From the listing description:
Now available, as seen on television, San Diego’s world famous “Cats’ House”!
Because who wouldn’t want who knows how many cats crawling around directly above your dining table?
Or climbing down into your bad whenever they want?
Wait. I’ve found the perfect buyer for this house:
So… Marty… I take it you don’t care for cats?
Above your dining table? No problem. *On* your dining table? A problem. Crawling down into your bed? Well, that’s just a variation on them jumping up into your bed which, if you leave the bedroom door open, *is* going to happen. The girl in the (likely fake) eHarmony video? Definitely *not* representative of cat lovers in general. Or any human ever, for that matter.
I remember seeing this place on TV only it used to have all sorts of brightly colored paint dashed around the place. That definitely added to the quirky appeal. For anyone who likes modern decor with a pop art look, it was a very appealing interior. It’s lost something in the translation to all white, though I understand the need to do that in order to sell it. And for those who aren’t cat people, it would take little effort to take down the various walkways and stairs and cover over the special cat-sized openings in walls.
That leaves… a pretty typical smallish house that is priced as though it were the frikkin’ Taj Mahal simply because it’s in a major U.S. city. Admittedly, it has really lovely hardwood and tile floors, a very nice climate, and a great view… But c’mon – $600K?! Give me a break! I *am* a cat lover and I still wouldn’t pay a penny over 1/4 that price for this place, cat-accommodating or not.
@Emerald63: Likely they’re trying for the celebrity mark-up effect – perhaps also known as “having it both ways:” they’ve painted out the pop, as you note, but left some of the runs. :D
Skritch skritch skritch… the proof of the pudding would be whether they have decommissioned, disassembled, and decontaminated the sandbox room…
@anodean: I hadn’t considered the “collector” aspect. You may well be right. Of course by cleaning and refinishing it, they’ve vastly devalued it. Don’t these people ever watch Antiques Roadshow? Original patina, people, original patina!!!
As to your other comment, I wonder how they would clean in the tunnels that go through walls? If a passage is more than just a hole in a wall from one side to the other, if it becomes a tunnel through a non-living space void, how to be sure Kitty didn’t leave any “surprises”? Or just track litter all over? Or mark his territory? There’s every chance each of multiple cats staked out his/her territory in that “special way” cats have. As for your exact concern, doesn’t matter how deeply you clean, once multiple litter boxes have been in the same place for a while, you’ll forever be finding kernels of litter if you ever take up the baseboard, flooring, etc. Not that this would necessarily cause smell, let alone disease. But it’s nice to be able to clean your house and be somewhat sure that you’ve gotten all of what you were going after. If there are longer passages in this house, I’m sure thoroughly cleaning them just ain’t fun and, sure enough, Kitty don’t respond well to training so as to clean them out himself. Well, at least any lingering not-detectable-to-humans odor might help keep down the rodent population. >^..^<
@Emerald63: *snerk* … somebody (else) knows litter dust. :D
I don’t remember their showing any tunnels per se, only runs with punch-throughs — and my hazy recollect of the kitty latrine was a quick glimpse into a closet/storeroom with intimations that it was ventilated. If they had the sense God gave a doorknob, this had a nice asphalt linoleum floor with a thick sheet of plastic tacked a yard up the walls, plus a rug scraps obstacle course around the exit… not, of course, that this would matter.
@anodean: “…not, of course, that this would matter.”
*snerk* yourself, Anodean. LOL
I wouldn’t be able to come within a block of that house without needing a gas mask hooked up to enough albuterol to asphyxiate an elephant. Apparently becoming pregnant with my eldest wreaked some sort of havoc on my ability to cuddle kitties, which really bums me out. :-( I love cats but their dander turns me into a walking puddle of histamines and snot.