Childish Landlord

Today is the first of the month and the property manager probably read my notice of vacating in 30 days and my request to have my security deposit applied to my last month's rent. But there has been no response... of course.

So at 8 AM I hear shouting and pounding next door in the empty apartment (which has been vacant for 4 months). Then I smell cigarette smoke wafting into my apartment. Management's maintenance crew is smoking and it's coming through the large holes in the basement wall between the two apartments and into my first and second floors. I know who it is because they shout when they speak as if they are hearing impaired.

Smoke has been a primary issue for me. I said before I signed the lease that I needed a smoke-free environment because I have respiratory restriction when I am around the residue of cigarette smoke. I discovered after moving in that the previous tenant was an employee of the management company, had free rent plus a salary for several years, and "smoked like a chimney" according to the current maintenance workers. The Landlord simply spray-painted over years of accumulated tar and nicotine. Paint doesn't remove toxicity and carcinogens! In my bathroom you can see hundreds of yellow streaks of nicotine all over the walls and sink area. They are sticky to the touch.

I've asked management what they were prepared to do to keep me as a loyal tenant and there has been no response. However, they have erected huge banners at two street corners announcing, "Now Leasing" and "Free Rent."

Yes, that's right. They are offering free rent to attract new tenants, but they are doing nothing to keep good tenants they already have! And now they are deliberately making my last month here unpleasant. Now I have a kidney stone that isn't passing, a sore and bruised hip from the icy parking lot they won't salt or sand, a wrenched shoulder from that same fall, a cough and throat constriction from 11 months of living with toxins, and now nausea from the smoke. (You already know about the unsafe basement and the slippery porch floor because they refused to use no-slip paint on the warping floor boards that had no expansion gaps.)

I offered them a year of my public relations services to help them attract fabulous tenants for only a month's rent. Not only can Landmark Square not comprehend the gift I offered them and refused to acknowledge the gift, but now they are being childishly passive-aggressive during my last four weeks that I paid for.

And did I mention, they insisted I pay 4 months in advance before I moved in? Why do they want to lose a good tenant like me?

This is exactly what my book, The Generosity Experiment, is about: working against your own best interests when someone wants to help you achieve what you want. 

And yes, the property manager knew about the premise of my book from Day One. What can I tell you?