Everybody felt it…no matter how remotely associated with the housing industry. The Recession of 2oo8 hit not only giant homebuilders, contractors, and suppliers of homebuilding materials, but your local hardware store, neighborhood real estate agent, and certainly anyone wishing to sell or buy a home to prepare for downsizing their domestic life.
It hit the business of speaking to audiences about these issues very hard, which certainly included yours truly. It is so exciting recently to feel a definite uptick in people being able to make important life decisions about their housing needs. About eighteen months ago, our Life Events Media company began to receive queries from companies like Shea Homes out west and others in the midwest and eastern seaboard inviting me to come talk to their clients about the art and science of “rightsizing” their lives. In the last year, alone, I’ve spoken in Chicago, Alabama, Maryland, Washington DC, Massachusetts, and most recently, at the beautiful Shea Homes Rio Vista development in the Sacramento Delta region in my home state of California.
What has been so rewarding is the eagerness with which the audiences appear ready to embrace the notion that simplifying their surroundings is a good thing…not some sort of “downgrade.” After everything so many people went through as a result of that horrendous shakeup of the U.S. economy, folks seem to have come to the conclusion that making their lives less encumbered with “stuff” was actually liberating! We live our life in chapters, and a new chapter where houses are filled with only the possessions we use and love has gained strong appeal.
But where to start that simplification to get to “what matters most?” That will be the subject of a future series of posts.
Watch this space!
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