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I joined landlord groups to persuade them to be better people to their tenants
- doodlebugging 2y agoI found it! Finally, after all these years, maybe 40 in all, I have the answer to the question that was posed on a t-shirt I bought years ago. The t-shirt question simply asked "Who cares about apathy?" Yeah, I know you're all thinking - Who buys those t-shirts anyway? I do of course and finally I know, after reading the author's byline, that the answer to this question is Luke. >Luke A man on a crusade against apathy. The topic is also close to me as I have a bit of experience being an actual landlord. I also joined a landlord group a long time ago to get access to useful forms, to understand landlord/tenant laws in my state, and to get a feel for how to handle issues that may arise. I didn't maintain that relationship because the site seemed dominated and poisoned by landlords who felt like slumlords in the advice they gave and the posts they made. I have a single family property in a nice neighborhood positioned so that I can advertise to a wide range of tenants and then pick the best candidates. I do all the maintenance myself except those things that require a licensed professional and I have local contractors that I call on for those things. For the operating forms I simply bought a couple of NOLO books and a copy of Texas real estate law and bookmarked the landlord/tenant parts for my state online so I could refer to them if I needed. I do all the tenant screening myself and offer the neighbors and opportunity to meet prospective tenants. I originally offered the place for lease with no pets allowed. All of that changed one day when I was comparing notes about prospective tenants before offering it and the best couple needed to bring their two dogs. That caused me to put myself in their shoes and ask myself what I would do with my two dogs and a cat if I needed to find somewhere to live. I decided that the best way to handle the pet question was to consider them as family members since that is the functional relationship that pet should have with its owner. With that in mind, I searched around and found a site to help me formulate a reasonable pet policy. I include the pets in the interview process so that I can see how they interact with the owners, I require a non-refundable pet deposit for cleaning and up-to-date vaccination records to satisfy state requirements, and I require photos from front, back and both sides so that if the pet gets loose or bites someone I can help identify it should the local animal control pick it up. With nearly 30 years behind me as a landlord I can say that I have only had problems with two tenants. Most tenants have stayed there past the term of their original lease, some more than twice as long. I have leased to a couple of people who just needed a comfortable place to stay for a short time so we worked out a short-term lease that lasted less than 6 months before they were transferred from the area. I have a couple of former tenants who still drop by to visit when they are back in the area. Being a landlord is not hard if you only have one property. Most people are good people.
- edfletcher_t137 2y agoOP isn't the hero we wanted, they're the hero we need.
- bhaney 2y agoThis is the kind of thing that we should be using LLMs to automate and scale up. Not product promotion spam.
- tadfisher 2y agoHow about we just don't use LLMs to automate or scale up anything? I'm trying to interact with humans, not GPUs.
- jszymborski 2y agoSite seems hugged for me. Here's an archive link https://archive.ph/2024.05.04-040152/https://www.thisisalot.com/unhinged-opinions/i-joined-a-bunch-of-landlord-groups-to-subtly-manipulate-them-into-being-better-people/118/ https://archive.ph/2024.05.04-040152/https://www.thisisalot....
- hughesjj 2y agoThis guy is amazing. And JFC, that landlord was really trying to pre-file an eviction. The best part is literally everything the OP is saying is right. I hate how adversarial small time landlords often are against their tenants (not that big ones are any better, but having a face to face just makes it hurt worse)
- koolba 2y agoIf you knew the tenant was not going to pay, wouldn’t you get the paperwork ready to be filed as soon as possible? It’s not a charity. And the net outcome of having to deal with paying $1K to get the tenant to move out means that the next tenant will likely see a higher security deposit to cover that eventuality. If an efficient legal system can’t be relied on to quickly move out non-paying tenants, costs are going to rise to compensate. There’s no free rent.
- kube-system 2y ago$1,000 can very easily be cheaper than the loss-of-use and/or damages and/or legal costs incurred by even a very efficient eviction.
- yieldcrv 2y agohaving gone through small claims court with my clients before, I wish there was a way or a practice of pre-filing with every invoice. its really shitty to have to wait for an invoice to go unpaid, for a very long time, and then file with the court, and then have your court date pushed out a couple times, and then win the case, and then go to the sheriff to try to collect I would definitely like to remove a few months from that process. I get the sentiment, but its a UX issue that can be improved, not really the parties involved.
- yowlingcat 2y agoThere's an two potential avenues to fix this, one logistical and one relationship based. The logistical solution is to set up (depending on your services and client appetite) automatic payment through stripe + debit upon invoice at some T settlement period after invoicing, and offer a discount on services to compensate for the improved cashflow. This makes the "easy way" the way that is also best for you (and the client) and you may find that making the path of least resistance one which also results in you getting paid by default to be one that clears out this issue systematically for you with well behaved clients. Of course, that is the caveat -- some clients are pathologically not "well behaved" and if you're in a circumstances where you're often having to go through small claims court with clients on a routine basis, it begs the question of whether you're selecting the right clients or not. Having been in your shoes before, I will say that I've been guilty of selecting clients who showed warning signs of poor behavior that ultimately resulted in my work not getting paid. I began to turn away certain kind of work that made me hesitant of such an outcome, even if it seemed to be lucrative at the outset. Without understand your potential clientele better, it's hard to say whether this would work for your issues, but it may be worth considering.
