We've been very, very fortunate to have good tenants. Until recently. And having a bad one really, really, really makes you appreciate the good ones. And as we've been
1. If you can't afford the place, don't rent it. That seems perfectly logical to me but you would be surprised by the number of people who appear to not even take cost of rent into consideration. Look, I don't care how much you like the place, if the rent is $800 and you only earn $1000 then this is not the place for you. Unless you can live without water, heat, electricity, transportation or food.
2. We remember you didn't pay rent, even when we don't hear from you. Do you remember playing hide and go seek? Picking a hiding spot completely obvious but believing you couldn't be seen because you couldn't see them? That same phenomenon sometimes occurs to tenants - except they believe if they don't call you then you won't notice they didn't send rent. There is nothing more frightening for a landlord than to not receive rent and to not hear from the tenant - deep down we are scared to death that you've skipped rent and moved out. Even if you have to make up some crazy, ridiculous, obvious excuse for why you don't have rent - call! We'll appreciate the gesture and maybe even the creativity.
3. It's your home, but not your house. We want you to make this your home, to feel like it's your own special place. And it is, it totally is. But the house you live in does not belong to you. Therefore, there are some basic limitations on what kind of liberties you can take when making this space "your own". The shrubs you removed cost money and I spent time putting them in. And I'm sorry you didn't like the lamp post in the yard; I'm even sorrier you took it out. It's okay you removed the bathroom cabinet door; it's not okay that you didn't leave the door behind. And for the life of me, I can't figure out why you would remove the doorbell...
See, the reality of renting is that you don't get to do whatever you want with this place because at some point I've got to come behind you and fix it.
4. It's not appropriate to let your children, or anybody, throw gum on the carpet. It's just not.
5. We know you lied, we're just not sure why. Our goal is to maintain our homes in the most cost effective manner that we can. Unfortunately, that means we don't allow animals or smoking. I know you love little Fefe and I understand that you can't get your day started without that nicotine hitting your lungs. You have every right to have as many dogs as you want and to smoke as often as you like. You just can't do that if you rent a house from us. There are plenty of places that welcome dogs and/or smoking. Find one of those.
6. Clean up after yourselves. Look, it's hard enough for me to clean my own bathroom so imagine the horror of having to clean someone else's filth. Have the decency to at least wipe all the grossness away. I don't want to see your urine spots, poop stains or pubs. It's gross and makes me puke.
7. Take your crap with you. If there are things you decide you don't want when you move out, there are some simple alternatives to just leaving them in the house: have a garage sale, donate to charity, or bag them up and set them on the curb. We have (in my state) to store whatever you leave behind for 30 days before it's legally considered abandoned. Thirty days. You took off and left your dumpy old furniture behind, most likely thinking we would throw it out for you, saving you the inconvenience of messing with it. In reality, you've just stuck us with a giant piece of trash. Which is exactly what we want to work around as we clean, paint, and recarpet. Thanks, thanks for that.
8. We're not rich. With some exceptions, most people with rental property carry a mortgage. Yes, your rent is higher than the mortgage and we make a profit. But we're not getting rich off your rent. The small profit we make is what we use for maintenance and repairs and to cover the mortgage during vacancies. The real value of investment properties comes at the end - when the mortgage is paid off or the house is sold. Just because we own houses doesn't mean we're swimming in money.
9. It's cheaper to give you your deposit back than it is to keep it. Everyone thinks landlords try to do whatever they can to keep the deposit - like greedy little trolls trying to steal your money. For the majority of us that couldn't be further from the truth. See, when you get your deposit back that means the house was clean and undamaged and I spent less of my time cleaning and repairing. You get your money, I get to avoid extra work - everybody is happy. What you may not realize is that if we keep your deposit, we're actually losing money.
It cost a landlord money every time someone moves out - there's the lost rent while finding a new tenant, cost of running ads in the paper, and cost of keeping the utilities on. There is also the cost of prepping for a new tenant - this cost usually comes in the form of time. And every landlord recognizes and accepts those costs - it's part of it.
But when a house is trashed and needs lots of cleaning and repair (and the deposit is kept) the prep work transforms to real cost - buying paint, cleaning/putting in new carpet, replacing damaged doors, putting in new sheet rock, replacing the faucet you broke, the blinds you bent, and the tile you cracked. That measly little deposit? Well, it doesn't even begin to cover it. So no, we don't want to keep your deposit. We just want you to follow these rules and
10. Leave the house exactly how you got it.
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