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Tuesday, April 17, 2007 11:21 PM

Time to Go?

By Jeanine

My landlord is driving me crazy! Don’t get me wrong, I love my apartment, but my landlord is a totally different story. I will admit, she did warn me -- when I was first interviewing to move-in, she said she liked to “keep tabs” on the tenants and to know what was going on in the building. I was prepared for her to come up and check on me every once in a while, but I am just now realizing that our definitions of “keeping tabs” is quite different.

Every time I come in and go out of the building, she pops out of her apartment and wants to chat. That’s fine, I don’t mind being cordial with her. The real problem is that she expects me to announce all my guests to her – and then she gives them the 3rd degree! I, personally, think this is too much. I understand that it’s her building and all, but I think it’s unreasonable for me to have to get all my guests approved by her. I recently had a friend spend the weekend with me and rather than make her leave early in the morning with me, I said it would be fine if she just dropped my key off at my job before she headed out of town. Bad idea. As she’s leaving, she runs into my landlord, smiles and says hi, but my landlord gives her the evil eye. And then when I get home, my landlord is jumping down my back about having “unsupervised guests” in the building. Seriously?!

So despite the fact that I just moved into this apartment, I am considering moving again. I just don’t think I should be paying rent (a LOT of rent, mind you) to live in an apartment where I am not free or comfortable to have friends over. I was wondering, though, does buying afford you more freedom and autonomy? I’m definitely not in a position to buy an apartment myself, but I am trying to build up a good argument for why it might be better to not rent my next place. What do you think?

Posted by Jeanine321
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Comments

re: Time to Go?

Jeanine, your landlord is without a doubt being unreasonable. But do you think she's doing this because you are new to the building and wants to feel you out? Have you spoken to your other neighbors? Is it the same deal with them?

As for owning - the autonomy depends... are you looking to buy a condo or a co-op? As you know there are differences between the two, but each have their own sets of rules that you wouldn't have with your own house. And those rules will vary from building to building. None are as crazy as what you are going through now (I hope) but things like subletting, pets, etc... it's something that comes with communal living. I serve on my condo Board of Managers and there are certain things we do and do not allow in our building, but all is written in our bylaws so there's no surprises of people popping out of their doors and examining your guests. But the bottom line is anytime you share walls with other people, you do give up SOME autonomy. Just comes with the territory, owning or not...

Posted by Bump Lori    Wednesday, April 18, 2007 12:44 PM


re: Time to Go?

Wow!  I had a similar landlord and it didn't last long.  My DH and I live in a duplex and really like it.  We're in a "normal" neighborhood (not all the houses are duplexes around here), don't mind our neighbors too much and still have the security that it's not ours to fix if something goes wrong.  We have way more space than an apartment (single story house with finished basement, 3 bedrooms, 2 full baths).  Unfortunately we're not supposed to have pets (we "don't" have a cat).  This is hard because our landlord does stop by occassionally to check the gutters in the summer and other little yard work.  We never know when he'll be here so it's hard to hide a cat sometimes.  LOL.  Also during a bad ice storm he decided to check the yard out at like 2 am and scared the crap out of the family living in the other duplex as he was in the backyard with a flashlight.

I have a good friend who lives in a condo and loves it but I've heard stories where you can only have certain vehicles (my friends parents had to sell their truck - only car were allowed).  There are definately pros and cons to every housing option.  

Posted by blondie42107    Tuesday, May 01, 2007 9:00 AM


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