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The Checks In The Fax?
By
Charlie France
(I swear these are all true!)
Sometimes I wonder if someone is writing all of this stuff down. As stressful as this business gets sometimes, I think we need to sit back and remember the comical things that happen to us everyday.
Randy and I were “reminiscing” so to speak. Here’s some of the fond memories we’d like to share with you …………
We remember getting a call from a neighbor who said she just wanted to be helpful and “There’s some guys walking through my back yard with your furnace from your house next door” Think about it. If she wanted to be so darn helpful, why didn’t she call the police?
And anyone who has rehabbed houses has probably had this happen to them. We showed our house to someone and found out that all the new carpet had been stolen. Then when we went outside we noticed that the people next door had three vans in their garage with the back doors wide open showing neatly lined brand new carpet inside the back of the vans. Surprisingly the carpet was the same color of the carpet that was stolen from our place.
I am sure we are not the only ones who have had neighbors get upset over the amount of signs we have in the yards. It just goes to show you that it DOES draw attention to the house. Randy has a way of fixing the stolen signs from the yards though. He just screws a big yellow and black rent to buy sign to the garage door.
We also had a neighbor who called to complain about “those hideous yellow signs in the yard next door”. This Doctor said we wasted our money going to all of those marketing classes because we should just use one sign like the realtors do. Of course the average pay for Realtors is $19,000 per year. Our per house average is in excess of $30,000.
How about payment time? Now when I was just divorced I used to intentionally send in checks that were not signed, and send the electric bill to the gas company and visa versa so I wouldn’t get the utilities cut off. Today people just call you up and expect forgiveness. Here are some of the calls we get from Tenants. I am sure you have heard a lot of these.
How about…
“I just thought I would start paying you again when I get a job”
I couldn’t pay this month…my television went out and I needed a new one.
I just thought I would bring your payment to court this month.
Now in December we don’t have a payment, right? No? What about Christmas?
Monday was a holiday and knew the next few days after that the mailman would be really busy so I waited an extra week to send in my payment. (how thoughtful!)
I can’t pay because my car broke down and it is costing me to much money to rent a car to get back and forth to work so I can make enough money to pay the rent.
We had one guy who sent in a note from his doctor saying he had been sick instead of sending the rent payment.
And I remember the young man who called and said he had to go out of town because his dad had passed away. I felt so bad for him I sent someone over to cut the grass for him so when he got back in town he wouldn’t have to worry about such a minor thing after losing his father. The next week when he got “back in town” I called and his dad answered the phone.
We had a gal who had not paid the payment tell us that …are you ready?….And I quote….I really need to change the color scheme of the house so I can’t pay the payment this month.
How about……..Let’s see, if my payment is $800 a month, that means in five years I will pay off the house, right?
Wait a minute, I just figured since I called you to tell you I would be late I wouldn’t have to pay late fees!
We had a Tenant call us to ask a favor. He wanted us to please go by the house he was leasing from us and pack up his clothes and bring them to him at the county jail. Now that was a quick eviction. When the judge asked if the Tenant was still in the house we told him no, he was providing housing for him now.
And the title of this story. This is the latest one. I guess it is a sign of the times but someone actually did call and tell me they were going to fax me the payment.
Closings can be fun also.
We had someone bring a charge card to closing and say, “I need to run right down and get a quick cash advance. I’ll be right back!” No closing that day!!!
We give a closing packet which contains all kinds of goodies. At one closing the new homeowner was all excited about the key chain in the packet. Like he said, “I can put the keys to the brand new car I just bought yesterday on my new key chain!”
No closing that day either!
What if you had a closing and no one showed up? All we got was a phone call from a relative. They called to say I thought I had better tell you Mr. Homebuyer asked me to call and tell you he was arrested last night and will be tied up for six years.
When I think about some of the silly stuff we have done I just shake my head. Well actually I kind of hide my head.
A long time ago we got the bright idea of making our own bus benches. Now we didn’t want to do all that work and have someone just pick up the bench and walk off with it, so here we are, in our driveway. Picture this. Filling this bench with cement. Lots of cement.
Do you think we thought of getting the thing in our truck? Heck no. By the time we were done it was so heavy that we had to tie a rope around it and drag it down our driveway and to the filling station on the other side of the street. Man it looked good though! On the corner. Looked sharp. Nice colors. We couldn’t wait until the next day to start getting calls. The next morning it was gone. I don’t know who stole it but I am sure they still have a back ache!
We recently had a tenant “donate” some of his vehicles when he skipped out on us instead of paying rent. I was really excited. There was a van and a motorcycle. I could just see the van. Bright Canary Yellow with black lettering. WE BUY HOUSES. I told Randy, what a neat thing this will be. We can get a press release. I can just see the local papers headlines:
LOCAL REAL ESTATE FIRM IN TOWN WITH BRIGHT IDEA FOR ADVERTISING.
Of course Mr. “I have my head on straight” said he could just see the headlines the day after that:
LOCAL REAL ESTATE FIRM ARRESTED FOR STOLEN VEHICLES.
So we got the titles and made sure the court knew we now owned them!
One of the funniest and dumbest things I have done happened to me a few years ago. I was by myself and checking out the job a contractor had done on a house that we rehabbed. It was early evening and in a not so great neighborhood. We had built a bedroom in the basement and I went downstairs to see if all the work was completed before I paid the final draw. All I did was go into the bedroom.
The door looked like it wasn’t on right. Naturally I went all the way into the room and shut the door to see what the problem was. Well the problem was the fool had put the doorknob on backwards and I got locked in the basement of this empty house. No one knew where I was, but I could just imagine a big sign neon flashing going up on the front porch.
HEY ALL YOU PERVERTS. THERE IS A LADY LOCKED IN THE BASEMENT OF THIS EMPTY HOUSE….. HAVE AT HER!!
OK so I have a wild imagination. I guess that’s when I started disliking contractors.
He did get paid though. I guess he did a pretty good job because as hard as I tried, it took me over twenty minutes to get that darn door open.
So remember the fun things about this business. Don’t get upset. Don’t sweat the small stuff and remember we can laugh all the way to the bank!
Charlie France from
Getthedeed.com
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