Meet St. Joseph, the Patron Saint of Real Estate

c. 2005 Religion News Service (UNDATED) At the Saint Jude Shop in Somerville, N.J., the shelves are stocked with Catholic supplies such as rosaries, Communion dresses, Bibles, gifts and crucifixes. But one of the hottest-selling items _ particularly these days with so many “For Sale” signs planted on suburban lawns _ is a 4-inch statue […]

c. 2005 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) At the Saint Jude Shop in Somerville, N.J., the shelves are stocked with Catholic supplies such as rosaries, Communion dresses, Bibles, gifts and crucifixes.

But one of the hottest-selling items _ particularly these days with so many “For Sale” signs planted on suburban lawns _ is a 4-inch statue of St. Joseph. That is because St. Joseph, in addition to being venerated as the chaste husband of the Virgin Mary and earthly father of Jesus, is revered in many circles for his uncanny ability to sell real estate in a pinch.


To uncork St. Joseph’s selling magic, the statue is typically stuffed inside a protective canvas bag and buried head first in the front lawn near the For Sale sign. Once the home is sold, the statue must be exhumed and displayed prominently in a person’s next home.

Diehard practitioners of all religious denominations swear St. Joseph has the Midas touch when it comes to selling homes, and given the wondrous mystery of faith, few would dispute their claims.

But does St. Joseph know something the rest of us don’t about an impending pop in the real estate bubble? Phil Cates, who founded the Modesto, Calif.-based stjosephstatue.com in 1996, thinks he might. Cates packages the statues in a kit for $9.95, and says sales are up 50 percent this year.

A mortgage broker by trade and a Lutheran by faith, Cates thinks the surge is an early indicator of cracks in the residential real estate market.

“People who are having a harder time selling their home are resorting to the statue,” he says. “It is an indicator of what’s out there.”

The Saint Jude Shop and other Catholic supply stores also sell pre-packaged St. Joseph kits for $7 to $9. The kits typically come with a standard 4-inch plastic statue, a burial bag, prayers and instructions.

Lately, whenever a shipment of kits arrives, they sell out in a week or so, says Maria Zach, an employee at the Saint Jude Shop. “We sell 15 to 20 of them a week,” Zach says.


Recently, Kathleen Maleski of Bridgewater, N.J., decided to bury a St. Joseph statue to sell her home. She ordered an “Underground Real Estate Agent Kit” from stjosephstatue.com.

After planting St. Joseph upside down in her front yard, Maleski says she got two offers on her home, but turned both down. Now in the dead heat of August, the real estate market is sluggish, but Maleski hasn’t lost faith.

“I don’t consider myself religious, but I consider myself highly spiritual,” says Maleski, 50. “House sales in August are slow but, see, the statue sent (a reporter) to me to get a little publicity. So it’s working.”

Maleski got the idea of planting St. Joseph from her older sister, Ceil Robinson, who lives just around the corner. She has been burying St. Joseph statues in her yard since 1988 as a way to sell her homes and they have worked wonders, she says.

Robinson’s first statue was made of plaster. After she sold her home, she dug it up _ a mandatory part of the ritual _ and its head broke off.

“I thought, `Oh no, something terrible is going to happen. He’s beheaded. This is a bad omen,”’ says Robinson, 56, a dental hygienist.


Sure enough, Robinson says she was unhappy in her next home and stayed there only two years. The next time around, she used a plastic statue. The statues are displayed in a safe place “of honor” in her kitchen.

The tradition of burying the statue dates back to the 1700s when nuns seeking land to establish or expand a convent would bury medals of St. Joseph and ask for his blessing, according to the Catholic Information Center in Washington, D.C.

Today, the ritual has expanded well beyond the Catholic faith. Cates says 50 percent of his customers are non-Catholic.

“We refer to him as a nondenominational saint,” Cates says. “This cuts across all boundaries of religion.”

Still, not everyone is a fan of the practice.

Thomas Farrell, 40, the owner of Our Daily Bread, a Catholic supply store in Sayville, N.Y., says he frowns on the practice because he thinks it has crossed into the realm of mysticism and superstition. Farrell says he often counsels shoppers to simply recite a short, heartfelt prayer requesting St. Joseph’s intercession to sell their homes.

But nobody listens.

During the first quarter of this year, Farrell says he sold just two statues. Then, during the first week of May, 22 statues flew out the door. Then, when school let out in late June, he sold another 40 of them.


So far this year, he says he has sold five times as many statues compared with last year.

He generally keeps them in a basket next to household blessing gifts and plaques, but Farrell says he could “hide them under the counter and still sell them.”

(OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS)

He is sold out of 4-inch statues and recently put up a sign on his shop window to stop people from inquiring about them until the next shipment arrives.

Christine Cannon, a public-relations manager in New York, says she recently bought a 4-inch statue for $3.95 from Farrell’s store after listing her home in February and finding no takers.

“Literally, the day I planted it, within half an hour, we got a call for a showing,” says Cannon, 37. She sold her home in July and will be closing this month.

“I couldn’t believe it,” she says. “I guess St. Joseph did come through.”

KRE/PH END ALI

(Sam Ali is a staff writer for The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J.)

(Editors: Check the RNS photo Web site at https://religionnews.com for photos to accompany this story. Search by slug. A version of this story is being transmitted by Newhouse News Service.)


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