Wealth This Good

Hi All,

When you’re a blogger a lot of information comes across your radar screen. This includes blog posts. Well, this week I came across a great little personal finance blog this week called Wealth This Good. The author is Meg, a banker in Dallas, Tx.

Check out her posting on a conflict her tenants are having. All of you landlords out there should be able to appreciate this one.

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Both of my tenants at the older duplex seem like peaceful, relatively responsible people. I have interacted with them both numerous times and feel fairly confident about this assessment.

Each tenant, though, is now accusing his neighbor of being a violent, threatening, drug using nuisance.

Tenant B called last week to complain that Tenant A smokes an inordinate amount of pot. Allegedly this guy smokes pot “all day every day” and that the smell seeps into the adjoining unit. In addition, Tenant B said the pot smoker is erratic and has become increasingly verbally abusive – sometimes unprovoked, sometimes when confronted about the pot smell.

I talked to Tenant B again this weekend when I met him (and his wife) to get the rent money, and he added that the guy goes to sleep at 7pm every night and wakes up banging on the walls and playing music at 6am. He said he wanted to make amends and get along but was cursed at and threatened when he approached the guy – and in front of the pot smoker’s young daughter (who doesn’t live there). He actually called the police to investigate his rights; the wife is afraid her husband is going to “get jumped;” it’s getting to be a real problem.

At this point I’ve been considering giving the other tenant notice. His lease is on a month-to-month basis, so there’s nothing keeping me from simply giving him 45 day notice in light of the complaints – not to mention the illegal activity.

Well today Tenant A called me – the PotHead. PotHead said he was visited by a policeman today and realized that his neighbors had complained and he wanted to know if they’d complained to me. I affirmed that I’d spoken to them and that there had been complaints about his drug use.

Well he launched into a story about how “it all started” when he saw Tenant B sling his wife to the ground in the front yard and scratch her up. He told her he’d call the police if she saw it again, and she begged him not to. He says he hears them fighting all the time and that ever since then Tenant B has been verbally abusive to him and threatening to “kick his ass” unprovoked, etc. He’s considered calling the cops but didn’t want to be “that guy,” blah blah blah.

He admitted to the pot smoking and apologized; said he’s from Hawaii and doesn’t consider it a big deal. He insisted he doesn’t do anything else and doesn’t sell it or anything. Then he complained about Tenant B making noise. Oh, and then he added for good measure that Tenant B asked him for some pot once and that he’d seen him shooting cats with a paintball gun on numerous occasions. Said he’d been keeping records for over a month. And then he rounded out the conversation by inviting me over for an inspection to see how “cozy” he’d made the place.

**Sigh**

I told the guy that I am not here to babysit anybody or call the cops on anybody and that I hoped they could learn to get along because nobody likes having bad relationships with his neighbor. I told him the other guy seems willing to make amends and wasn’t asking me to get rid of him or threatening to call the cops. I told him I’d heard pretty much the same story on both sides and I hoped none of it was true and that they all seemed like good people, etc.

Good Lord.

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Want more? Check out the World of Wealth.

Best,

James