"Sister! There's A Monster In The Sink!"

 

This past week has been one of those hectic landlady weeks when you get to hear that your very 'smart' tenant wants to draw a 'bottom line' (exact words!) and expects you to pay half of ALL the damages he/she himself/herself does to the rental unit. Uh ... when did we agree to that? Some tenant species treat rental homes like hotels.

"Sister, since this is YOUR property I am ASSUMING that you will share all the expenses."

A voice of reason told me through my boiling rage fit that this guy had definitely not read the lease he signed. He had a clogged kitchen sink and the trash disposal machine was functioning but not draining it. I have known sinks and trash disposal units for 6 years now since I moved to the US and not once have I clogged them. They work fine unless you throw an entire animal load of meat in there without turning the crusher machine on. Solid chunks go in and clog the pipe. Period! That's your 'negligence' and 'misconduct' like the lease reads if you clog the pipe.

"I don't think there is any food clogging it." he insisted. 

So before jumping to the conclusion about the 'Sink Monster', I began to Google my rights and responsibilities as a landlord (lady!) before I answered this argumentative guy professionally who insisted that nothing was clogging the sink and there was some plumbing choke that I am obliged to have fixed. I texted my agent (the poor agent! he always suffers my panic attacks!). He confirmed that I was thinking right and told me to deduct service charges (if the guy did not agree!) from his security deposit.

I had to take photos of the lease! And yes I had to dig out the lease from my emails to take that photo. All this to confirm the obvious to someone who was stubbornly asking me to arrange an emergency plumber because the STINK from the sink was too much. Dude! The stink was because of decomposing food! Phew! Meanwhile I was texting away my plumbing guy asking for an appointment. The legal jargon seemed to have made sense (of course! supported by photographs) and the tenant agreed to pay for the monster in the sink.

The plumbing technician managed to find the monster three course meal that was dumped into the poor sink and contributed to the clog. 

The case is sealed.