Of course you're curious, and you'd like to see what goes on when potential buyers come into your home.

But real estate brokers are just about unanimous in asking that you be absent when they bring people in. Why?. Because although you know your home, the broker knows these buyers. They've already looked at several houses today, they are remarkably suspicious about plumbing problems, and they need a long dining-room wall for an heirloom breakfront.

To take the last requirement first: they'll make a beeline for your dining-room. If it doesn't have that wall, they'll ask to go right on to the next house. And if someone spends only two minutes in your home -- you don't want to know about it!.

As a nervous bystander, you might chatter to them about how the living-room ceiling was just repainted, to get rid of the water stain from that one time when Uncle Marvin let the tub overflow.You'd never realize what needless anxiety this could stir up.

Another problem is the simple matter of overcrowding. It's easy for stairway and halls to jam up. The broker knows enough to linger outside the doorway of small bedrooms.

With you around, buyers are reluctant to open closets, try out windows, stroke bannisters and perform all the small get-acquainted gestures that are the real estate equivalent of kicking the tires on a new car. And they're reluctant to voice objections -- which a good broker can handle properly.

Your agent knows when to fade into the woodwork, and how to keep silent while prospects mentally place their furniture in your master bedroom. In fact, the amount of silence that accompanies an expert house-showing might surprise you.

Falling in love with a house is like falling in love with a person, and three can be a crowd.