TANGLED UP IN RENT DUE

A landlord friend turned up his speaker phone to demonstrate how much he was loved.  Some kid, on the other end, asked if he had to hook up his own washing machine and dryer at the rental house.  My buddy said, “No, we’ll supply that.  Save your appliances for down the road when you buy a house.”  The kid was happy.

My friend rents houses in the Heights to medical residents, Case Western Reserve PhD candidates, and Cleveland Institute of Music students.  These people want to live near University Circle. They’re high achievers with no time, or inclination, to trash an apartment.

Has my buddy ever rented to a stripper?  No.  What about a stripper who uses crack? Doubt it.   How about a stripper who cracks a whip while using crack?

The West Side, where my properties are, is a little dicier than the ivory towers of the Heights.   Or can be — particularly if the landlord is lazy and plays the “show me the money and you’re in” game.

My company screens tenants big-time.  (OK, we did let the stripper in.  Make that exotic dancer.  Exotic dancer with child.  Pure innocence.)  We do criminal and civil court checks. Credit checks.  Previous landlord.

That’s called Keeping Up the Neighborhood. Sounds middle-class. True that.

We’re making a significant civic contribution — offering people a decent place to live in a decent neighborhood.  That’s probably a bigger civic contribution than what my band does.  In a nutshell, my plumbers and custodians keep up appearances.  Every day they create an art installation called Decent Neighborhood.

Is this art? The Webb building, Detroit Avenue at Webb Road.

Take the Webb building. It has a mother hen, concerned manager; Lebanese mini-mart guy on the ground floor; Korean dry cleaner; small-town Ohio Suzuki violin teacher upstairs; a Continental Express flight attendant, a truck driver, a welder, etc.

Some of these Webb tenants marry each other.  (That’s bad for business.  They move in together and I have an empty.)
—-
2 of 2 posts for 8/5/09.

share