My listing sat for 4 months. Marketing it as a multigenerational home got 2 offers in a day.

Sep 13, 2026 05:13 PM - 1 day ago 4

A existent property supplier opinionated extracurricular a ceramic house.

Scheryl W. Glanton extracurricular the spot she sold arsenic a multi-generational home. Courtesy of Scheryl W. Glanton

This communicative is based connected an question and reply pinch Scheryl W. Glanton, 74, a existent property supplier from Philadelphia. It has been edited for magnitude and clarity.

It was getting frustrating. Despite astatine slightest 20 showings of my listing successful suburban Philadelphia, nary 1 made an offer.

We put the 5,100-square-foot Tudor-style property, built successful 1925, connected the marketplace successful April 2026. I hoped it would waste comparatively quickly for the $1m asking price. It was an property sale, the area had bully schools, and the vicinity was highly sought after.

However, whenever I asked the buyers' agents why their clients weren't interested, they said the aforesaid thing: "It's excessively overmuch house."

They said the seven-bedroom, five-and-a-half-bathroom location was excessively ample for 1 family, sloppy of whether they were readying to person much kids.

I decided to marketplace it arsenic a multigenerational home

A female opinionated adjacent to a show board.

Glanton, who has worked successful existent property for seven-and-a-half years.  Courtesy of Scheryl W. Glanton

Everything other — specified arsenic its agelong history, a third-of-an-acre plot, chromatic walls, and ray interior — made it a beautiful option.

Four months went by, and location was nary movement. Then, successful August, I had what tin only beryllium described arsenic an "aha moment."

The three-story location had 2 chopped wings and included 2 sitting rooms connected the 2nd floor, 2 en-suite bedrooms, and a Jack-and-Jill bathroom. It besides had 2 abstracted entrances, 2 staircases, and a four-car garage.

The spot struck maine arsenic being perfectly group up for multi-generational living.

If I wanted a sale, I needed to little the value to $875K and pivot.

So I repositioned the listing. This time, I marketed it toward young parents and grandparents who wanted to beryllium nether the aforesaid tile pinch privacy, too.

I sewage offers immediately

Within a day, I sewage 2 offers from multigenerational families, pinch 1 connected clasp successful lawsuit they fell through.

The successful buyers, who are paying adjacent to the asking price, were a mates from Los Angeles, their 2 children, and their aging parents from Indiana.

They'd decided to settee successful Philadelphia because of a occupation move, a large relocation for everybody.

A female wearing a chapeau pinch a waterway down her.

Glanton has spotted a inclination toward multi-generational living.  Courtesy of Scheryl W. Glanton

After seven-and-a-half years arsenic a real property agent, I've realized each spot is different to me, and each location is personal. It's reinforced my belief that group want to unrecorded really they want to live.

It has thing to do pinch the house, arsenic overmuch arsenic the lifestyle. I ever attraction connected that.

There is decidedly a inclination successful the US toward 3 — aliases moreover 4 — generations surviving together, whether successful a compound, the aforesaid house, a duplex, aliases a triplex.

It mightiness beryllium connected to affordability, but I specialize successful luxury existent estate. Something other is going on.

As group get older, what choices do they make astir living? One of the astir important concerns these days is childcare and eldercare. Multi-generational surviving tin beryllium the saccharine spot.

There's intelligibly a market. As the aged saying goes, it's the marketplace that speaks.

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Jane Ridley is simply a analogous connected Business Insider’s Life team, wherever she tackles parenting, health, careers, and existent property pinch a reporter’s separator and a storyteller’s instinct.She’s known for her signature As Told To narratives — raw, first‑person accounts shaped from intimate, revealing interviews.Before Business Insider, Ridley spent a decade astatine the New York Post and six years astatine the New York Daily News, wherever she wrote exclusive, standout features.Born and raised successful the UK, she moved to the US successful 2005 aft 7 years astatine The Daily Mirror successful London. Her reporting has taken her everyplace from Tokyo and Beijing to Sydney, Bangkok, Athens, and Madrid.Her viral As Told To essays astatine Business Insider include:https://www.businessinsider.com/mom-arrested-after-tween-walked-mile-town-alone-2024-11https://www.businessinsider.com/retired-grandma-refuses-babysit-her-kids-know-not-to-ask-2024-https://www.businessinsider.com/single-mom-rare-terminal-cancer-living-funeral-2025-10https://www.businessinsider.com/soft-retired-for-work-life-balance-earn-twice-much-2026-8https://www.businessinsider.com/avoided-assisted-living-housemates-aging-in-place-2026-5

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