A Man and His Apartment.

My lobster has been offered a very unique and privileged opportunity with the internship of her choice for next year, and therefore we are relocating (again) to even out our commutes. After a slew of phone calls and searches on Craigslist, we went on five showings yesterday afternoon. Our first was far and away the most interesting, hands down because of Paul. Paul is in love with his properties. He has more pride in his properties than any landlord we've met. Paul dares us to find anything better than his.

(For the record, I'm not ripping on Paul. I'm in awe of Paul. He's...eccentric.)

"Are you ready to see a great apartment?" he asks as we walk up the front stoop.

Our hopes are high. He lists tons of great features in his ad and boasted quite a bit on the phone, so I'm ready to see his great apartment.

We walk in the door.

Everything is blue.

The carpet is blue, not just in the front room, but in the living room, the hallway, and both bedrooms.

The kitchen countertops are blue.

The toilets are blue.

The bathroom sinks are blue.

But we continue with the showing, and Paul continues with the showing off.

Early on, I make the mistake of asking how old the building is.

Paul: "How....?" (looks at me quizzically)

Me: "I mean, how young is the building?"

Paul: "That's right. None of my buildings have the look of any wear and tear at all. Nothing about them suggests that they're old. This building was built in 1990, which makes it 14 years young."

Erika noticed very few pictures on the wall. We pride ourselves in our artwork and well-framed photographs, and asked if we're allowed to put them up.

"I'd like you to only use 15 nail holes in the walls. The reason I ask is because of ____ (gives first and last name of previous tenant, apparently the scourge of the earth) who left the bedroom wall with 280 nail holes. What's worse, she pounded the nails all the way in before she left. I had to pry them out."

(Fifteen? Uh oh.)

Paul: "I want to show you this furnace. It's a Lennox Pulse 22. That's top of the line, it's 98% efficient. I paid $2600 for this furnace. Landlords are only required to pay for the bare minimum, but I went ahead and bought the best to save my tenants money. I'm the only landlord that'll do that. Go ahead and ask them when you see other places, ask them what kind of furnace they have. Ask why it's not a Pulse 22. They'll tell you, 'it's too expensive'. Tell them, well Paul bought one for me."

Me: "I bet they'll like that."

Paul: "No they won't."

Me: "I know, Paul. I was being facetious."

"Look at all this overhead lighting. In the kitchen alone there's five overhead lighting fixtures. Well, one of them is in the closet, but it totals five."

(I should point out that they were among the ugliest lighting fixtures I've ever seen.)

"All of the sink fixtures are Koehler and the countertops are updated."

(Yeah Paul, but they're blue.)

"The bathroom floors are Armstrong in-laid vinyl. That means they crush little pieces of vinyl directly into the concrete. That way you won't ruin the floors with high heels or something like that."

(Two points: A. Do we look like the kind of girls who wear high heels? and 2. When is the last time any of you walked with high heels on your bathroom floor and the stiletto poked a hole right through it?)

"See these windows? Look at all the glass on these windows. Most landlords will put in window frames but skimp on the glass. You know why? Because glass is expensive. These windows have more glass than required."

(It's true. Those windows did have glass.)

Erika is terribly allergic to cats, and we noticed the tenant had two of them. I asked if there was a chance the carpets would be cleaned after she left.

"Oh, there's no chance of it. It's deliberate. I make all my tenants clean the carpets upon their move-out. By a professional. And show me proof they've done it. If they don't then I do it. And charge 'em for it."

(Paul--the long arm of the Carpet-Cleaning Law.)



I had to call Paul this morning and let him know that we were "going with a different property". He received my voice mail and called me back 25 minutes later to ask me why. I think he was genuinely flabbergasted as to how on earth we could choose anyplace else. I mean, the furnace! The glass! Just look at the in-laid vinyl! I was honest--I told him it was all the blue. He said he does that for variety and that the place across the hall has neutral colors.



Damn. So close.