Michael Rossi's Landlording Blog

With dozens of rentals, there is always something to fix. Today's project was a clogged drain line that occurred because the low income tenants weren't smart enough to scrape off their plates before trying to wash them. The drain line was BADLY plugged and it took a significant amount of effort and a significant mess to fix it. I ended up cutting the drain line and installing a new cleanout in the line so that I could run a snake through the line.

After finishing the repair, I gave the tenants a lecture about scraping the food from their plates BEFORE washing their dishes. I also promised them that I wouldn't repair another tenant-caused clog without charging them!

While we're talking about tenants that aren't too bright, one of my tenants reported to me today that a fellow tenant stole cigarettes from her. The tenant that stole the cigarettes is already being evicted for non-payment and has had several police contacts in the 6 weeks she has lived in the apartment. All the tenants, including the victim KNEW that this person was a scumbag and a thief. Even so, my tenant allowed the tenant into her apartment to use the phone and therefore became the victim of the theft. Not too bright.

BTW, the thief (my tenant) had a clean criminal background check when I accepted her. She is young and was probably a criminal all along, but obviously previous juvenile records are sealed making it impossible to discover the truth about young applicants! UGH!

I took the day off today, at least as far as the rental property business is concerned. However, I did still have a personal real estate project to do. To make a long story short, my wife's family is selling a house they inherited and somehow I got picked to do a few maintenance items at the house. To accomplish that job, I needed to pick up a few things from my storage room at the Pink Elephant. I got the things out I needed and started to cut a 2 X 6 right there on the sidewalk. I'm always aware of my surroundings when I work in low income areas (and everywhere else for that matter) and therefore I certainly took notice when a very rough looking man approached me. He had a cast on his left arm and his right forearm had MANY noticable cuts. I stopped working and asked him what I could do for him. His answer was unique to say the least. He said he wanted me to call someone to pick him up. That's not too uncommon in low income areas. Many times in the past, homeless people have asked me to call someone for them because they don't have a phone. I'm normally willing to make a quick call for them, provided I have the time. I thought that was what he wanted and I asked who he wanted me to call. His answer was that he was "thinking of committing homicide and suicide" and he wanted me to call the police. Well, that definitely got my attention! I didn't see a gun or knife and he hadn't threatened me directly, but I felt like I needed to have a few feet of separation from this guy and I definitely needed to keep him in front of me for tactical reasons. I directed him to sit down on the porch and told him that I would call the police. As soon as he sat down, I dialed the police and explained the situation to them. The said they would send an officer.

As we waited, I talked to the guy. As it turns out he was a mental health patient who is homeless and hasn't taken his medication for about 2 months. He apparently got into a fight with someone who accused him of stealing drugs and that person broke his arm. That occurred recently, although he told me different stories about when. He claimed that his wife cut his other arm, but from the shear number of cuts and the look of them, I'd bet that these were self-inflicted razor blade wounds.

About 10 minutes later, the police arrived. They talked to the man for a few minutes and it seemed like they were just going to leave. The man told them that he thought he might kill someone and burn down the guy's house that broke his arm. I wasn't too keen on him being released without getting some help. I pushed the idea of taking the guy to the hospital for a mental health evaluation and after radioing the station for permission, the police decided to do that. They searched the guy for drugs and weapons and put him in the cruiser to take him to the hospital.

Very strange encounter for a day off and just one more reason to always be armed!

After not working much last week, I did get a little work done today. To start, I had a tenant that reported that her kitchen light had gone out. I always suspect that the bulb(s) are burned out when a tenant reports that a light is out, but in this case the tenant swore that the switch didn't feel the same as it felt yesterday (she thought it felt much weaker than yesterday). I have seen switches break on occassion and that is often how they feel. This particular light fixture had four flourescent tubes and the tenant reported that they all were on yesterday. It seemed highly unlikely that all four bulbs burned out at once. So, I removed the switch cover and tested the switch with a meter. The switch was fine. I should have gone with my next inclination. So, I changed the bulbs and the light worked fine. I suspect that three of the bulbs had burned out over time and the last bulb finally burned out yesterday. Obviously, the tenant hadn't realized that only one bulb was working until yesterday and the tenant just imagined that the feel of the switch had changed. No big deal!

My next project was to mow the grass at 2 apartment buildings and then spray weeds. Both of these buildings have small yards and that only took about an hour.

