by Stella Kaye

Created on: July 31, 2011

All my Worldly Goods

Being a landlord should be simple, thought Joe - you let the house, you collect the rent, you pay the mortgage, the tenants get a good place to live and everyone’s happy. But there are too many things that go wrong.  Involvement with people's personal lives was all too commonplace - it would always be a no-win situation for the landlord.

Joe’s tenants had been a nice couple, but once they’d spilt up the wife left the rental property taking just two carrier bags of possessions and since the husband no longer wanted to live there he left owing several month’s rent.

‘You can have all the furniture,’ he told Joe when he’d phoned to request the rent.

‘I don’t want your furniture… I can’t pay the mortgage in wardrobes! And what shall I do with all your wife’s clothes?’

‘She doesn’t want anything from the house.’

All Joe wanted was the rent and an empty house so he could re-let it - not a load of furniture in lieu of rent. He wasn’t a detective and he was hopeless in figuring out who the villain was in crime novels so he didn't know who or what to believe.

Wouldn't it be good if everyone came equipped with some built-in device that lit up if you’re being lied to? He’d already come to the conclusion that the only sensible method is to trust no one and assume everyone’s lying.

He tried to contact the wife via her divorce solicitor as the number was on some papers left in the house. He knew there were two sides to every story and enclosed a letter requesting her to collect her belongings.

Although Joe didn’t want the furniture, its value equalled the amount of rent owed and therefore he and his tenant were quits. The tenant agreed and that should have been the end of that.

Joe’s letter was never replied to but months later, long after the house had been cleared and re-let the tenant’s wife rang Joe out of the blue:

‘I’ve only just had your letter forwarded because I changed my solicitor. The furniture was all mine, not my husbands - and what have you done with all my clothes?’

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