Yeah right! This week has not been the best in terms of problems at the palace. On Sunday I woke up to the sound of what I first thought was a really noisy washing machine exploding. When I came to my senses I decided it was really a car exploding...after having crashed into the side of the building. Then the power went out. It turns out it was something on the power line exploding. The fire department came and sprayed foam all over the place so the power company could do their thing. I called my roommate/landlord to tell him the power would be out all day, but he did not believe me. He came over and asked the power company guy how long he thought it would take to get the power back on, and the power company guy said, "If everything goes well, we should have it up in an hour." For a moment, I thought there was a chance he was telling the truth. Maybe I was just hoping beyond all hope it would only take a short time. After all, the final of the World Cup was on in a mere five hours. Even if it took longer than he thought, surely I would be able to watch the World Cup while sitting in the comfort of air conditioning, right? Wrong! After the power had been out for four hours I decided to get some ice from the store to try and salvage the food in the refrigerator. I put as much food as I could in coolers with ice and went to my friend's to watch the game.
On Tuesday, I went out on my porch to finish reading a book, and I noticed there was a very welcoming wasp's nest above my head, with many welcoming wasps ready to greet me. While I do not like to offend those who are ready to greet me with open arms, these wasps looked like they wanted to double cross me. Thus, I ran back inside. Once inside, I heard a strange beeping sound coming from the carbon monoxide detector. The alarms in the apartment usually beep when the power is out because they are running on battery back-up, and we never bother to put in fresh batteries. When the power is on, they run on some kind of sophisticated electrical wiring and should not beep. There was no reason for alarm, as I assume the alarm makes a really hideous sound when there is actually a danger, but being protective of my life I immediately worried that I would die from carbon monoxide poisoning. I wasted no time in running outside, downstairs, away from the devil wasps, to take in one last gulp of fresh air before keeling over. When I realized I was not dying, I did notice how disgusting the entry to the door was. There was a tremendous amount of dirt and leaves and debris in the corners and on the ground, including a couple of shoes that had been sitting outside for a year. There were countless spiderwebs and other bugs that may have been colluding with the wasps. I decided something had to be done, so I spent the next hour cleaning the door, door frame, and sidewalk. This all follow the discovery of mice in the apartment a few weeks ago, which led to a massive cleaning project. Also, the garage door is broken. All in all, I am fed up with how poorly the place is taken care of.
As I was cleaning the door with the heat index pressing towards 100, sweat dripping down my face, gross water dripping down my arms, I wondered if the concept of homeowners taking better care of their property than renters still holds. One of the most popular arguments homeowners use to try and keep renters out of their neighborhoods is that renters will bring down property values. The basic argument is that homeowners take better care of their property because they are invested in both their home and the neighborhood. Renters, on the other hand, move in and out often and do not care about upkeep. I am wondering if this basic truth has changed at all over the last few decades, if it was ever completely true. There is some intuitive sense to the idea that people who know they are going to live in the same house for twenty years will want to take care of it. In fact, I tend to believe the underlying logic that people will maintain their property up to a standard they can stand to live with for a certain amount of time. Renters can stand to live in mess for a year if they know they can just leave, and putting up with the mess may be preferable to putting in all the hours of cleaning. In other words a person will determine if putting in the work to keep up the property is more or less onerous than putting up with the discomfort of living in filth and disorder over an expected period of time. The basic assumption that homeowners take better care of their property seems to hinge on how long renters and homeowners live in their respective homes and on how messy they can stand it. I wonder if the gap is closing now that many homeowners are looking to flip their homes within five years.
Most of the ongoing problems are the result of my roommate/landlord wanting to put off a lot of maintenance until he is ready to sell the place. He is trying to wait to replace the garage door and paint the place so he does not have to do it again. I think a lot of the general neglect is a result of the fact that he always has it in the back of his mind that he is going to leave. In that sense, maybe there is no difference between a renter who is expecting to stay only a year and a homeowner expecting to stay five years. If they know they will eventually leave, they have no incentive to take care of the place even in the beginning (a problem inherent in any finite game, eh Chris?). If that is the case, homeowners only have an incentive to take care of the place if they expect to live there forever. While I am sure that is not the case in practice, there probably is a significant difference between investment-type homeowners and homeowners buying for life in terms of property maintenance. I think this is an interesting research question that needs answering. Maybe I will put more thought into answering that question in the future, but for now, I am going to clean the palace. I just wish Jasmine would come back.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment