A Brothel Death

My husband has a fish hobby that borders on that fine line between hobby and obsession.

We first started with a 180 gallon fish tank in our room(as to not be seen by our tenants).

That is a LARGE fish tank. We are talking 6 feet long.

Then he added several other small tanks.

His hobby/obsession came to a whole new level when he brought in a giant tank that was just for breeding fish.

(don't worry this all comes together to relate to property management so hang on)

When he brought in this breeding tank I started referring to it as the fish brothel.

Now I told you that to tell you this.

Last night at 3:30am my son came into bed with us which is a major no no with my husband.

Which is kind of ironic because my husband loves fish and my children sleep like fish out of water.

You know limbs flying around every few seconds.

So I am taking my son back to his bedroom when I hear this major commotion going on in the giant tank.

I don't pay to much attention because I am half awake and my sleeping son is in my arms.

When I come back to bed I hear some flopping going on.

I smack my husband a little harder then I wanted to and told him that I think a fish escaped.

He jumped out of bed like I told him the house was on fire and went to the aid of his fish.

He flipped on ALL the bedroom lights and practically dove into the tank.

As he was practically inside the bottom of the tank trying to rescue his fish he was using his cell phone voice(which is about 10 octaves higher than a normal persons voice) calling to the fish as if it would actually respond.

At his point all my children are up.

And I mean UP like laughing and talking and running around the room.

My husband finally rescues his fish and dumps it into the tank.

Then we both try to get the kids down to bed.

They are screaming and calling for me.

My husband and I take turns going in and putting them back in their beds.

I finally succumb to sitting by their bed and waiting for them to fall asleep.

FINALLY they fall asleep almost an hour later.

Phew.

I creep back in bed.

My head hits the pillow and...

RING RING RING RING

It's my office phone.

It's now 4:30 am

I run out to the phone so it would not wake up the children.

I answer it

"HELLO!?"

(you know the hello that says someone better be dying)

"Um yes I was wondering how much your two bedrooms are?"

My usual sarcasm escapes me and I just hang up and turn around to find my son standing there asking for breakfast.

Honestly?

Who calls (mind you it was a local phone number) at 4:30 to ask about apartments.

I have the number saved and I plan on returning her call very early tomorrow morning.

And on a sad side note.

The fish sadly did not make it.

He died a courageous death.

For I believe he had heard about the fish brothel and was making a run for it.

Funeral services were held this morning in the master bathroom.

And an additional service will be held later today when the plumber comes to snake our drain because you should NOT flush a 10 inch fish down the toilet

Read more...

Some Advice from one property manager to another

You never really know how a tenant is going to be until you move them in.
See this person, this person and this person all seemed great on paper and made a wonderful first impression.
But don't we all??
Well most of us anyways.
Here we do the normal credit/background check which gives us the basic info.
I find that collect accounts to cell phone companies and California Edison seem to be red flags.
But someone could pay all their bills and still be a total A$$.
But thanks to the wonderful public access court websites, facebook and blogs I can see a person true identity.
So to the person who applied today with good credit but with no rental references...you should probably remove the giant marijuana leaf and picture of you with a giant bong off of your myspace page.
I am just sayin.

PS- To all those managers out there try this website it will give you a full background on your perspective tenants.

Read more...

Applications

Not every person that turns in an application and pays the application fee is approved.

And NO when you are not approved you do NOT get your application fee back.

BUT I do look over the application before I take your money to make sure you even have a shot at approval.

You would be surprised how many times I simply hand the application back and say

Don't even bother.

And you know I have a few examples that have crossed my path over the years...

Under

EMPLOYMENT:

None

Under

Income per month

None

When I asked how they proposed to pay for the apartment every month they replied

"Not sure"

--

Under

DATE OF BIRTH:

Blank

When I asked why she didn't put her birthday she said she didn't remember it.

Then she gets on the phone and asks her cousin in Spanish what her cousins birthday is.

When I asked her why she was writing down her cousins birthday she said because she was using her cousins social.

ooookay.

So I asked why she wasn't using her own information she replied

"I don't ever use my own information."

Right.

Makes perfect sense.

--

Under the section

ADDITIONAL ACCUPANTS:

first, middle,last name

Baby

Babys Mom

--

Have you ever been convicted for selling, possessing,

distributing or manufacturing illegal drugs or convicted of any

other crime? If yes please explain:

yes

I sell medicinal marijuana from my home.

--

Why are you leaving your current residence?

Because the manager is a B****

I actually took this application and called the manager for rental verification and it turns out she really is a B. So I rented the apartment.

You might also want to check out

first impressions

Read more...

Sorry we don't rent to Tweekers

Picture this.

You are in a deep sleep.

We are talking rim cycle type of sleep.

When suddenly the phone rings.

You don't just wake up you jump up.

You look at the clock it's 3:30am

Something must be wrong.

Someone is dying

The building is on fire

So you rush to the phone.

You don't bother with your normal

"thank you for calling..." nonsense

You fanatically say "Hello?!"

"Um yes I was wondering if you had any two bedroom apartments available for the end of February."

"#$%*-*&$!?!?"

-cllick-

Read more...

Seriously?!?

