The New And Improved Readme Guide to Being a Landlord
Congrats! You just picked up the keys to your second home. Time to turn this place into the shittiest slightly below average college house of some wannabe frat bro’s dreams. Here are readmE’s patented tips to get your place ready for some fresh faced college douchebags.
Tip 1: Your new home might have several maintenance issues, chipped paint, or a kitchen faucet that is held on by a stick of gum and one nondenominational prayer. DO NOT REPAIR THIS. Many tenants will complain about the so-called “landlord special” of painting over problems instead of properly addressing them. To avoid your tenants hating you for landlord-specialing over any problem, simply do not address any problem at all. Ever. In fact, don’t even step foot into your new property. By not looking at any problem you don’t actually have to fix it. The biohazards can’t hurt you if you never actually enter the house.
Tip 2: Many college students may complain that their landlord is overbearing. You can easily avoid this problem by including nothing in the lease. Keep your lease as minimal as possible to avoid having to pay for things like “mold damage” or “moveout cleans”. Your tenants will be secretly grateful because you could have included things in your lease such as “no cars more than 8 years-old on the property”. In fact, by simply not including anything in the lease, your tenants should really be tipping you 5-10% of their rent every month.
Tip 3: Do not respond to anything ever. Your second home is a perfect free money maker. If you have to do things like calling a plumber or electrician, your 100% profit margins will take a dip. ReadMe recommends keeping your phone constantly on do not disturb. Your tenants should not be able to contact you for any reason whatsoever. If your tenants start calling you to make you deal with the horrible plumbing or piles of trash left behind from previous tenants, simply throw your phone into a river. If that does not work and your tenants show up in person, pretend to not speak English. Readme recommends learning a few phrases in German to really sell this performance.
Tip 4: If none of these tips work and your tenants are insistent that you deal with any of the numerous issues on your property, we recommend dealing with one issue and then completely disappearing off of the face of the planet for 2-4 months. Your tenants should be so grateful that you handled the active biohazards in the second floor bathroom, that you shouldn’t have to address the live high-voltage wire hanging off of the porch for at least a few months.