Being a landlord gives an initial aura of being different than other businesses. I believe this is because your product is an intangible. You’re not selling an item like a store. You’re selling a service, but even that is different than most services. It’s not like you are an electrician or plumber where you come in, perform a service and get paid. As landlords the service we provide is a properly maintained housing unit.
The service we provide forces us to have a different relationship with our customers than a plumber would have with their customers. Our business relationship with our customers can last for multiple years. We can see marriages happen, children being born, growing up, etc. We have a view into intimate happenings.
On a personal note, I will say that I believe that if you are a good person, and treat people well, you will be treated well and have a good life. You can call it living by the golden rule, karma, whatever you want. My point is that it is how I live my life and it flows through to my business practices.
As a landlord, especially a new landlord, it can be hard to realize that there needs to be a line drawn between the tenant and you. This is a business and it nes to be treated as such. This isn’t charity, it isn’t a helping hand, it is a business.
When it comes to landlording it may seem that those two points conflict but I don’t believe so. I give everyone a fair shake when i deal with them. I don’t take advantage of anyone and I don’t expect to be taken advantage of. If a tenant doesn’t pay me I see it as being taken advantage of. I live up to my end of the deal by taking care of any issues that arise and providing good, sound housing. They need to live up to their end by paying on time and taking care of the property.
Below you will see an interesting news article, along with a video about a tenant who died during his lease and the landlord’s response.
Fort Lauderdale Landlord Emulates Scrooge In Demanding Rent From Dead Man
Fort Lauderdale, FL (AHN) – Florida’s overbuilt and slow real estate market has left the state over loaded with a huge inventory of homes, condos and apartments that don’t sell or rent. That might explain why one South Florida landlord is seeking rent from a dead man, claiming that he is owed three months rent because the tenant failed to give 60 days notice before dropping dead of an unexpected heart attack.
Fort Lauderdale landlord Alan Statsky claims he is owed the money for the apartment at Sun Harbour Yearly Residences that Art Zissen left vacant after dying there of a heart attack on Sept. 22.
"Part of the contract says if you abandon your lease and you don’t pay on your lease that we have a right to collect your security deposit," property manager Alan Statsky was quoted as saying by Local 10 news.
But it’s not just the dead man’s security deposit. In a move that could have been a scene in novelist Charles Dickens’ "A Christmas Carol" by character Ebenezer Scrooge, Statsky wants rent for October, November and December for the vacant apartment too. And since Art Zissen is dead, Statsky sent his relatives a bill for three months of rent.
Although it’s up to a Broward County judge to interpret the lease in January, a lawyer says the lease died when Zissen did leaving Statsky without any contract to enforce.
"This landlord’s ability to collect rent came to an end when Mr. Zissen died," Russell White, an attorney for Zissen’s family, was quoted as saying by Local 10 news. He added, "That landlord, in my view, is trying to take advantage of the situation to extract money. It looks to me that it’s motivated on pure greed."
Zissen’s brother notified the apartment management company on Sept. 24 that his brother had died, then cleaned out the apartment and did a walk through with apartment managers on Oct. 5.
While I can understand the man’s estate being responsible for the remainder of the lease I would expect the death to remove the need for notice. Is it really abandonment? It seems like the bother was trying to do the right thing. This just reminds me of something Bill Maher said when interviewing Elizabeth Warren. They were discussing the recently passed Credit Card legislation and Bill said that it was needed because we just don’t treat each other very well. This is another example of that. I can see legislation being formed because one guy wants to rip off another one here.
The last few weeks have been pretty bust for me. In my personal life I have been swamped. I was literally going from 8am through until just past midnight Saturday and then back out at 8am on Sunday and got home around 6pm. A very long weekend and when you add in that I was tossing and turning all night Saturday into Sunday I am exhausted. Anyway, on to some updates. The house has been rented. The tenants are a couple moving to a larger place from a studio apartment they have in the city.
They seem like nice people, so they passed the "gut" test. For the rental criteria, they passed everything. Financials were OK, current landlord for one gave a great reference.
The guy currently splits time between his parent’s house and his girlfriend. She has a loft apartment which makes it a tight fit for them both to live there. His financials were good, everything on credit looked good. I wasn’t able to get a hold of his previous landlord from another state. That was something that gave me cause to give a second thought.
For the lady, she was OK with her financials. No recent delinquencies. Not a great credit score but an OK score. Current landlord gave a good recommendation. Pays on time, no issues at all. The current landlord and I got into a conversation about how there aren’t many landlords now that call and check references. It’s refreshing to talk to someone else who does. The previous landlord gave a mediocre recommendation. She said that the place was kept nice, rent was paid on time and they even gave a full refund of the security deposit. The issue that she had was the tenant was in a tumultuous relationship and this caused social issues (arguments, etc). I’m not sure if this is the current relationship she is in now. I didn’t really get the opportunity to bring it up in conversation and I really wasn’t that concerned with relationship arguments. Both candidates qualified for the place independent of each other so if there is a split, it should be OK.
Either way, the place is rented and I am back to full capacity. It’s nice to see the bank account for the rental business growing instead of shrinking.
