25 August 2006

life lessons suck

I've learned a valuable lesson today.

Our landlord decided that instead of charging rent weekly, he wanted us to start paying on the first of the month. So over the course of August, we've been in the process of switching over. The month's rent was divided into a per-day rate. On the 6th we were given a balance on what we owed for the rest of the month. We paid $250 of the $400-some-odd we owed, leaving us with a balance of $177-some-odd dollars. Arthur stopped by today, asking for more rent. "You're supposed to be four weeks in advance," he said. "But two weeks ago you told us you wanted us to start paying a month's rent on the 1st from now on, and you gave us a balance to pay to catch us up for August. I paid $250, and we owe $170-some-odd dollars." He was quiet for a minute, and said "let me go figure it out." He went to his apartment to do some math, and I scrambled to find the note he had written, where he spelled out what we owed, and I noted my payment. I was still looking when he came back.

"The difference is $213.69."

No, no it's not, I thought. I said "okay, just a second..." and ran upstairs to check my bank balance. Also to see if maybe the paperwork I now desperately needed was near the computer, or on my dresser. Nope. Not in the breadbox, not in the junk drawer. My only means of proving we didn't owe him this mystical additional $40 was nowhere to be found. I don't know if my face betrayed how angry and frustrated I was. I'm not sure if his math was wrong, or if he is blatantly trying to rob us blind, but it's my own fault. We've been very careless with filing important papers (and mail!). If we had a filing system in place, I wouldn't be paying extra rent right now. If I am, at that. Maybe his math was wrong before, and I would've benefitted from his error. We'll never know for sure, will we? I'm spitting mad, moreso at me than him (though I'm still pretty pissed at him - he took my moment of frantic searching and non-check-writing to restate the amount I needed to make the check out for.)

That's it.

5 comments:

Dan said...

Go to http://www.filesolutions.com
Buy the Home Filing System - it is super-easy to use and well worth the price.

Anonymous said...

that sucks
i hope his mortgage goes up because the bank decides to change the payment schedule

Dan said...

You should do an update - the people demand it!

toujoursmardi said...

yeah- the people
me people

Dan said...

Are you dead?