Landlord Shmandlord

You’re living in a nice apartment, but you have really noisy neighbors.  You have been trying to deal with it, but you’re at the point where you feel you cannot put up with it any longer. What do you do?

I recently spoke about this with Rob Sachs at NPR, and I thought it would help to elaborate.

Step 0: Take Notes

Keep a detailed record of every incident and communication related to the noisy neighbors.  Record what happened, when it happened, who was involved, who else saw/heard/etc.  In general, this is a good rule of thumb whenever you’re having trouble with another party, whether it’s a tenant, landlord, noisy neighbor, or somebody else.  It will allow you to remember the details and help you refute inaccurate claims if things get nasty.

Step 1: Talk to Your Neighbors

Your first step should be to talk with your neighbors.  It is important to let them know that you are bothered by their noise.  They may not realize that they are being loud, and they cannot do anything unless they know about the problem.

You should approach them in a calm and friendly way while the noise is going on.  Do not be confrontational, but be clear in describing how the noise is affecting you.  You won’t be perceived as being nasty or unfriendly as long as you are nice, calm, and neighborly.

Assume  that they are reasonable people and that they are not aware they are being loud.

Step 2: Talk with Your Landlord

Do not approach your landlord until you have tried talking to the neighbors at least two times.   You should only approach the landlord after the neighbors have demonstrated a complete lack of regard for you and your sanity, when there have been several incidents with no sign of stopping.

When you speak with your landlord, start of by describing that you have unsuccessfully tried to deal with the situation yourself.  List the incidents from your record, and describe the conversations that you’ve had.  Not all landlords are going to deal with the noise, but  you won’t know until you try.

Also, encourage other neighbors to contact the landlord if they are bothered too.

Now, I am a landlord (obviously) and I know that some landlords will be mad at me for giving this advice.  My reason is as follows:  while, as a landlord, I would prefer not to be bothered, I also want my tenants to be happy and to continue renting from me.  If they have a problem, and have been diligent yet unsuccessful in solving it, I want to do what I can to help them.  If I can help them fix a problem, especially if it would prevent them from moving out, then I am happy to help.

Step 3: Call the Police

That being said, the landlord may be unable or unwilling to help.  At this point, you have explored all of the options available, so the next thing to do is to call the police.  It is important that you call the police while the noise is still going on.  You will lose credibility if they show up and the only audible sound are birds chirping peacefully in the back yard.

Talk with the police offers when they arrive.  Ask them what options you have, and see what they recommend.  Laws and ordinances change depending on your location, but they should know what options you have.

Also, it is important to remember that once the police are involved you will no longer have a good relationship with your neighbors.  Bringing the police in may encourage the neighbors to increase the volume or retaliate in other ways.

Step 4: Speak with a Lawyer

Depending on the local laws and regulations, you may have civil recourse.  A judge cannot silence your neighbor, but he may be able to impose fines which you will receive.  Again, this varies widely by town, so a local lawyer could give the most specific advice.

If you’re ambitious and confident, you can explore the law yourself and potentially take the noisy neighbors to small claims court pro se.

What not to do!

There are several things that you should not do throughout this process, because they will be counterproductive to your goal.

• DO NOT fight fire with fire.  Do not start blasting loud music to retaliate.  This will only encourage them and mutually assured destruction will ensue.
• DO NOT be nasty to the neighbors at any point.  Always try to be friendly, even when you’re explaining how they’re ruining your life.
• DO NOT call the police or the landlord unless they would agree that the noise is excessively loud.  If you are complaining about your neighbors breathing, then you are going to lose all sympathy.
• DO NOT permanently change your apartment without your landlord’s written approval.  This includes new walls,  permanent soundproofing, or anything which is permanent or in violation of your lease.

What else can you do?

There are a few other options of things you can do if the noise doesn’t stop

• Rearrange the furniture in your apartment, sometimes this can help damper the noise.
• Be understanding, if the noise is a new infant, then try to understand that parents probably have it worse than you.  At some point, you may have your own child who will keep the neighbors up at night.
• Move = (

[image courtesy of ms4jah]

Like James Saft, I believe that we will face heavy inflation in the coming years, which will help those of us who own financed real estate.

For the first time in a very long time U.S. housing might actually be a reasonable buy on a five-year view.

As a long-time housing bear and someone who believes there is still considerable pain to come in the U.S. economy and banking system that is quite a hard thing to say.

