NO SMOKING! NO PETS!

[outsidethebox]

NO SMOKING, NO PETS!

I'm the fool whose been trying to move to NH for the past couple of years, looking for a *quiet life in the country*. I repeat - country. You know...villages, "quaint" little vintage houses, peace & quiet, somewhere where I could garden and enjoy unspoiled nature and live in peace. I am a ?live-and-let-live? American who was raised to live by the Golden Rule. In other words ? a relic.

I was thinking more, well...Norman Rockwell than Randy Weaver. I was thinking "general store" rather than "strip malls". Some place where people had settled because they were like-minded about their surroundings and living environment. Maybe some artsy types and creative people, and just plain good old down-to-earth Americans who cared about their environment rather than wrecking and despoiling it. Maybe a base of older conservatives (forgive me..) who would keep the strip joints, methadone clinics, and other ugliness that ? in the name of ?freedom? ? has degraded and despoiled our country. A place where the TV show "COPS" would never be filmed. Just a nice slice of Americana where the land hadn't been bulldozed into tracts, developments, and "estates" filled with row upon row of cookie cutter Barbie dream houses, strip malls, fast food joints, and soul-less, gaudy "trophy" homes and McMansions......in other words...not California or cape Cod...

It's a funny thing about the rental trap - the prospective tenant who may not be able to afford the upper price ranges must provide everything short of their first born, plus thousands of dollars, to apply for a mold infested wreck that's never been cleaned, is filled with junk and litter, and overgrown with weeds. See how that works? You - the tenant, after filling out incredibly invasive forms, abandoning any and all privacy, opening your life up to microscopic scrutiny, shelling out thousands of dollars, are paying someone (who YOU know NOTHING about...) for the PRIVELEDGE of cleaning up their neglected property, the PRIVELEDGE of paying to have old junk hauled away, the PRIVELEDGE of scraping away their mold, and the PRIVELEDGE of practically killing yourself clearing years of weeds and brambles.  And... those PRIVELEDGES will only cost you about $1000.+ per month after you make the place habitable so you can move in. Such a deal I have never seen! AFTER you've been subjected to the 3rd degree, the hot lights, whips, and chains...you can just get right to work missy!
                                               
Of course, it doesn?t work in reverse, and, you, the tenant do not have the right to have the landlord fill out forms so that you can check their credit history, criminal record, and their character references. You - the tenant - don't even have the right to know if the landlord is sane.

Once you get the junk hauled away, the weeds beaten down, the place cleaned, painted, and spruced up, cleaned the windows so you can see through them, and installed flower beds - then the owner can break the lease to either double the rent or put the house on the market. Nifty system.

"NO smoking - No pets!". Puleeeeeeezzze! Spare me! House owners usually don't give two hoots about finding "good" tenant who is quiet, clean, stable! Why don't the ads in the "houses to rent" column say: "No alcoholics/ No felons/No hoarders/No crackheads/No filthy pigs", huh huh?! Wouldn't those issues be of just a tad more concern than cigarette smoking or pets? But, no, they can?t say that because it would be discrimination.  I really, really love the fact that many of those landlords and real estate agents themselves have pets. If someone is a dirty, neglectful, destructive filthy pig, they are that way with or without pets. On the other hand, those "ideal" tenants - the anti-septic, sterilized, upscale yuppies with the platinum credit rating do usually have the de riguer Black Lab or Golden retriever in the back of the ol' Land Rover when they come to apply.

So, my understanding then is that these landlords would not be renting to Martha Stewart and her Chows? Or they would not have rented to Jackie-three-packs-a-day-O? What about Queen Elizabeth? Because she smokes, and is going nowhere without her herd of Corgis. So, you wouldn't rent to J.Lo, Ben Affleck, or Steven King? Or Deepak Chopra? Princess Caroline? Nicole Kidman, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Aniston, or Brad Pitt? Sure you wouldn't ? I believe you...

What about a Vietnmam vet? A former POW who endured years of torture to protect your freedom, only to find that now you - the people he suffered to keep free - have now taken away his right to have a cigarette with his beer at the VFW. How about those American soldiers in Iraq who we see on CNN, gasp... smoking cigarettes! We want them home ? yet, when they come home we will then control their personal choices. Hero schmero! I suppose if you are a real card-carrying member of the histrionic anti-smoking jihad, and you rent your house out furnished, and you genuinely live in terror that 10 years from now you will be able to smell cigarette smoke in the draperies (because you couldn't figure out to wash them or have them dry cleaned, as I do), okay, don't rent to the most feared and hated people on earth - cigarette smokers. (Because ? Lord only knows ? THAT is SO much more important than the plethora of other social problems we have ? like pollution, drugs, moral decay, urban blight, violence, the teen birth rate, crack ?).
Otherwise, try thinking rationally for a change. Theoretically landlords SAY they want to find good, stable tenants who will be in the house for a few years and will take care of it well. And YOU, Mr. Landlord, will NOT be living in the house - so, what's it to you? If you want a decent, clean, stable, long-term tenant who will keep your home well maintained and cared for (and?smelling sweetly..) how does it matter if they smoke cigarettes? If it bothers you, well, you won?t be living there anyway, will you?

To me a prospective tenants integrity, character and qualities would be more important than if they smoke or have pets. Most normal, stable people do have pets. Most crackheads and transients don?t. The picture post card of the charming Cape Cod rose covered cottage or New England farmhouse wouldn?t be complete without a cat on the windowsill. Anyway, I always feel that there is something inherently wrong with people who don?t like animals. The love of animals indicates the character traits of kindness, caring, and compassion. I?ve read that sociopaths kill animals ?hhmmm?

I do smoke. I do have pets. My home, wherever it may be, is immaculate, orderly, creative, charming, and fresh. Even though I am a smoker, I can't stand the smell of cigarette smoke. So, I clean, I am a fresh air fiend, and I use smoke eliminating products. (I've been to Buckingham Palace, and you can't smell the ciggy smoke there either). And, Lord help the troll who even thinks of throwing a cigarette butt on the ground, or out of a car window, in my presence! I have beautiful furnishings, antiques, and objects d?art. Gardening is my passion, my art. The creation of the lovely cottage garden is my forte? and there won?t be any ciggy butts on the ground.

The point is that people are either decent tenants or they aren't, regardless if they smoke cigarettes or have pets, or not. I am an excellent tenant, stable, honest, compulsively clean, an excellent housekeeper and decorator, and award winning gardener, who cannot find a stable home to rent or an HONEST landlord with integrity. And who's not a kook.

Wouldn't it be fun to see this ad in the "houses to rent" column:

" Seeking honest landlord of good character, with platinum credit rating, who's word is good, to rent me a clean, decent house in a quiet location. Must have good references."
Treason! Get the rope! NF

[NH_Geek]

I feel ya...  My current lease is up soon and I'm having a helluva time finding a place that accepts pets...

[Russell Kanning]

I have never had any of those kinds of rental experiences. Maybe that is because I have never lived in Mass.