Take the money and run

Viewing the lies landlord/owner posted online about the great amenities of this house in order to sell it, it is clear he has learned nothing from his deceit and is still deluded by his own greed. If any of these things are actually true would be miraculous.

Overuse of the word “custom” throughout the description is indicative of the simple fact that he most likely did the hackjob work himself — as he did in “replumbing” the place — which is why there was never any hot water in winter nor cold water in summer.

The fact is that as tenants we arranged and withstood the installation of the new air conditioning unit during a week in August of 2010,  when landlord/owner refused to have it done, even in February 2010 upon our advice that it would be less expensive.

The fact is that the installers noted the fire hazards in the attic due to landlord/owner’s faulty wiring near his plumbing handiwork.

The fact is that the new bath tubs, particularly the one in the smaller bathroom, was replaced while we were tenants as the old one was scratched to the point of being unusable. That installation entailed replacement by owner’s cohort in crime, someone who was inept at doing such work but who would do it for a bottle of vodka. His first attempt was merely a smathering of glaze to cover the scratches. The chemical odors filled the house for two weeks. When that did not work, owner’s friend installed a new tub improperly which resulted in a complete flooding of the nearby bedroom, requiring replacement of the carpet.

Owner took credit for appliances that we purchased when he went AWOL that five years.

The fact remains that he cannot look into his own reflection to know the horrible things he perpetrated on us as we withstood five years upgrading his appliances, withstanding his lies about the pool pump destruction by his own hand, my husband trimming trees and scaling the roof to clean gutters, without remuneration, done only in accordance with his promise that the house would be ours someday. No consideration, no remuneration for us trying to keep his dung heap from stinking up the neighborhood after he abandoned it for those years. Just lies, abuse, assault and theft of security deposit.

Hopefully, at least, he did some true, actual repairs by a PROFESSIONAL to this money pit before trying to unload it on an unsuspecting, gullible buyer.

Did owner reveal the fire hazard in the attic, pointed out by professional air conditioning installers?

Did owner reveal the fact that by his own hand the “custom” electrical work he did is faulty, with many outlets and light switches not grounded properly, as any professional electrician had told us when we were forced to have electrical work done on the property.

Did owner reveal that there was no insulation?

Did owner reveal the crack in the slab that he had told my husband about?

These are crimes he can live with apparently, in his signature take-the-money-and-run mode of operation without remorse or restitution.

It is clear that more than one life lesson for him will be necessary and is inevitable.

Delusions of grandeur

I’ve been asked by many why we withstood so much for so long.

After looking over the property in January 2007, I had made it clear to landlord that this was not something I wished to rent at his exorbitant price of $1550 per month plus lawn care. I was too old to be without a house and just continue renting. His promise that day — if we stayed at least three years, the lease would be converted to a rent to own.

This was the prime reason we withstood so much abuse from this man. When we moved in, we began thoroughly cleaning and replacing fixtures — particularly closet hardware. He had left furniture of all kinds that we had to sell for him. When all of the appliances eventually needed replaced, landlord was too lazy to perform his property management duties so we ended up running around town time and again buying those appliances on our credit cards, waiting, and hoping, for reimbursement. We made sensible purchases of those keeping in mind that some day this would be our house, and, therefore, we would not want to have cheap or scratch-and-dent preferred by owner to “cut his costs” — a phrase engraved in my mind by him at any circumstance that involved him opening his wallet in performance of his rightful duties.

But after that three years elapsed, no such arrangement materialized. He informed us that “a millionaire had bought his estate.” It was his terrible  joke. But it indicated to us that he was clearly deluded. He informed us shortly thereafter that he wanted approximately $45,000 more than the property value. And that was that.

It was at that point we ended his days of “landlord enrichment.” And we watched our investments — financial, emotional and physical, go straight down the proverbial drain in one instant.

Everyone has their delusion of grandeur. He based his on lies. And that crushed ours, which was based on misplaced trust. And when I left, I told him:

— Your word is worthless. Your word is not your bond. —

It is, thus, no wonder that he had two failed businesses in two years, PLUS this one. Three strikes you’re out! Hopefully, he will stay away from entrepreneurial endeavors that debilitate so many.

A foundation mortared with lies and greed will not support a strong business relationship.

The Brotherhood of the Traveling Refrigerator

When we rented this house, owner told us, “The refrigerator came with the house when I bought it. It works great except the front water and ice dispenser don’t work but I’m going to replace the refrigerator before you move in.” My husband asked, “Well when you do, please replace it with a side-by-side like this one.” Owner agreed.

