This time, I was much more calm, cool and collected. Steve was in the basement, and I yelled downstairs, "Steve! There is water coming from upstairs." He immediately shut off the water and came upstairs.
Again, it was over the bathroom door. Again, the toilet had overflowed. Moments later, a knock on the door. Our tenant was desperate to use the loo, you see. If you think about it, the whole situation is pretty funny really. Water comes pouring down over our bathroom door. Moments later tenant comes in with legs crossed begging to use our bathroom. Funny.
Fortunately, there was no real damage as the water came through the door trim again, which is just so weird.
Of course, the first question Steve asked was, "Has the toilet been acting up?" Our tenant, in a meek voice said, "Well, yes a little, but I didn't notice it until this morning."
A yes, the life of a landlord is filled with trials and tribulations. Those who throw away a plunger because it has feces on it and those who don't heed warning signs. It's best to just laugh sometimes.
p.s. We do like these tenants pretty well. They are just a bit young and inexperienced.
3 comments:
Oh man, you two have so much patience to come through this with a sense of humor. :) Sending good plumbing vibes your way!
I'm new to the landlord gig; we rented out our condo before closing on our current place. Nothing really bad has happened so far, but our tenants are right out of college. I probably hover over them too much, but it's from reading blogs like yours that I imagine the worst possible scenarios. And we're actually foolish enough to expand our landlord duties with the new place and will be renting out one of the units soon. Yikes!
hi jocelyn and steve,
I'm actually not commenting but trying to get in touch with you for a story for the Chicago Reader. Please contact me by email and hopefully we can arrange a time to meet.
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