Tenant from Hell Question/Help **WARNING VERY VERY LONG!!!**

[blas]

I can't offer much advice, but many, many condolences.

My absolute fucking retarded parents let my brother's girlfriend move in with us after she was kicked out of where she was living before (does it sound suspicious to anyone that she was always just living with people, but not on leases or anything?), this was over Labor Day and was only supposed to be for a few weeks.

Since she's moved in, I no longer have hardly any room for refrigerated/frozen groceries, I have had to move all of my dry foods upstairs and into my bedroom because she and my brother were getting into my food (even though before this, my brother always left my shit alone), she's become more and more slobby and careless of others the longer she stays.

Didn't want to steal your thread, but damn will I be happy when those two leave.

[Flying Grype]

Aaaah. My mom let a couple of my brother's friends rent a room while she was away at school, so it was my brother D and his friends B and C living in the townhouse. Because they were friends and we thought they were a fairly responsible young couple (they'd been living on their own without grownups for a little while already) my mother didn't make up a contract for them.

Some of the things they did...

Generally not cleaning up after themselves, waiting until it got really bad before doing anything. Filthy kitchen, filthy bathrooms, pet hair and dirty clothes everywhere. They were supposed to be renting one bedroom and sharing the common areas with my brother. Instead their stuff and their messes spread into the whole house and my brother retreated to his basement bedroom, which he kept quite clean thank you.

Not getting their dog spayed because they "couldn't afford it", but buying electronics and other toys -- meanwhile the poor dog is in heat, running around the house with underwear on so that she doesn't bleed on stuff. Not that the underwear actually worked. They weren't the specialty doggie sanitary pants that you put on a breeding bitch when she's not being bred. They were just an old pair of Underoos.

Bringing a new kitten into the house without asking, AND without getting her checked out by a vet first. Of course she turned out to have a fatal and infectious disease. I felt sorry for the kitty, she was a sweetheart. My sorrow for the kitty only strengthened my desire to smash B's head against a wall for exposing my cats to said disease, which one of my first cats had died from when I was little. (As it turned out, fortunately for the integrity of B's braincase, neither of our cats got sick. Neither did their existing cat. The small mercy of FIP is that many cats get exposed but only a few actually get sick.)

On the pet-related points -- my mother was at school to become a vet tech, and she'd worked in clinics and in animal rescue, and she knew about the problems of bringing new pets into a home with existing pets. She knew about FIP, and FIV and FeLV and other stuff cats can carry. She just didn't think B and C would be stupid enough to bring an unvetted cat into the house, and neither did we, so nobody thought to make that a condition of their moving in.

When my brother told Mom what was going on, she gave them some conditions for staying, and when they clearly showed that they had no intent of following the rules, they were out as soon as they found a new apartment. Of course they took their sweet time looking. We've never talked to them deliberately since. (C worked in a store down the street, and we saw her once when we stopped in there for something. I stopped shopping there after that. No idea if she still works there.)

Bottom line for people who are reading this thread and have never rented out a room or apartment -- no matter who you're renting to or how awesome you think they are, always, always write up a contract and have them sign it. I know some of this stuff is just bizarre and you'd never think of it without having seen it first. In my case and in the OP's, we're talking about kids who have never or barely ever lived on their own before and have no idea how to behave. But you don't have to think like them and forbid specific wacko things before they happen. Just use general common sense and require that they keep the place clean to your satisfaction, that they know what their responsibilities are and what yours are, that they won't do anything to harm any existing pets or people in the house, that they won't damage property, etc.

[Sapphire Silk]

Bottom line for people who are reading this thread and have never rented out a room or apartment -- no matter who you're renting to or how awesome you think they are, always, always write up a contract and have them sign it.

Quoted for Truth. Stories like the OP's are why I have not had roommates since I got divorced, even though it would have helped my financials loads to rent out the spare room in the house/apartment over the years.

I've had some really good roomies. And some horrible ones, include one very similar to the OP's who lasted a semester before he announced that he was moving out because I was such a bitch: when I had TOLD him when he moved in that I worked nights and slept days, and he couldn't play his music at its highest volume whether I was sleeping or not . . . and whose announcement simply beat me to the punch; I had already planned to tell him he wasn't welcome to return in the Fall (I would hold the room for a room mate who was out of town for the summer if they paid half rent).

Jester is quite right; little fucktard needs to hit the curb and hard. He will never improve; blood is in the water and he knows he is the one running the show.