Finally, I was scheduled to meet a woman who was interested in one of my apartments. She is significantly disabled and this is a downstairs apartment. Moreover, her son lived right across the street and he would be able to come over and help her with her daily activities. She liked the apartment and put down a non-refundable deposit so that I would hold the apartment for her. One more apartment rented!

..or NOT!!! That was my tenant's best defense this morning in my 1st eviction in 9 months. She claimed that it was all a misunderstanding. The magistrate asked the tenant if she contacted me to clear up the misunderstanding. The answer was no. The magistrate asked the tenant if she paid June's rent - again the answer was no. The bottom line was that the eviction was short and sweet and the tenant was EVICTED!

What was the misunderstanding? There wasn't one, but I guess that was the only thing the tenant could think of.

This eviction was a little unique for me because I had a new lawyer, after my previous lawyer was indicted on a felony prescription drug charge a few months ago. It was also a little more interesting because I haven't had an eviction in 9 months (I felt a little rusty). My new lawyer is young and has virtually no experience actually doing an eviction, but she did fine today and this was actually a very good first eviction for her.

I have collected several rents so far today and will be collecting more later this afternoon. I didn't have any maintenance to do today, so that is about it for today.

I received a call from the city prosecutor's office today. She wanted to inform me that the pre-trial for the felon that has been stalking me has officially been moved to June 3rd and the trial is scheduled for June 4th. I also found out that he is charged with a 1st degree misdemeanor of violating a protection order and the maximum sentence is 6 months in jail.

My project of the day was to mow my grass at home; mow the grass at two of my rentals; and haul away some old carpet from a 3 bedroom house that I'm making ready to be re-rented. I also bought some solar powered sidewalk lighting; planted a tomato plant; and did a few other things at home.

I forgot to mention that I once again won't have any evictions this month. I did collect all the rents (along with several late fees), so this month makes the 8th straight month with no evictions. I currently have two rentals that are vacant and ready to be rented.

As I was driving into town at about noon today, I received a call from one of my Section 8 tenants. She said that they were nearly "frozen to death". Since that sounded pretty serious, I told her that I would be right over, I certainly don't want to have any tenants die from the cold. I knocked on the door and was surprised when the female tenant (the one that called) was wearing shorts and a short-sleeve shirt. I asked her what the problem was and she said that the kitchen was so cold that the water in her washing machine was frozen and that it was "ice cold" in the bedrooms upstairs.

Now I'm no newbie when it comes to operating rentals during the winter. I know that EVERY year tenants call to complain about the cold and about their utility bills. During the winter, I always carry two thermometers in my truck. So, I told her that we would put a thermometer in each room to see what the temperature actually is. Within a couple of minutes, the thermometer in the kitchen read 68 degrees and the one upstairs read nearly 70 degrees! Hardly cold enough to "freeze to death". As I did a little more looking, I determined that the tenants had placed things over the registers in both rooms. So, I instructed the tenants to uncover the registers and expressed my sincere belief that they would indeed survive!

Never underestimate a tenant's ability to exaggerate and be dramatic!!!

I've started my next project, which is the rehab of a 3 bedroom apartment. This apartment was in a building that I bought more than a year ago and I have never done anything with this apartment. In reality, this apartment is a little more complicated than that. When I took this building over, this upstairs had actually been illegally converted to 2 units and had two separate tenants that were sharing a single electric meter. Shortly after I took the building over, one tenant left voluntarily. The other tenant refused to pay the rent and I immediately evicted him. Both of these tenants were real scumbags and the apartment was a pigsty! There were mice and roaches all over the apartment(s) and dog feces was everywhere. The tenant that I evicted had 5 or 6 large dogs that he never took outside!!!

After kicking out the tenant, I cleaned up the mess and that was the last thing I did with this apartment, except for installing a new 200 amp electric service when we did the electric services for the other apartments. My rental property business has been expanding so fast, that I just put this apartment on hold for the time being.

Fast forward more than a year to today. The plan is to convert these two illegal apartments back into one. So, instead of having a 1-bedroom and a 2-bedroom apartment sharing an electric meter, I will have a 3 bedroom, 2 bath apartment that has its own electric meter. I started this process on Tuesday by ripping one of the kitchens out. This room will now be a bedroom. Wednesday (yesterday), I installed new glass (plexiglass) in several windows that had cracked or missing panes. My intention today is to begin patching the walls in preparation for painting. I'll take my time and plan on having this apartment ready to rent by Dec. 1st.