April 18, 2011 – The risk that I took

Nobody would ever rent out the apartment they own if they had enough money to sustain the mortgage payments without having to host strange people at their precious home for money. There is always a risk of your apartment being trashed in one way or another by your tenants, however nice and normal looking they may seem when they sign the lease.

Unfortunately, I didn't have the luxury of keeping my apartment doors shut while I'm goofing around traveling. So I had to take this enormous risk. And I paid for it. Well, technically, my last tenants paid for the damages that they had inflicted upon my apartment, but I am still paying emotionally.

I decided to go back to school (yes, in fact this is relevant to the story) and needed to find my University transcripts to start the admission process. Of course I have no idea where they are now, with most of my stuff in boxes at the storage and the rest still at the apartment. I thought checking the apartment first would be a good idea – less work. Luckily, my last tenants had just left a week ago and my real estate agent is now in the process of finding me new ones. Tanya, Sasha and I walked all the way from Yama (the weather was very nice) to my place. We were all a little nervous because we hadn't been there for such a long time and everybody was afraid of getting too emotional. Well, emotions were inevitable. Slowly, carefully I opened the front door and for a second hesitated to switch the light on. But it had to be done, and… thank God everything seemed to be all right – all the furniture still there, walls are still painted, floors are still… well… there. "Phew," – I exhaled out loud. "Phew," – echoed Tanya and Sasha.

Relieved and confident now, I entered the bedroom. "AH!" – I couldn't contain myself. Tanya turned pale and looked like she was ready to faint – apparently, to her my exclamation signified the presence of a dead body on my bed. Honestly, I think I might have liked a dead body better. But instead, I had a GIANT ASS TV hanged on my bedroom wall! Right in front of my bed! Forget even about the fact that they needed to make several giant holes for this installation and cables, I'm completely against TVs in the bedroom, on principle! But seriously, who rents a furnished apartment for only 6 months and hangs their stupid TV on a sheetrock wall, without even thinking of asking the owner's permission! What, if they didn't fancy some of my furniture, they would have felt it was OK to throw it out, too? Outrageous! Still trying to recover from the initial shock, I turned around to look at the bed and the… "AH!" Tanya quickly repeated the routine of turning all pale and faint-looking – she didn't seem to get that it wasn't a dead-body scream frequency. The closet was punched through right in the middle. Yes, definitely with a fist. There was a block of unpainted wood leaning on the door though, clearly intended for replacement – how very nice of them. "OK, OK, OK" – I tried to calm myself down as I made my way back to the living room to park on the couch and catch my breath, - "It's really not the end of the world. Everything can be fixed." "AH!" – "Stop it already!" – Tanya shouted. Seriously, there cannot possibly be so many dead bodies in my little apartment, I don't understand why she was so worked up about my emotional response to damages. This time it was my coffee table… with its legs completely chewed up by some small animal, potentially a dog or a cat.

Of course, this is not such a big deal and it could have been much-much worse and everything will be fixed and this is the risk you take when renting your apartment, BUT… I have one problem with it. What kind of people would do something like this and not even let me know? If I were renting an apartment and got into a situation like this, I would at least let the owner know of the damages and offered a compensation way before they discover it all. Isn't this the only decent solution? And my real estate agent (and those tenants were his friends by the way) had told me that he'd inspected the apartment and everything was "just the way it was before they moved in". I already sent the deposit check back to him! What the hell! Sasha immediately started pressuring me to call the bank and cancel the check. I really wouldn't have done it on my own, but she can be very convincing, so the wheels of justice had started turning. After the bank, I called my real estate agent and gave him a piece of my mind. He was shocked and appalled himself (obviously, he couldn't admit that he hadn't really inspected the apartment and just relied on their word instead, which made him invent such stupid excuses that he looked like a complete demented idiot – although really he is a nice guy and has so far been very reliable, I must say).

The resolution is (1) I'm keeping the deposit; (2) the closet and the wall replacement will be taken care of by the agency; and (3) I'll get the money for the coffee table. Well, I did throw in the dirty couch, although at this point I was not really sure whether it was dirtied specifically by them or was just a regular wear and tear (well, 99% it was them). In any case, (4) the couch will be professionally cleaned as well.

So I guess, all is well that ends well… Except it hasn't ended yet and I don't want to jinx it. So hope that everything will be all right next week. This time, Tanya will be inspecting.