Lunch with Mr. Partner

The American Medical Association recommends adults over a certain age get a colonoscopy every ten years as part of an overall wellness and healthy-living lifestyle. I believe this is also the same guidelines for me meeting with Mr. Partner.

Last week, I spent a few hours writing up a State-Of-Our-Alabama-Nonsense report. I carefully took time to put in lots of information, including but not limited to, the second mortgage we are trying to convince the bank to let us refinance, the flood at my Section 8 house and a litany of other items that I have just not had the lining stomach to write about.

Though I loathed doing so, instead of letting Marty Sunshine meet with Mr. Partner and discuss my fabulous report, I opted to tag along, figuring Mr. Partner hadn't bothered to even glance at my hard efforts. Marty was encouraged by this, given I would be a fresh voice, provided I could hold off the snark--which I wasn't promising.

The main item on our agenda was that I wanted money. Let me back up, we pay our home owner's insurance in July out of pocket. Property Taxes are due, also out of pocket, at the end of December. Additionally there are a few other bills that deserve some attention by the end of the year. Since 2008, all parties have had to put a few dollars in here and there, with Marty Sunshine and I putting in money first and Mr. and Mrs. Partner matching us when we get around to telling them it is time. This generally results in Mr. Partner being completely astonished this venture isn't profitable and citing some completely obscure 2007 scenario which will include us being in the black. Mr. Partner will then be reminded that 1) 2007 was many years ago, 2) we changed our business strategies when the housing market took a dive and restrictive owner-financing laws took affect, as a result we are now dealing with vacancies and turnovers, and 3) we go through this ever year and it should not come as a shock.

Generally when we have these conversations with Mr. Partner, he is not open to selling any home  where we won't make a stellar profit. In all fairness, he isn't keen on vacancies, repairs or property management companies either. Somehow last week I managed to convince him that it is in our best interest to sell a few undesirable properties. On the list were a couple of homes that just don't cash flow. Though we don't want to sell them all at once, for fear of capital gains issues. Not that I am expecting him to remember, he did also acquiesce to a few capital improvements. In the end, I got the exact item I came for: a check from him, so that I don't have to figure out where I was going to get the money to pay the property taxes. And hopefully I won't have to attend another meeting with him for an additional 10 years.