Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Rent

No…

…this is not a post about the Broadway show Rent, but rather a post about my apartment rent.

For seven out of the eight years that I’ve lived in Philadelphia, my habitation has been within this apartment building.

When I first moved in I had a studio apartment on a lower floor and my rent was less than $600.00 a month (heat included). A year later I moved to the same size studio on the 21st floor, but before signing the lease I asked for a two year lease with no rent increase. They gave it to me. So for the next two years I paid exactly the same. In the years that followed, the apartment company raised my rent anywhere from $25-$35.

However, last year during the beginnings of the economy crunch, the greedy little heathens tried to raise my rent $50.00. I immediately went down to the leasing office and reminded them that I had been living here for seven years and was a good tenant who paid the rent on time and took impeccable care of their property. And after a strong persuasion and a fake-threat to vacate, they decreased my increase to $35.00.

*Because as Joan Crawford would say….“Don‘t FUCK with me fellas!”

There are pros and cons to living in my area of the city. On one hand it’s incredibly convenient. I’m a short walk away from work and I’m close to all public transportation and shopping. Also, for east coast city living, my rent is still very reasonable.

On the other hand it’s incredibly noisy because the area is congested with nothing by bars and restaurants, so it always sounds like there’s a party going on. My building is also occupied by a large percentage of rowdy college students, so sometimes it closely resembles scenes from the movie Animal House.

Life is not always nirvana. So you must weigh the positives against the negatives and decide which is more important. Right now, for me, it’s the convenience and reasonable rent.

Anyway….

…since my renewal was coming up again I was curious to find out how much my apartment was going to increase this year, so a few weeks ago I went down to the leasing office and asked them. I was told that the increase would probably be no more than $20-$25.

(the word probably made me a little leery)

Once again I reminded the new property manager about my longevity as a tenant and was hoping they would take that into consideration.

Last Thursday I found the renewal lease in my mailbox and was very apprehensive about opening it. I had had a very long week at work and was not in the mood to see that my rent had been increased by an amount that I was going to have to haggle with.

So I place the unopened envelope on my desk and decided that I wouldn’t open it until Monday morning.

(why deal with something today when you can just as easily procrastinate?)

First thing Monday morning, I made myself a cup of coffee. And after I had a nice peaceful caffeine buzz going on I walked over to my desk, opened the envelope, closed my eyes, and then very slowly opened them so I could see the bad news.

I was shvitzing!

But guess what?

They decided NOT to increase my rent at all.

All my love,

Joan Crawford