This article is about the habits of bad tenants and how to deal with them both as a tenant and as property owners…..a short story of Ade’s encounter with a bad tenant brings your attention to situations that call for apt action especially when the landlord isn’t forthcoming.
A compound is also known as the premises where you live. It is made up of apartments occupied by tenants who are also referred to as your neighbours.
Your premises should be able to give some sort of serenity and peace of mind, especially after the close of work or daily activities, a house is supposed to provide a peaceable and comfortable shelter devoid of distractions, nuisances and discomfort.
There are times we are perturbed by the attitude of our neighbours for numerous reasons ranging from playing loud music, noise from pounding, fumes from generators, couples fighting, noisy visitors, unkempt environment etc.
We’ll be looking at ways of dealing with bad tenants where we live;
I will share the experience of a friend who moved into a property filled with terrible tenants.
Ade, as fondly called by most of his friends is a banker turned student; oh I see your expression! Yes, he used to work with First Bank of Nigeria Plc but after working with the bank for about 5years, he thought of furthering his education, so Ade applied for an MSc at the University of Lagos and as God would have it, he passed the aptitude test and was admitted to study Economics. He had to relocate from his former accommodation which was distant from his campus; he got an apartment very close to School.
After paying his rent and fees, he moved in. The house is a 45-room self-contain apartment, you can imagine the population of such a building, the building is such that doors are opposite the other “face me I face you” kind of arrangement. Ade couldn’t sleep on his first night; loud music came from his next-door neighbour, choking fumes from cigarettes and screams from the female occupants, the noise was so intense that Ade stayed up the whole night. “Well, let me tolerate it since it’s obvious I’m still trying to adjust to this new environment,” he said to himself as he prepared the next morning to commence registration of courses.
Ade returned home around 4 pm to rest and prepare food for himself and low and behold right in front of his door were four ladies plaiting their hair and littering the entire place, he just smiled, greeted them and squeezed himself into his apartment. He had prepared food, ate and laid on his bed to sleep and jeez! A repetition of what had transpired a night before, at this point he became very infuriated and decided to address the challenge once and for all but on a second thought he calmed himself and managed to sleep with pillows wrapped around his ears.
The next day he called his landlord to complain, Mr. Augustine, his landlord promised to talk to his neighbors. However, after about a week it seemed like not much was done by Mr Augustine to stop the noise, so he resolved to handle the issues himself, but to be done in such a way that he wouldn’t sound rude to his neighbours. He did just two things which are:
- Became friends with his neighbours: Getting close to his neighbours helped him to understand them better. On some occasions, he had to share some of his personal belongings with neighbours. He started getting along with them; this was reciprocated with love and kindness.
- Had honest conversations with them: He was able to express himself to his neighbours, he explained the effect of loud music and fumes from marijuana on his health, making them see the level of inconvenience they have caused him since he moved in.
In a short time, they had all adjusted, hence he became more comfortable afterwards.
**Communication is the best antidote for bad tenants irrespective of the type of accommodation you occupy or where it’s located, humans are always humans. Dealing with them only requires a little self-expression to get along and be happy rather than sounding rude and making enemies for yourself.