How to: Be a Bad Landlord

There are so many sad stories in the world about people or things that had so much potential to be good, but just fell short. And then, there is Blackberry Ridge, which seemed to fail upon launch and never even came close to being good. There was good to be had, but none was coveted by the management at Blackberry Ridge. Thanks to their wonderful demonstration, I can now tell you exactly how to be a bad landlord.

Blackberry Ridge was the best place that Ashley and I could find when we first moved to Franklin. The duplexes were new, there were police officers that lived in the subdivision, and the rates were good for the house we were getting. We were met by someone around our age named Cody, who seemed extremely friendly and helpful. His wife Amber joined him when we signed our lease, and we considered that we may be able to be friends with them...wrong.

Hung out to Dry

Our first issue greeted us early when we bought ourselves a new washer and dryer. Lowes came and hooked them up, but we realized that the dryer was not drying anything. We called in a warranty claim with Lowes, and we found out that our dryer vent was 1. On the roof and 2. Blocked. Because it was blocked, this was obviously a problem not only with getting our clothes dry, but a major fire hazard. The Lowes technician told us that our landlords would have to fix the dryer vent. And thus began our problems!

We were told by Cody and Amber that all work orders should go through them. So, I called them and told them that our dryer vent was blocked and that it was a fire hazard and needed to be fixed ASAP. And then after a week, I told them again. And then the next week. And then, after two months of doing nothing, I was fed up. They would feed me excuses, like "well, one of our maintenance guys is sick" for why it was being done...was he dead?! He's been sick for TWO MONTHS?! And don't tell me that he's your only technician. They finally sent someone, who did not enter our house and probably didn't even look at the dryer vent; they just wanted to appease us, and he left a note on our front door that literally said, "It's fine." No, buddy, clearly it's not. You didn't fix anything and you didn't even look, otherwise you would have seen the blockage.

I believe that my hair caught on fire that day. I decided that Cody and Amber didn't care to fix anything, so I called their boss in Jasper, IN. Doug is the property manager, and when I explained the situation, he promised me that he was immediately going to hire someone to come out and fix my vent for me. He followed through, and once our vent was fixed, the technician that fixed it noted that it was a miracle that we didn't burn our house down...

The trust had certainly taken a major hit between me and Cody and Amber. So when my back door wouldn't close properly and anyone could open it, and when my doorbell stopped working, and when the towel rack fell out of the wall (along with other issues), I didn't have much faith that they would be fixed. Am I a prophet? I must be, because once again, they did nothing to help us.

A Sticky Situation

As if the dryer vent and my back door weren't enough, my most fond memory with my landlords came a year ago, when I bought a new car and still had my HHR. There was not enough room for us to have three cars on our little driveway, so I parked the HHR on the sidewalk, as is normal practice in Blackberry Ridge. I came home the next day to find a permanent sticker stuck to the HHR's window. I'm not talking one of those stickers that the car dealer sticks on your window to remind you to change your oil; this was stickier than a bumper sticker. Right on the window. Of a car that I was trying to sell. And no matter how much GooGone I used or how hard I worked to get it off, it still would not come off without leaving a huge, sticky residue. 

I called Amber and Cody to ask how they justified doing that, and they just said, "well, it's a nice way to remind people not to do this." I should have gone and super glued it to their windshield. They damaged my property and thought that they were justified in doing so. It's so weird that they did that to me, because everyone else, every single day, even those living directly across from their house (that they are probably given for free, since they are the "landlords") still park over the sidewalk and for another year, I never saw one other stick on anyone's cars. Can you say, "discrimination?"

If you want people moving out of your subdivision every week, this is how you treat them. That probably explains exactly why people did indeed move out every single week. I know that it is just terrible to have to do your job, Cody and Amber, but guess what?! IT IS YOUR JOB! So sad that you have to take time and effort to put in a work order and make someone go do them! It must be taxing, but that is why you get to live in the subdivision yourself and/or collect a paycheck!

The only helpful person at Blackberry Ridge was Doug. Doug was an angel in a den of thieves, who only care about that check you write them every single month. Doug actually put in the time and effort to take care of his tenants. That is certainly more than can be said about anyone else at Blackberry Ridge. When we had decided to break our lease, I asked Doug, as he was looking in my file, how many work orders that I had under my name, since I had reported at least four. He said that they only one in my file was the dryer vent that he fixed. Go figure.

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