Housing in the Silicon Valley has always been different, but upon returning, it is crystal clear how odd it is.
Our experience selling our house in Chandler, AZ was typical. You clean it up, fix all the warts, put it on the market, and are inconvenienced for months as agents (infrequently) bring parties through. Your life sucks as you have a 30 minute warning to get out for the next group of shoppers. Every time, you are hopeful that they are the ones who will buy. You will do a half dozen open houses, where on a good weekend day, you might get 4 groups of people walking through.
Then 5 months later, you get an offer you can accept.
Here, it is like this. You put your house on the market on a Tuesday or Wednesday, you schedule an open house over the weekend, where HUNDREDS of people will come through, and the following Thursday you accept offers, and pick the one you like best.
Depressing.