Moving Accident

The other day I was talking to a friend of mine who owns several apartments. You wouldn't believe some of the stuff he has to put up with as a landlord. Just a few weeks ago he had to pay for a glass board-up due to a ridiculous accident caused by his previous tenant.

The tenant, who had already given him a lot of problems, was in the process of moving out with the assistance of two friends. As payment for their help, the tenant had bought them a lunch of pizza and beer, which was not such a bad idea, except that they drank before starting the move and one of the friends had drunk too much. The three of them started trying to move the sofa out through the glass sliding doors, but ran into some problems. What began as a small argument over how to manipulate the sofa, escalated quickly into a big fight. Soon, the drunk friend picked up a chair and lunged toward the other guy. He lost his balance and the chair hit the glass sliding door, shattering it. 

Unhurt, the men continued with the move and left the house. It wasn’t until when the tenant went to drop off the keys that he informed the landlord what had happened. The tenant agreed to pay for damages and the landlord called an emergency glass service to board up the door temporarily. Unfortunately, the incident delayed the following renter from moving in, and my friend the landlord had to prorate the rent for that month.

As of yet, my friend hasn’t received payment from the tenant for the glass board-up and replacement. He was smart enough to document the damage in case he has to take legal action against the tenant, but hopefully it won’t come to that. It seems the moral of the story is: don’t drink and move!