Posting about your house hunt on Facebook/social media

[Anonymous]

I do not, and I’ve never seen anyone do this on Facebook.

[Anonymous]

I've seen people post pictures of their new houses after they've moved - never thought to bad-mouth them for doing so.

I don't know anyone who posts about houses they are considering or even the homes they've bought before they moved into them.

[Anonymous]

OP again-- thanks for the input. An almost overwhelming consensus-- I didn't expect that.

What prompted this was that I have a friend/friend-of-a-friend (complicated) who's been annoying me for a whole host of reasons, so I'll say up front it may be a BEC situation. I admit it!

That said, she and her spouse have been considering buying their first place for about a year, but obviously interrupted by the pandemic, etc. I think they'll buy in the next 6 months.

She posts somewhat frequently about homes she's found in her Trulia searches, like, "Ooh, this one is nice, but the kitchen is small. Would you get this one (great location), or would the kitchen be a dealbreaker?" Or "I can see just where I'd put my home office in this one, but we'd have to add a carport because blah blah." Just noodling the way you do, but on Facebook, to her friends.

I didn't think much of it at first, but after a while, it started to grate on me, specifically because she grew up poor and then eventually barely MC, and about half of her friends have total HHIs between literally $0/nearly homeless and $60k, and most of the rest (me included) under $120k. Her spouse makes $$$$$$ now, and she made it clear eventually that her budget is $1.5-2mm+, so she shares houses in that range and sometimes higher.

I mentioned her posting to DH and he said, "Wait, no one I know does that at all." Like, regardless of budget. He said that's just not something people do. They might ask about neighborhoods and they will post once they've gotten a house, but they don't constantly crowdsource opinions on their Trulia searches. He just thought it was weird. (If it matters, most of his friends are women.)

So in his opinion, it's an odd behavior, period. When he said that, I realized I only knew one other person who did this-- in her case, she's moving to a low COL area, so that's not a factor, and she mostly, though not exclusively, just posts really weird houses she finds in her searches, for amusement.

It sounds like folks here are agreeing it's not common, and also that they'd be more discreet if they significantly outearned their friends.

I'm still considering why I didn't find the behavior itself odd at first, even thought it does seem to be uncommon. I guess I categorized it with, say, deciding on a wedding dress or a couch or something-- some people enjoy crowdsourcing those things, and many people enjoy helping their friends choose them. But I guess with houses, it is different?

FWIW, we also bought our first home in the past few years, and I am heavily on FB and didn't really share where we even put offers (had to make several in the competitive market). I never thought about why I didn't share the house hunt on FB... I did discuss it IRL, and I don't remember feeling it would be weird to post about it, or jinx things or anything. I just didn't, and I'm a big oversharer. Hm.

[Anonymous]

Rule of thumb: share purchases only with those who will get to enjoy them. So if you buy a new house, share the news with people who you will invite to come over to visit. If you buy a car, share the news with those who might ride in it. If you buy new clothes or shoes, share the news with people you will lend them to. See how these lists are much smaller than “people you are connected to on Facebook”? That’s why you shouldn’t share purchases on Facebook. A handful of those people might benefit from your purchase, but most will not. Why do they need to know? You should really ask yourself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP again-- thanks for the input. An almost overwhelming consensus-- I didn't expect that.

What prompted this was that I have a friend/friend-of-a-friend (complicated) who's been annoying me for a whole host of reasons, so I'll say up front it may be a BEC situation. I admit it!

That said, she and her spouse have been considering buying their first place for about a year, but obviously interrupted by the pandemic, etc. I think they'll buy in the next 6 months.

She posts somewhat frequently about homes she's found in her Trulia searches, like, "Ooh, this one is nice, but the kitchen is small. Would you get this one (great location), or would the kitchen be a dealbreaker?" Or "I can see just where I'd put my home office in this one, but we'd have to add a carport because blah blah." Just noodling the way you do, but on Facebook, to her friends.

