Best Of the Worst

On Wednesday night I couldn't sleep, and it was all thanks to Property X. For the past few weeks, I'd been trying to get Property X's downstairs apartment rented out. It seemed that, no matter who comes to see the place, there's a problem. And just when I think I've found the right tenants for the place, I find out that the matriarch of the family is an SSI bum whose been evicted and has written bad checks in the past. But first, here's a list of the people that came in... the prospective tenant list:

Prospective Tenant #1:

Next door neighbor's son, with his fiance and their three kids. The fiance works as a manager ($11 an hour “manager”) while the son stays at home to take care of the kids. I have no respect for men who should work but don't. His three under-aged sisters who live next door also showed up for the viewing, and all three looked as if they were looking to get pregnant within the hour. I don't need that kind of drama. Besides all that, I don't want to do business with any neighbors... especially in that neighborhood. Any problem with the tenants and I'll have problems with the neighbors as well. Gotta keep 'em separated. Grade: D-

Prospective Tenant #2:

A guy shows up with his girlfriend and friend. They like the place and I give them the application. As they fill it out, the guy mentions that he has an eviction on his record. I tell him the usual line, "We take everything into consideration... yadda yadda yadda". So they continue to fill out the application and the guy starts asking dumb questions. He asks whether the entire place is going to be painted. I tell him no, only the areas that need paint. He then has the audacity to say,"I'm sorry, I don't want to be one of those guys, but I'm pretty sure NY State law requires that apartments must be freshly painted before a tenant moves in." The nerve! First of all, there is no law stating that. Secondly, this motherfucker has an eviction on his record and is trying to tell ME about property laws?! He also complained about the $10 application fee. When a person is not even a tenant and they give me a headache, I don't bother entertaining the idea of choosing them as tenants. Grade: F-

Prospective Tenant #3:

Lady with two autistic kids. She seemed nice enough, as did the kid that came with her. But after Tisha, it's safe to say that I'm done with inviting “special” people into my life, especially when there's money to be made/lost. Grade: D

Prospective Tenant #4:

A young Jamaican woman who seemed familiar to me. She didn't seem to mind the place in its condition and wanted the place for her herself, her baby, her baby's father, and her young (cute) Liberian friend. As we're doing the showing, she asks me about roaches. I told her that there shouldn't be any, as I already had the pest control guy do a treatment. What I forgot was that it takes a few days for the treatment to get rid of all the roaches, so there may be a few that stagger out looking for a place to die. Just as she's about to leave, she points out a big fat roach that was walking on the kitchen wall. That embarrassed the hell out of me. I told her it would be taken care of, and didn't expect to see her again. But she kept making appointments to drop off the application and would show up late or not at all. Eventually I gave up on her and moved on. That roach thing really bothered me. The former tenant Tisha was definitely a nasty bitch. Grade: D

Prospective Tenant #5:

Lady with her daughter. The lady was dismissive of the place and they were in and out pretty quick. Before she left, she said “Good luck trying to get this place rented for $750.” Usually a comment like that wouldn't bother me. But Handyman Alfonso was working very slow with the job, there were still roaches in the kitchen that I had to kill, and I started to doubt whether I could actually get $750. I... I let her get to me. After her I stopped taking appointments and waited until the following week, when the apartment would look better and the pest control treatments should have all the roaches dead by then. Bitch. If you've got nothing nice to say, keep your worthless mouth shut. No Grade.

Prospective Tenant #6:

Young woman with a kid and unemployed boyfriend. I actually liked her a lot, and was surprised when she returned with the application and the $10 app fee. Doing her background check, I found that she and her unemployed boyfriend have to pay hospital bills that are taken out of her paycheck. She simply wouldn't be able to comfortably make the rent, so I had to say no. Maybe if her boyfriend had a fucking job, I would have reconsidered. Grade: C

Prospective Tenant #7:

A guy who has a wife in California with their two kids. The wife is coming back to Smalltown and they need a bigger place, as he currently stays with his mom. He just started a new job, and the wife would start a new job upon moving here. Good for them. But I require that all prospective tenants have at least 6 months working their current job. Too many things can go wrong, so I declined them. It may have worked out, but I didn't want to take chances. Grade: C

Prospective Tenant #8:

A lady with her son came in. The son looked as if he had some kind of mental issue. He said he works as an HVAC guy but talked super fast.. He... he just... look, no more mental cases! Maybe they would have worked out because the mother had a good job and the son seemed nice enough. But Tisha completely ruined any chances of me renting out to anyone that has “issues”. Grade: F (B- had I never met Tisha)

