The Successful Landlord Blog

So in a previous post I wrote about a tenant who, besides having the worst attitude possible, obviously has no idea how to handle her finances. It seems she’d rather steal than position herself appropriately for success in life. To wit:

Recently while working at the newly vacant property, I noticed the utility interface boxes for telephone and cable TV were both open and exposed to the elements. While attempting to secure them, I noticed the electricity “meter can” was also open. As soon as I touched it, it completely fell apart and its pieces fell to the ground exposing the inner workings of the meter. I gingerly reassembled the meter can (220 volts at 100 amps is not your friend) and made a mental note to call the power company to notify them. Read the rest of this entry »

So finally, after a seemingly long month, the tenant whose lease I terminated due to her inability to pay on time, inability to perform simple maintenance in the unit and her generally bad attitude…is finally gone! And all I have to say is, “Good Riddance, you witch!”

Like many of my past bad tenants, I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that this girl will be her own worst enemy unless she makes a major change her attitude toward life in general. Her complete lack of responsibility will do her no favors.

As an example, when she moved in, she brought with her a refrigerator, washer and dryer which she removed from her house before it was foreclosed upon. This happened supposedly due to a divorce (surprise!) Well, I’m not sure where she went, but she left all that stuff behind. All the appliances were completely filthy but they can be cleaned. I’m thinking a garage sale is in order. Her loss, my gain. Read the rest of this entry »

So this past week I had a sales representative from Sears (of all places) call me to ask my permission to come out to one of my rental properties to give the tenant an estimate to replace the central air-conditioning system in her unit.

Now, lets just pause a moment to think about this……

Ok, now. What in TARNATION is this tenant thinking?! I know she must obviously want a new air-conditioning system  but I don’t know how many tenants have a spare $2500 just lying around to pay for it. Well, it turns out that she wanted ME to pay for the replacement of course.  W-H-A-T-E-V-E-R  lady. Read the rest of this entry »

Well, it’s been a whole month since these people moved in to one of my rentals and they have called me no less than 8 times to complain about things, great and small, that are wrong with the unit.

Granted, some of the complaints were valid and I fixed them promptly. The other things consisted of  a dead battery in the garage opener remote, minuscule cracks in the bathroom tile and non-working light bulbs.

What’s probably going on here is that they probably don’t want to be charged for things that are wrong with the unit when they move out, which is understandable but that’s what the move-in/move-out inspection is for. Before a tenant moves into a unit, I require them to walk through the unit with a checklist and note the condition of major things such as cracked tile, non-working appliances, etc. Read the rest of this entry »

Like clockwork on Sunday evening at 7:30pm, I received a call from a tenant complaining that their air-conditioning unit was not working. I should mention that summer in central Florida is on its way and the temperature hit a sweltering 80°F that afternoon. For some people (mostly my tenants) that means freak-out time. God forbid a bead of sweat were to appear on their forehead.

I called the tenant back on Monday morning and let her know that I have no problem coming out to take a look at her air-conditioning unit but that I wanted to talk to her about paying her rent late…. Every. Single. Month.  It seems that this tenant thinks that as long as she pays the late fees, she can pay whenever she chooses. Oh, how mistaken she is. Read the rest of this entry »