- zeroCalories 2y agoWe don't need landlords to be better people. We need functioning institutions and laws to protect both parties in the lease. More importantly we need a massive increase in the supply of housing. Whatever I guess. It's a fun game trying to manipulate people on the internet I bet.
- bbstats 2y agoThe only thing that anything needs, everywhere, is for people to be better people.
- kube-system 2y agoYes, we do. The legal system always has friction, and I wouldn't want to rent from someone who I know is an asshole and expect to lean on the legal system, even if I had all of the protections in the world. The best scenario is always people behaving well.
- chongli 2y agoThe issue right now is that the housing crisis has progressed to the point where the legal system is breaking down. At least where I live, the landlord and tenant board (which adjudicates claims between landlords and tenants) is backlogged 18-24 months or more. Many tenants realize this and have started taking advantage by refusing to pay rent altogether, knowing they’re protected from eviction by law (until their day comes to be brought before the board). For their part, landlords have completely lost trust in the system and demand excruciating levels of background checks and references and personal information to try and avoid these bad tenants. All the while raising the rent to exorbitant levels (due to hot real estate market and low vacancies). It’s become an incredibly vicious situation!
- bluefirebrand 2y agoHey if the landlords are tired of renting out property because it's too hard they could sell instead! No sympathy for rent seekers that would rather let their buildings sit empty than rent below the absolute maximum they can get
- kube-system 2y agoI'm not sure what I was expecting, but this person is just giving them good advice on how to run a business.
- henry2023 2y agoOf course. We live in a world that wouldn’t dare to do any actions to save itself unless it’s “profitable”. This way of thinking permeates to each fiber of our social fabric.
- kube-system 2y agoThere is more to running a good business than being profitable.
- Repulsion9513 2y agoThe executives and shareholders of every large business would like to disagree.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- kube-system 2y agoI'd argue that many of them aren't good businesses, even if they're profitable. The opinions of shareholders are just opinions. We all have one.
- Repulsion9513 2y agoYou're free to make that argument, and the stock market and capital will make a different one. Using that capital, the businesses competing against you will make sure that your good business is no longer a business. At which point it will indisputably be a bad business, failing to do anything for anyone.
- 2y ago
- scottiebarnes 2y agoThe internet is one big psyop
- IncreasePosts 2y agoIncluding this comment.
- roenxi 2y agoThis looks like hard work, but based on this article well done to the author for putting in the effort. > Landlords won’t listen to tenants. In the same way that Republicans won’t seriously engage with Democrats and vice versa. As presented, this interaction looks like a completely standard negotiation where both sides get something they want. It is a little unusual in that one side is being represented pro-bono by a neutral party, but stranger things happen. So although I agree that landlords wouldn't listen to tenants in these circumstances, it'd be interesting to explore how much this is underselling this "Luke" fellow simply having good negotiation skills. If a landlord is presented with a choice of losing $1,000 or $3,000 and everyone is reasonably polite I suspect a vast majority would choose $1,000.
- aidenn0 2y agoI strongly suspect that if a tenant asked to be paid to move out it would piss the landlord off even more. "Now they are extorting me!" People love to appear generous but hate demands.
- roenxi 2y agoEh, that isn't that important though. They can choose to feel however they like and a skilled negotiator could frame the request well. The question is really "would they pay?".
- notpushkin 2y agoSkilled negotiator would know that how their counterparty feels is extremely important. This is exactly what determines whether they would pay or not. Now, the real question is: how does a skilled negotiator frame “pay me $1000 and I’ll leave tomorrow” in such a way that the landlord feels like a hero for complying? With a neutral third party suggesting this, it is pretty easy as OP post suggests, but if you're the tenant suggesting that I think it won’t be as easy.
- roenxi 2y ago
- neilv 2y agoThe writer acknowledges being deceptive and manipulative. (Falsely claiming someone he's not, disingenuous wasting of others time to become a familiar name, SEO-like content for banking capital for the purpose of influencing.) The reason I'm mentioning this is not to criticize the writer themselves, but to strongly discourage any impressionable people from assuming that behaving like the writer described is totally OK. For example, one of my goals in being on HN is to "gain the trust of techbros, and destroy them from within", but I'm not dishonest about that.
- NewJazz 2y agoWait what?
- eternauta3k 2y agoWho are techbros, and what do you mean by destroy?
- arp242 2y agoMeh; I don't think people need to declare all their motivations, (possible) conflict of interests, long-term plans for the community, and so forth before commenting on a Facebook group. Reality is tons of people have complex motivations, interests, and such. And mostly, he just seems to be giving decent advice. Not spamming, not abusive or disruptive behaviour, just decent advice.
