DIARY OF A PROPERTY MANAGER

There may be a business with more wacky experiences than property management but I don’t know what it is. Here is a sampler of notable events from a typical month.

1. Awakened At 2:30 a.m. by the emergency pager. Checked the answering service to find that the caller had hung up leaving no message.

2. Returned a call from a bilingual tenant. Got his answering machine, the recorded message from which began, “ I’m sorry I’m not here to miss your call….”

3. A tenant called complaining that a plumber was in the front yard with pipes in the ground from which there was water spewing forth. I explained that this was known as a sprinkler system.

4. All tenants at a building were informed to move their cars from the underground garage during a particular time period to facilitate preventative rootering of the drain lines. I called one tenant who had not moved her car. She said that it was not a convenient time to do so. I asked her if it was a convenient time to have a sewage back up in her apartment.

5. Received a 5:30 a.m. emergency page and another at 5:32 a.m. At 5:35 a.m. I checked both messages. The first reported that the tenant had awakened to find the sprinkler system on. She called back two minutes later to say that it had gone off automatically, so everything seemed fine. Had an early breakfast that day.

6. Tenant in a building called to complain that the lawn sprinkler, which was operating at 6:00 p.m. made the steps slippery when she left for dinner and suggested an alternative time for operation at approximately 1:30 a.m.

7. After changing the time for the sprinklers to operate at 1:30 a.m. another tenant call to complain that they awakened her and she suggested an alternative time for operation at approximately 6:00 p.m.

8. Elderly tenant regularly calls to complain that the “man upstairs” keeps coming in to her apartment when she is asleep and eats the food in her refrigerator. I promise to speak to “him” and she is always grateful.

9. Spoke to the decorator for a progress report on an interior refurbishing project. He asked why I was calling him so often. I said, “I’m keeping you on a short leash.” He said, “Ooooh, I might like that.”

10. Tenant called to tell me that she had been late to her class on Getting Organized because she couldn’t find her keys or her shoes. She said they told her not to speak to anyone on the phone more that three minutes, so she hung up. Wish more people would take that class.

11. Owner called and began by asking, “got a minute?” To which I replied, “Actually I don’t.” He then proceeded to tell me what he wanted to tell me anyway.

12. One of my employees called in to say that she had an acting audition and a migraine, but could come in for an hour. Only in L.A.

13. Tenant called to say she wasn’t going to admit the workman that had been scheduled for her unit because she was sitting in the apartment nude drinking beer. At least she wasn’t my employee.

14. Tenant called to report a domestic dispute between the couple next door. The man locked his girl friend out of the apartment on the balcony and left the premises.

15. Sent a Latina property manager to a building to serve notices. One of the tenants tells her, “No pizza door hangers allowed here lady.”

16. Tenant in a $300 rent controlled apartment called to say that he had a chance for a subsidized unit at a lower rent, but was requesting $12,000 to $15,000 to help defray moving costs.

17. Got a voice mail message from an elderly owner, “This is... (Pause). This is... (Pause). Who the hell
am I?”

18. Elderly owner brought a letter she had sent to me that had been returned. It was addressed as follows: Wes Wellman #3, 1415 Stanford Santa Monica Blvd., 90404. She should have known that only Wes Wellman #1 is at that address.

19. Tenant called to say that she would be gone for two weeks to attend a “fat farm.’ She went on to tell me of the list of three great nearby restaurants that she planned to visit on the sly.

20. Just got a new magazine in the mail— “Rest Room World.” Call me if you want the subscription information.

21. Tenant, during a city code inspection, said she did not want smoke detectors because they were radioactive and would kill her children.

22. Section 8 tenant, who pays $17 per month, upon getting a three-day notice more than two weeks after her rent was due, defiantly stated, “I don’t get paid until the 10th.” (“Paid”= a government check)

23. Upon taking over management of a new building, served a late paying tenant with a three-day notice to which the tenant replied, “The previous owner let us pay whenever we wanted. What’s the problem.”

24. Received a complaint from a neighbor about a female tenant who creates a disturbance by beating her boyfriend.

25. Received a request from a tenant to have the electrical wiring checked in her unit because “people” were listening to her conversations.

26. Same tenant called again to have her plumbing checked because the same “people” were listening to her through her toilet when she tinkled.

27. Tenant called complaining that when she walks across her carpeting her feet catch on fire. Told her to call her doctor that perhaps she had a medical condition. She said that she had already called her doctor and he said that she should elevate her feet. She did that but it didn’t help so she was requesting that we send someone to inspect her unit.