There is a website called apartmentratings.com. This website usually does more harm than good for an apartment complex because people tend to seek this website out to complain rather than to compliment. I was searching near by apartment buildings and I happen to stumble across this review for a complex a few blocks away...

You can go here to see the original

The Manager is the most unorganized ridiculous person I have ever met in my entire life, I have no idea how she can even think that she knows how to run this mess. We gave a 30 day notice stating that we would be moving out at the end of our lease and the manager let us know 3 weeks later that the note was not sufficient. She said she'd call us back and get everything taken care of and never did. ...Living here was like living in a Natzi camp. This is the worst place I have ever lived and they are so unorganized and careless that it will now affect my record forever. The Managers lose your rent and call you at work when there is better things to worry about - Puke had been left on the sidewalk down from our door for 3 WEEKS!!! Kids shoot pellets at your car while it's parked in the garage and no one does anything about it. There are drug dealers and gangs living here, there are careless workers that sweep trash in the garage and they sweep it right under your car to hide it so they don't have to pick it up. ...they just tried to make it look a little better on the outside so they could get attract people that are looking for a nice place and rape them for rent and ruin their life. The location sucks, these apartments suck, they are dirty, old, molding and disgusting. These people DO NOT know how to run an apartment complex and should all go back to elementary school to learn some basics. This is NOT a place for families, it is a place for TRASH!!! If you want to be completely miserable and abosultely HATE where you live, deal with miscommunication, and live in a Natzi Camp, this is the place for you!

There are a few things here that got me

First, is it really fare to compare living in an unorganized apartment complex to a Nazi camp? Honestly! Is it just me or do you find that incredibly disrespectful for the thousands of inncent Jewish people that were tortured and brutally murdered. Did the manager kill this persons entire family, force them to go without food while they did their hard manual labor?

Honestly!

Second, that living at this complex ruined their life. Really? I can think of 100 different things that are WAY worse than having a crappy manager. How about this or maybe this.

Third, the whole rape you for rent....(shaking head)....I can't even go there.

Now I have to say that this apartment complex could be horrible, it could smell, it could have an unorganized manager. There are always two sides to every story and I am going to take a stab in the dark and say that this might have been a difficult tenant who didn't pay rent. Just a guess. Otherwise someone should call Fair Housing/the police about the murdering/raping manager.

BUT honestly. Get some perspective PLEASE.

I bet you this persons manager had no problem telling a little lie on their rental verification form(see post below)

Read more...

Honesty isn't always necessary

It was 8:30PM on a Saturday night and I was just about to sit down and watch a movie with my husband when the phone rings. I generally pick up the phone even when we are closed. I answer the phone and a women half way asleep answers. She asks if she can come see the apartment right now?!? When I tell her it's too late and ask if I could possibly show her tomorrow she tells me that should work for her. Great.... and then for some reason she felt the need to tell me and I quote "I really wanted to come see the apartment earlier today, I don't have a lot of money, I don't make enough to always pay the rent. But I took too many pain pills and I fell asleep and I just woke up."

-Nice

Oh and I will be posting about my fun encounter with the cops today. It's always fun when they show up and show you a line up with one of your RESIDENTS on it! I guess I shouldn't be surprised being that he asked if he could film an adult movie in our lobby.

Read more...

First Impression

When someone walks into my office it's my turn to SELL SELL SELL. Once the perspective tenant decides that they would in fact like to rent my apartment it is now THEIR turn to sell sell sell. Why you ask?

As a manager you don't want vacancies. But you also don't want to deal with crazy tenants who don't pay rent and cause problems. The later almost always trumps the first. At least a vacant apartment is not going to cost you thousands in lawyer fees, gray hairs and the occasional frantic 9-1-1 call(that story coming later).

So what we often do as managers is have the applicant fill out the application, do a background check, credit check and then check with past landlords and verify their jobs. Even after all this it still can not give you a real clear picture of if this person will in fact be a good tenant. We as landlords rely A LOT on first impressions and that first meeting.

Now here is a list I have made from my own personal experience of what I would say are key signs that this paticular person would NOT make a good renter. Again just based off first meetings....

When a person starts off the conversation with "How much do you charge for NSF checks?" (Non suffiecent funds, basically writting a bad rent check)

When someone shows up with no shirt on. I don't need to see all the tatoos you got in prison.

Creepy old men should not ask how many children live in the complex.

When a large man comes running into the office and says he needs to rent an apartment "RIGHT NOW!" and keeps looking behind his shoulder as if someone is following him.

When you tell someone that you run a credit and background check and they ask if you can just run the credit. Ummm, scary.

When two roomates are looking at an apartment and talking about how many awesome parties they can have here.

When you ask someone why they are moving and they point blank say "I am being evicted"

When someone shows up drunk/high to look at an apartment.

One time I am showing an apartment and someone is looking at the bathroom and full on unzips his pants and starts peeing in the toilet. Oh gee don't mind me standing right here.

When someone says they would like to pay 6 months rent in advance but has to write a check for double the amount so if we could just deposit the check for him and give him the balance that would be great....do I look like I was born yesterday. Honestly!

"I really love the apartment, is there is school near by?"

"Yes there is right around the corner actually."

"Oh I see about how many feet would you say it is?"

Seriously???

Read more...