- neilv 2y ago> # Establishing your credentials by lying > [...] So, the first move was to convince them that I am in fact a landlord 2. > So, when the question was posed “do you own a property?” when I applied to join the group, I chose a random 2-flat at the other end of my street and said “yes”. > 2. Once again, I am not a landlord. > # Asking Questions to get your name out there > When I was still new in the groups, I asked some questions about common landlord issues to win cheap interactions. Please don't be a lying manipulator. Just as importantly, don't advocate and normalize it for everyone else. Presumably, most kids through new grads don't realize that tech became a go-to career for those upper-middle who don't value ethics, when that became the easy money. You don't want the impressionable young people thinking that being a lying manipulator is what people should do. Venues like HN and blog posts will significantly influence some of them.
- MichaelMug 2y agoVery accurate: > However, all humans listen to people that they think are like themselves. Naturally, we place more weight on people with whom we have a common reference point.
- acje 2y agoThis has some analogies to how I interact with management as an architect… and with devs ducks
- asdefghyk 2y agoHas the writer ever been a landlord ? Most likely not. I've been a landlord for 37 years - since 1987 At times I have employed agents. Other times if DIY. That includes study to be up to date with tenancy legislation and law changes in my jurisdiction Also have access for advice how to deal with certain tenancy situations - what are my options. Some of these property's are complete houses . Some are boarding houses ( multi room ) Some are "share houses " where the house is rented by the room. All the boarding house management and share house management and tenant selection paperwork I do by myself. I have rented to 100s of people over the years - over a few 100s of tenacious. I do not know if I would give the tenant money. I would offer to help them. However I would definitely advise them how to do it cheaply. If can rent a small truck ( only need car license ) for one day for just 100$ . and it has a hydraulic lifter. For tenants with smaller number of possessions I have actually provided transport and helped with moving. Out of those 100s of tenants, Ive only every evicted 2 people. Anyone that says being a landlord is no work - has obviously never been landlord. The statement "Landlords won’t listen to tenants." is wrong in my case. I actually do a survey when people move out to find out good and bad experiences and ways to improve.
- arthurofbabylon 2y agoIt sounds like you’d benefit from reading the article.
- declan_roberts 2y agoHow exactly?
- asdefghyk 2y agoSeveral of my tenant's have stayed long periods 5 - 10 years when they have been free to leave at just 2 weeks notice So I must have been doing "something" better than "the market"
- bombcar 2y agoYou likely did the most common form of landlord "largesse" - subsidizing the tenant's rent by charging below market. This is extremely common and doesn't hurt anyone, really. The tenant gets a stable place to live, the landlord gets a good tenant, and only the economists complain about something being sold below its value.
- chr15m 2y ago> I’ve worked diligently to manipulate them...lying Disgusting and deeply unethical behaviour. [I am not a landlord.]
- declan_roberts 2y agoThe OP says he "persuaded them to be better people" but only offers up one example of urging a landlord to offer a tenant money to move which he calls a "radical approach". OP calls it radical because he knows nothing about being a landlord or probably even owning a house. It's actually an extremely common approach, not radical it all. It's called "cash for keys" and every landlord knows about it and many of them are forced to use it, and there was probably going to be 2 or 3 people suggesting it below OPs comment. He also says incorrectly "spare you the $3k" lawsuit. What lawsuit? Filing eviction with the sheriff isn't a lawsuit. Just FUD. Just people lying on the internet and then writing a "please clap" blog post. If you want to get involved and help tenants then volunteer at a tenant's advocacy group in your state or city. These places do a lot to actually help tenants from predatory landlords.
- MichaelZuo 2y agoSomething about the article doesn't pass the smell test. Maybe it's the attention seeking wording or something else.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoIt is literally a person blogging about their reddit posts, and bragging about their astroturfing.
- MichaelZuo 2y agoHuh? You mean facebook posts?
- s1artibartfast 2y agoyeah, I get them mixed up.
- noashavit 2y agoDo landlords pay tenants to leave outside of SF? I’ve never heard this before I moved to SF and I believe the pro tenant legislation is the cause.
- smsm42 2y agoI heard such stories about NY and other big heavily regulated markets.
- noashavit 2y agoheavily regulated being key
- smsm42 2y agoIt's only natural - as soon as you have heavy regulation there, all the processes become very complex and time consuming, as anything involving the bureaucracy is. And people with certain inclinations very quickly learn to exploit this. You want to evict me? Fine, welcome to the 2-year process which will consume immense amount of time and mental energy, while I live in your house for free in the meantime (and maybe destroy it - if you want to go after me for that, see above). Or you pay me off and we part as friends.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoIt is common elsewhere in CA, wherever courts are slow to evict. Tenants can incur 100s of thousands of dollars of costs before you get them out through the legal system. The worst tenants are judgements proof and can bankrupt you with impunity. Easy to lose your retirement funds.
- davidguetta 2y agoIm a landlord and i will NEVER rent to an individual because of the ridiculous power imbalance in case of problems. Better off renting to compagnies
- fennecbutt 2y agoWe could legislate them out of existence but the legislators are all landlords. Basically the source of so many problems.