But, a week or two before we were to move in, owner said he had a hernia. Thus, many things were left undone. Owner left the house in a filthy mess, left us with rooms full of furniture he asked us to sell for him, and he had not replaced the refrigerator.

It wasn’t long before we noticed that food was not cold on the refrigerator side. The freezer side seemed okay. But food spoiled very fast, despite our turning the control to the coolest setting. At this point, the cost of spoiled food was shameful. My husband had to work with owner for well over a year to get him to finally replace the refrigerator. He did not replace it with the side-by-side model he promised. Owner, being somewhere up north, asked us to run around to Sears, Home Depot, Lowes and other stores to get him best price and select a model. We invested a great deal of time and gas in doing so and selected a low priced side-by-side. Shocked, delivery came by one day with  a model nowhere close to being a side-by-side. It was the least expensive refrigerator on the market, which had a freezer at the top and was so much smaller, that the food we did have in the old one couldn’t fit into the new one. All that waiting, and time and gas we wasted running around to do his property management to be slapped in the face with this.

Upon installation of the new refrigerator, installer tells us that there is an icemaker in the freezer that we will not be able to use because the line behind the refrigerator looks to have been rusted for years and is completely broken off! My husband tells owner, and, of course, it is never repaired because owner cannot come down to attempt repair himself and don’t even suggest having a repairman come because that would be out of the question.

Now, what to do with the old refrigerator?

Owner did not take care of the old refrigerator removal. And, of course, no charity wanted it because the icemaker did not work. Since the new one was too small for some of our freezer items, my husband and I decided to keep the old one in the garage temporarily and use the freezer side since that still seemed to work.  We were able to get a few months out of the freezer side until Hunters Creek had its community garage sale when we rolled it out onto the driveway and put a big “FREE” sign on it.

The guy next door comes over laughing, “I see you’re finally getting rid of my old refrigerator. That thing hasn’t worked for years, since I hauled it out to the curb and your landlord pushed it over here!”

With our jaws on the ground, the journey of the traveling refrigerator was unveiled to us. Years and years ago, the guy next door was getting rid of this refrigerator because it did not work. Our landlord pushed it from this guy’s house to his house, despite this guy telling him that the thing did not work.

Now, all the pieces of landlord’s lying puzzle fit. That’s why there were only a few condiment jars in it when landlord first showed us the refrigerator, and he had laughed it off as, “Well, you know how it is with single guys in the house.”

The wasted time, the wasted food and the wasted money we endured!

When I finally brought this incident up to landlord this year, his response was, “Okay! So I lied! So I’m a bad person. So what!”

A House with a Pool

I recall my parents looking at new homes, and their dreams of buying one with a built-in pool.  But it was never meant to be then.

When an opportunity arose for my husband and I to rent a Florida house with an in-ground pool, it was exciting.  That must have overshadowed our judgment when we entered into a lease with the house owner.

The pool was a dream when we first saw it.  After signing the lease, we brought our daughters to look at the house to find that the pool was filled with paint chips from the owner and his friend trying to repair the deck and porch surface.

As part of the lease, owner was responsible for the pool maintenance.  For the first year, the pool was barely useable.  Owner had left the state and had engaged from afar some of the worst, and cheapest, pool maintenance people available in the Hunters Creek, Orlando area.  The pump did not operate properly.  The filter was never cleaned.  One service put in so many chemicals, my daughters were nearly hospitalized from skin rashes.  Another service put in hardly any chemicals so the pool was either green from algae or cloudy from dead algae.

Finally, we told owner we were going to engage our own service.  For the first time in over a year, we had a beautiful, crystal clear pool where no one got rashes and even our little dog could swim without getting abscesses on her little paws!

Then in January 2012, owner relocated back to Florida, after two other of his businesses and several of his personal relationships failed.

On February 11, 2012, I told owner there was a problem with the pool pump.  Wrong move on my part.  Owner, as usual, decided to try to fix it himself.  To make a long and painful story short, pump was broken for weeks, due to owner’s lack of knowledge in not only operating but in fixing pool pumps.  But that did not stop him from blaming all but himself and holding me responsible for having it cleaned due to his gross negligence.

This painful story will be dealt with in more details in other posts, but as of the date of this post, April 22, 2012, this is what the pool looks like after owner’s meddling and failure.  It should be noted that the pool pump is still not operating properly.  I have had several professional pool services assess the problems, of which owner has refused to acknowledge their expert remedies.