However historically cheap long-term fixed-rate financing (less than 5 percent on a 30-year mortgage) and the prospect of some nasty inflation a year or two out, both courtesy of current Federal Reserve and government policies, make owning a real asset that is debt financed a lot more attractive than would have been the case just three or six months ago.

You can read the whole article here.  

[Found via Paul Kedrosky]

Last week, your Shmandlord was interviewed by NPR’s Rob Sachs for the NPR podcast, What Would Rob Do?  The topic of the interview was what to do about noisy neighbors: when to talk to them in person, when to call in the landlord, and when to call in the police. Check out the interview here.

There is a great guest post about Moral Hazards on Infectious Greed written by Tom Vanderwell.  It starts off with two comics:

In the post Tom describes the dangers of government bailouts and government protections for investors.  If investors do not bear the full risk of their investments, then they will make moves that they wouldn’t otherwise make (the Moral Hazzard).  This leads to various undesirable outcomes, because in the end somebody has to pay when the losses accrue.

I strongly support some of the suggestions that Tom makes, and believe that the US government should do as little of possible (with the one exception of preventing a larger market collapse).  The notion of privatizing the gains and nationalizing the losses, for example what this $25 billion dollar bailout of Freddie and Fannie would be, goes against everything our country stands for.

More inline with the first comic above, I’ve mentioned before that all of my mortgages were all done in a very sustainable way.  They’re almost all fixed mortgages, which ironically enough I took out against the recommendations of both my mortgage brokers and realtors at the time.  If I had taken their advice, and was in bad shape now, I wouldn’t deserve any government help.  But, if those who get in trouble because they chose the less-prudent, shinier path get bailed out,  I may be more likely to take the riskier approach next time.

Hey, why lose out on some extra profits a second time?

I saw this link earlier today for apartment hunting tools intended for tenants.

http://mashable.com/2008/07/23/apartment-hunting-tools/ 

As a landlord, it would be very helpful to take advantage of these.  If anybody has any experience with any of the links, from a Landlord’s perspective, please share your thoughts in the comments (also, include your location).

Two of my tenants are moving out at the end of this month, so last week I started advertising in the our local circulation, which I talked about here. So as the calls started coming in and I was doing my initial screen, I realized that I had spoke with this one woman multiple times before. It seems like each time I try to rent an apartment she calls.

She doesn’t sound like a real estate agent or someone in the industry, trying to get dirt on new rental listings. She didn’t ask many questions about the property at all. I get the impression that she is genuinely looking to rent, and I suppose always is.

Anyway, she’s going to drive by the place and visually assesses whether or not she is interested, and if so call me back. I’ll let you know if she does.

I have a question out there for Shmandlord readers: Are there certain types of business that you won’t do with family members because of the potential conflicts of interest? For example, if your relative was a mortgage broker, real estate agent, or a lawyer, would you use them? If you do, are you able to keep it objective and non-personal? If you don’t, why don’t you?

For certain types of transactions, dealing with family is fine. For example, if your brother has access to wholesale prices on goods that you want to buy, not much can go wrong. Other jobs seem more conducive to problems, like what if your cousin is a mortgage broker, would you go with him? What happens if you find better rates after he’s quoted you?

Does it depend on what the service is? What about real estate brokers? lawyers? doctors?

I’ve passed off the judgment to a Collections lawyer who is going to try to collect money from the settlement that my former tenants receive every year. We set up contingency compensation where they’ll receive one-third of what is collected. At this point, I just want to get this thing over with since it has been dragging on _way_ too long.

Check out this link to see some more great pictures of strange houses.

I hadn’t thought of this technique, but maybe I could use it if ever presented with a similar situation.

A New York landlord hired a marching band to drown out the sound of his tenants protesting asbestos contamination.

Many tenants at the midtown building, owned by Kent Swig of Swig Equities, have been driven out to make room for the construction of luxury condos at the site, the New York Post reported Monday.

The tenants remaining also have complained they have been subjected to airborne asbestos by bad renovation work.

“It’s a question of health and safety … . We have four independent tests that show asbestos,” said resident Alan Kroll, who was among about two dozen protesters outside the building Sunday.

Swig decided to drown out the protesters by hiring the Steppers Marching Band, although the move mostly just drew a curious crowd.

The Department of Environmental Protection has ordered construction halted until the asbestos is cleaned up.

Thanks mshades for the image.