Prospective Tenant #9:

Lady that makes $1500 a month and has 4 kids. I had no idea why she thought she could afford the place, but she was interested. When she came to drop off the application, she seemed miffed that she had to pay an application fee (it actually indicates the fee on the application itself). She gave me a look and I hated her immediately. She paid me to deal with her bullshit, so I won't hold a grudge. From now on, the application fee goes on the ad as well. Grade: F

Prospective Tenant #10:

A couple with a hard luck story. Their landlord got into trouble with code enforcement after he refused to fix the issues in their apartment. They are currently staying in a hotel. I liked them, and thought that I had finally found my tenants. They reminded me of the very first tenants of Property X, Clifford, who stayed for a long time and was a decent tenant. The woman said that she had an eviction on her record from a few years ago, but nothing current. I called their landlord and he said he had them evicted. He said they destroyed the place and actually seemed miserable at the very mention of their name. It all started making sense to me. Why would they need an emergency voucher from the city if the landlord was found negligent? They said they withheld rent because he wasn't fixing anything, right? So why wouldn't they have that money saved up for a new place? Why would they need help from the city? Putting the pieces together, I realized that I was being played. They gave the perfect interview and I almost fell for their bullshit. Any mention of “code enforcement” should be a big red flag, no matter what the reason. I'll remember these guys for a long time. Grade: F-

Prospective Tenant #11:

I picked up the phone and heard a heavy Indian accent asking about the vacant apartment. My mood went from miserable to excited almost immediately. If I can get Indian tenants in there like the ones I have at Property 1, that should stabilize the whole building long term! I knew he was going to have a problem paying $750 (immigrants never want to pay full price), so I told him to come in and we'll talk about it. I was even willing to lower it to $675 for them. When the appointment time came, however, no one showed. I called his dumbass and his son said he was sick. Bullshit. That got me down for a while, as I uncharacteristically got my hopes up. I'll try to not let that happen again. No Grade.

Prospective Tenant #12:

Middle aged woman who works a $10 an hour job. Her daughter gets benefits from her deceased husband, which would qualify them for the place. Her landlord gave her a good reference. My only issue so far is that it would be her, her three daughters, and her 13 year old son. I dunno. I liked her and she was my first choice to get the place. All this ass had to do was to call her job to grant me permission for a job verification. She didn't. So that was that.Grade: B-

Prospective Tenant #13:

A mother, a son, and another son w/girlfriend. They all seemed nice and the girlfriend looked WAY too good for the area. She wasn't super attractive, but the woman knows how to dress. The mother looked strange but no different than what I usually see around Property X's neighborhood. They all live in different places and want to have one place to live... to save money and eventually get a big house of their own. The mother is "retired" but everyone else works. So why, when it came down to the application, did they put the mother as the only applicant? And she listed her landlord as the Smalltown Housing Authority. Their application didn't make sense, so I used the info of the girlfriend and the son. Grade: B-

The son works construction but doesn't get a paycheck. That was the first flag. The bigger flag was when they came in to give the holding deposit. As I opened the door, the mother is talking to the son about her past eviction and whether I would hold that against her. When I typed in her name into the court database, nothing showed up. So I told her that I found some issues with her background and her response was, "Oh, was that the eviction or the bad check?" Bad check?! The fuck?! Her explanation was rambling, but they now have a holding deposit on the place. So now I'm not sure what to do. Her son and his girlfriend have been living together for a year, and their landlord gave them a very good referral. My best solution is to put it in the son and girlfriend's name and let that be that.

At this point, I'm just glad it's over. I couldn't take it anymore. Renting out an apartment in freezing temperatures sucks, but the prospective tenants made this whole process 50 times worse. Everyone that wanted the apartment had some issue. I've now spent my first two weeks away from the shipping depot dealing with scumbags and losers. I'm starting to think, however, that I should go with these guys. No matter who I choose for that place, there will always be a problem with their background or income. That's the pain of dealing with Property X's neighborhood. Maybe my problem all along was that my standards were too high. Maybe I need to rent out in a different way when dealing with neighborhoods like Property X's, you know? I've seen the same losers in the neighborhood, so obviously their landlords found a way to make it work long term. So I'll go with Prospective Tenant #13. Who knows? Maybe they're the right kind of scumbags for the area.