I feel guilty selling the house our children grew up in. Is that normal?
Guilt like that is common, and it's misplaced — the kind worth talking yourself out of. You didn't promise your children a building. You gave them what happened inside it, and that part is already theirs.
Here's what the guilt usually turns out to be: the fear that selling declares the family's best chapter over. It doesn't. It declares the house's job done. The Thanksgivings happened. The height marks on the doorframe happened. A sale can't repossess any of it. What I tell people, because it keeps proving true: your children are attached to the gatherings, not the square footage — and gatherings move.
Plan for one thing directly: the last walkthrough will hurt. Handle it instead of dreading it. Let the children come say goodbye if they want to. Then let the house do for another family what it did for yours. That's not betrayal. That's the point of a house.
I wrote this answer, and I stand behind it. I'm Chris Deutsch, a Minneapolis Realtor (MN #20382264). Twenty-five years of walking these neighborhoods, checking basements, and sitting across kitchen tables from people making exactly this call. I re-check every answer and date it — this one was last verified .
If your situation is more specific than the market, that's the one worth talking through. Email me at chris@lakesarearealty.com.