I didn't think much of it at first, but after a while, it started to grate on me, specifically because she grew up poor and then eventually barely MC, and about half of her friends have total HHIs between literally $0/nearly homeless and $60k, and most of the rest (me included) under $120k. Her spouse makes $$$$$$ now, and she made it clear eventually that her budget is $1.5-2mm+, so she shares houses in that range and sometimes higher.

I mentioned her posting to DH and he said, "Wait, no one I know does that at all." Like, regardless of budget. He said that's just not something people do. They might ask about neighborhoods and they will post once they've gotten a house, but they don't constantly crowdsource opinions on their Trulia searches. He just thought it was weird. (If it matters, most of his friends are women.)

So in his opinion, it's an odd behavior, period. When he said that, I realized I only knew one other person who did this-- in her case, she's moving to a low COL area, so that's not a factor, and she mostly, though not exclusively, just posts really weird houses she finds in her searches, for amusement.

It sounds like folks here are agreeing it's not common, and also that they'd be more discreet if they significantly outearned their friends.

I'm still considering why I didn't find the behavior itself odd at first, even thought it does seem to be uncommon. I guess I categorized it with, say, deciding on a wedding dress or a couch or something-- some people enjoy crowdsourcing those things, and many people enjoy helping their friends choose them. But I guess with houses, it is different?

FWIW, we also bought our first home in the past few years, and I am heavily on FB and didn't really share where we even put offers (had to make several in the competitive market). I never thought about why I didn't share the house hunt on FB... I did discuss it IRL, and I don't remember feeling it would be weird to post about it, or jinx things or anything. I just didn't, and I'm a big oversharer. Hm.

Yeah that would grate on me too. She is probably insecure about her background and that influences what she shares, so it’s kind of understandable, but I definitely wouldn’t do it.

It probably didn’t bug you at first because I think it’s pretty common to post weird one-off stuff, and you kind of shrug your shoulders and move on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is a s/o of a thread I posted elsewhere, but I never got much of an answer to this narrow question-- I guess broken up into these subquestions, which don't have to be answered individually, but...

If you're house hunting, do you post on FB/etc. about houses you're considering? No. My facebook friends list is far longer than the list of people I'd like to have my address or to know my budget.

Do you know people who do? No but I went to school with people who became realtors and they do post about new houses they have on the market/open houses/etc.

What do you think about it? Seems attention-seeking and frankly stupid. Do you want everyone you know to be able to find out how much you paid for your house with a simple reverse image search? If so, why do you want that? And many if not most of these people will not live nearby so are of no help in deciding between neighborhoods/amenities/schools/commutes - there's no reason to do it other than you cannot keep a thought to yourself.

Does your answer change depending on your means vs your friends' means? It becomes increasingly stupider the more well-off the person posting is, yes.

Does it matter if you're seriously considering houses vs just starting to look around? It's not logical in either instance.

Hope this helps.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a s/o of a thread I posted elsewhere, but I never got much of an answer to this narrow question-- I guess broken up into these subquestions, which don't have to be answered individually, but...

If you're house hunting, do you post on FB/etc. about houses you're considering? No. My facebook friends list is far longer than the list of people I'd like to have my address or to know my budget.

Do you know people who do? No but I went to school with people who became realtors and they do post about new houses they have on the market/open houses/etc.

What do you think about it? Seems attention-seeking and frankly stupid. Do you want everyone you know to be able to find out how much you paid for your house with a simple reverse image search? If so, why do you want that? And many if not most of these people will not live nearby so are of no help in deciding between neighborhoods/amenities/schools/commutes - there's no reason to do it other than you cannot keep a thought to yourself.

Does your answer change depending on your means vs your friends' means? It becomes increasingly stupider the more well-off the person posting is, yes.

Does it matter if you're seriously considering houses vs just starting to look around? It's not logical in either instance.

Hope this helps.

Thanks! When you say it's "not logical," are you mostly referring to what you said about not wanting people to know your address/budget? Or them not likely having valuable input if they don't live in the area, or...?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP again-- thanks for the input. An almost overwhelming consensus-- I didn't expect that.

