told KTRK.

Learn more at Wachs’ website here.

For the selling strategy to be worth it for Wachs’ family, he needs to collect 3,000 essays. If he doesn’t, he’ll refund all the application fees and list the house “the old-fashioned way.”

Wachs is accepting entries until June 13. The entrant with the best-written essay will be awarded the house and its appliances, but will have to cover closing costs and taxes.

Stay in school, kids. Essay-writing can change your life — and save you a lot of money.

Earlier this month, an Alabama couple made headlines for giving away their goat cheese farm to the winner of a similar essay contest. They were hoping for 2,500 essays, each with an entrance fee of $150.

The winner, who will be announced in October, will take over ownership of the debt-free, 20-acre farm and its 85 goats, and will receive $20,000 to help get them started on the farm.

In March, the owner of the Center Lovell Inn and Restaurant in southwestern Maine also employed the essay-contest strategy for selling her historic inn, valued at $905,000.

Owner Janice Sage hoped to collect 7,500 200-word essays, each with a fee of $125, which would cover the cost of the sale and leave $20,000 for the new owner.

“There are a lot of talented people that can’t, just can’t, go out and buy an inn like this,” said Sage. “Now all they need to do is write and convince me.”

Sage took ownership of the inn after winning a similar essay contest 22 years earlier.

“I came here on angel’s wings,” she said. “I hope I can do the same for someone else.”