All News is News

Ok. I understand bad news happens. I am good with that. It happens to all of us, even those who aren't landlords or don't want to be landlords.

What I don't understand is when reasonable people genuinely lack accountability. It is as if these tenants think I am going to march right over to their home and do something about the frustration stemming from their bad news (even the ones who lived less than a five miles away). Or worse, they don't want to tell me about the space aliens living in the basement for fear I will be upset. Yea. Probably. But then again, wouldn't anyone be.

Recently, my daughter didn't want to tell me about the black magic marker that is now permanently in my beige carpet. So, she hid it under some couch cushions (in the middle of the living room floor). When I picked up the couch cushions, I had a surprise. When I asked her why she hid the mess, she said, "I didn't want you to be mad."

I explained to her "mad" was a reasonable assumption under the circumstances. "Mad" doesn't always have consequences. But, now the emotion factor had escalated because she purposely decieved me. Sometimes I fell like some of my tenants are 9 year old girls playing with magic markers.


Anyway, in the interest of full disclosure, I have nothing to write about. So, I am calling it in. Here is my list of the baddies I don't want to hear--but will listen to. And, just in case some other tenant finds my blog via Twitter, please understand, don't expect no reaction to any of these.

1. Crickets. If you have news, tell me. Don't wait. Unlike wine and cheese, news does not age well with time.

2. "I just got back from vacation and I can't afford the rent."

3. "I can't pay you because all my other bills are due at the same time." Honest to goodness, someone said that to me.

4. "I didn't want to bother you, so I thought I would take care of it myself." (but then called you at 6:30 in the morning anyway, to tell you the upstairs extension I was in the process of adding collapsed on me.).

5. "I know my rights." Every tenant who has thrown this at me, did not know their rights. I am amazed at how many people who are in the wrong bandy this one around.

6. "I got a roommate." Um. Read your lease. No you didn't.

7. "Ms. Landlord, this is Mrs. Nosey, living next door to your rental in Birmingham. I wanted to tell you that..."

8. "What am I supposed to do?" I have to say, I am numb to this. If you have lived long enough so that your parents are no longer responsible for your general maintenance and upkeep, don't expect me to have an answer either.