What prompted this was that I have a friend/friend-of-a-friend (complicated) who's been annoying me for a whole host of reasons, so I'll say up front it may be a BEC situation. I admit it!

That said, she and her spouse have been considering buying their first place for about a year, but obviously interrupted by the pandemic, etc. I think they'll buy in the next 6 months.

She posts somewhat frequently about homes she's found in her Trulia searches, like, "Ooh, this one is nice, but the kitchen is small. Would you get this one (great location), or would the kitchen be a dealbreaker?" Or "I can see just where I'd put my home office in this one, but we'd have to add a carport because blah blah." Just noodling the way you do, but on Facebook, to her friends.

I didn't think much of it at first, but after a while, it started to grate on me, specifically because she grew up poor and then eventually barely MC, and about half of her friends have total HHIs between literally $0/nearly homeless and $60k, and most of the rest (me included) under $120k. Her spouse makes $$$$$$ now, and she made it clear eventually that her budget is $1.5-2mm+, so she shares houses in that range and sometimes higher.

I mentioned her posting to DH and he said, "Wait, no one I know does that at all." Like, regardless of budget. He said that's just not something people do. They might ask about neighborhoods and they will post once they've gotten a house, but they don't constantly crowdsource opinions on their Trulia searches. He just thought it was weird. (If it matters, most of his friends are women.)

So in his opinion, it's an odd behavior, period. When he said that, I realized I only knew one other person who did this-- in her case, she's moving to a low COL area, so that's not a factor, and she mostly, though not exclusively, just posts really weird houses she finds in her searches, for amusement.

It sounds like folks here are agreeing it's not common, and also that they'd be more discreet if they significantly outearned their friends.

I'm still considering why I didn't find the behavior itself odd at first, even thought it does seem to be uncommon. I guess I categorized it with, say, deciding on a wedding dress or a couch or something-- some people enjoy crowdsourcing those things, and many people enjoy helping their friends choose them. But I guess with houses, it is different?

FWIW, we also bought our first home in the past few years, and I am heavily on FB and didn't really share where we even put offers (had to make several in the competitive market). I never thought about why I didn't share the house hunt on FB... I did discuss it IRL, and I don't remember feeling it would be weird to post about it, or jinx things or anything. I just didn't, and I'm a big oversharer. Hm.

Yeah that would grate on me too. She is probably insecure about her background and that influences what she shares, so it’s kind of understandable, but I definitely wouldn’t do it.

It probably didn’t bug you at first because I think it’s pretty common to post weird one-off stuff, and you kind of shrug your shoulders and move on.

OP again, thank you-- I think you may be right about the weird one-off part, though honestly it was quite a lot of such posts before it began to bug me. Or maybe they took a while to register because they were still a bit random and infrequent for a while, or maybe because I overshare a lot too, though I don't crowdsource a lot.

As for her being insecure because she grew up financially unstable... I could get that, and have thought about it, but that's also complicated by the fact that she identifies as a leftist and posts memes about eating the rich, guillotines, etc. I'm also pretty left-leaning, but the part that's complicated is that if she's all about class uplift, you might think she'd be more sensitive to posting about very expensive things (housing is just one) among people who, in some cases, have almost no hope of ever owning a home of any kind. In one case mentioned in her comments, literally relying on charity to get a Christmas meal and presents.

It's not so much that I think she can't enjoy her wealth at all just because she'd prefer socialism-- no ethical consumption under capitalism and all that. She has a personality that's like... less that she's bragging or hypocritical, and more like she doesn't understand that she's rich now... but the insensitivity is not okay IMO for someone who says she wants to uplift the working class.

But also, I guess, according to you all, it really is just weird to post this stuff? No matter the price point or disparity in income. Maybe it's a subconscious way of dealing with her feelings about money or something but I... don't get it.

Oh, well. I guess that's plenty of thinking about this for me.