We Just Had Our First Official Open House!

And well, it was kinda underwhelming...
Only 5 people showed up....sigh...

Here's the ad I put up on Craig's List.
$3000 / 3br - 1400ft² - Brand New 3bed2bath apartment in Alamedas Gold Coast (alameda)             

3BR / 2Ba 1400ft² apartment available sep 01
laundry in bldg street parking
no smoking

Open House Dates
saturday 2014-07-26

Hello Apartment Seekers,
We have a very nice three bedroom two bathroom
basement apartment for rent starting Sept 1st.
This is one unit in a triplex.
The house is located in the Gold Cost neighborhood
of Alameda two blocks from Franklin School and park.
It is a good sized unit with a big master bedroom and
a huge master closet.
Everything is new in this unit.
When its done there will be: frig (ice and water in door), gas stove, microwave over the stove, dishwasher, garbage disposal.

Here's the catch:
Its not done yet....we are working mightily on finishing the
unit but it will not be done until the last week of August.
So, yes, we are asking people to walk through the unfinished
apartment and make a commitment without seeing the finished product.

For everything you ever wanted to know about the apartment, the house
its in, and the owners-landlords please go here.
http://chezneumansky.blogspot.com/

So, think about it, read the blog, and then email me if you're still interested in
coming and taking a tour.
Open House This Sat 1-3pm.
Walk down the driveway, the entrance to the basement unit is at the back of the house.

So yea only five people...two of which obviously hadn't managed to read the ad
at all....Its a basement apartment??? What? How can you rent something in this
condition??

Well, I can kinda understand it...as the apartment looks like this right now.

The high end kitchen

When I was giving the tours I was like, 'And here's where the frig will go, and the stove,
and the cabinets...ya just gotta use your imagination....ha...

The Luxurious Master Bedroom

 Ahem, I keep forgetting that the average person doesn't seem to have much of an
imagination....
My way of thinking is, that this will give someone with the brains and imagination to
take advantage of the situation on a nice rental apartment in a great area.

What will probably end up happening is that we will have to wait to finish the entire thing
then when it looks all pretty and high-endy we'll have a bunch of schmucks in here
getting into a bidding war or something stupid like that...

A Home Depot Rant
Went to Home Despot the other day to buy some 'all purpose' joint compound for the walls.
Brought home an expired container with a bunch of hardened chunks in it. Take it back for a
refund and get a couple more buckets...they're expired also! In fact EVERY SINGLE BUCKET
of the stuff was expired....
I don't know which numbnutz's own stock in that company.....but you should really think about
selling it all...

More Water Through The Ceiling In The Dining Room

This was just exactly what I needed while desperately trying to finish the kitchen under the very, very strict code enforcement permit time lines....

Water Dripping From The Ceiling!!!!

Hurray!!!!!!

That makes it three times now....
I bet y'all know what I'm thinking...that same friggen tenant left her water running for a third time? That's two times too many...and she's away on vacation!
So, I go racing upstairs and make emergency access to both units to determine where the water is coming from.
I tear through the units and find.......
Nothing.... I tear through the most likely culprit again, ....nothing....
The water is absolutely not coming from the units...that's good, cause I was going to perform my first ever eviction if it was, I tell you what!

It wasn't a lot of water, not like last time. We don't have any access to this area of the ceiling...I was looking at cutting into the ceiling to investigate...not a happy prospect as this is still the original lathe and plaster part of the home...

But then, Mrs MadMadScientist saves the day....She says, I just noticed that the toilet on the top floor bathroom is leaking from the tank bolts. A pretty steady drip too.
We turned off the water supply to the toilet, drained the tank and stopped the drip.
The leak in the ceiling stopped also!! Hurray!!!

I have no idea what sort of bizarre circuitous route that water was taking to go down two stories and into the dining room ceiling...

But, Hurray, problem solved without having to cut into the ceiling.
 

Why Being A Landlord Is Awesome Part 2

and now back to our regularly scheduled goofiness....

I Love Having Tenants!!!

One of our tenants knocked on the back door the other day all a flustered.
'I'm sorry I broke your sprinkler.'
'Huh?'
'I broke your sprinkler. Here's a replacement.'
'Uh, okay....'

I went to take a look at our sprinkler...this is what I found...

I stood there for like five minutes...I still have no idea how the tenant managed to do this...
The sprinkler was on the grass in its 'sprinkle position'...The tenant must of ran it over with
her car???
Why the car was on the grass is beyond me....

Yay tenants!!!!!

next up: Kitchen, Kitchen, Kitchen