Welcome Home or Beware of Renters

My family and I spent almost three years in China.  During our time in Beijing, we have rented out our house to a really nice young couple, with a beautiful girl.  While we were away, they have had another beautiful little girl.  Obviously, our experience in China has changed us a lot.  We lived with different people, we were exposed to a different culture, different weather.  Our house went through the same experience.  It lived with different people, it was exposed to different culture, it became different.  When we first went to see the house after we came back, we saw right away that it was not the same house.

The lawn was no longer.  Its life ended after years of neglect.  The gardener later on told me that he was fired shortly after we moved out.  Weeds took over the back yard, the plants separating our yard from the neighbors’ grew to the size of the Berlin Wall before the re-unification of Germany.  The grease on the kitchen cabinets could use military vehicles in extreme conditions for long rides.  There were stains on the floor which required the removal of the top layer from the actual tiles.  Missing light fixtures, burnt kitchen cabinet door, useless oven, useless stove, broken faucets, filthy AC filters.  We ended up remodeling, which turned out to be a great thing.  But still we always had to ask ourselves, how could someone live in a house and neglect it so much.  I’ve lived in rental apartments.  I always treated them as mine.  I wanted my living environment to be clean, in order, functional, and pleasant to the eye.  Have I chosen to have it looking like a stable, I’d move into one.

Anyway, one of the most interesting gifts the tenants left behind were a bunch of pests.  From spiders and insects that viewed us as invaders, all the way to the best pests ever: pigeons.  What happened was that during one or more storms during the couple of winters we were away, some shingles moved off the roof and created the pigeon heaven in our own attic.  Free to enter and leave as they wish, to crap everywhere, to lay their eggs and rear the next generation of winged rats.  They thought, and with good reason, that they were the residents, and we were the invaders.  So here is how it went down.  We came to Israel and lived in a rented apartment (which we returned in a better condition than we received) for a couple of months.  During these couple of months the house was empty, excluding the contractor workers, and of course the current owners of the house: the pigeons.  When we finally moved in, we woke up in the morning to the soothing cooing sound our landlords make when they wake up.  We didn’t pay attention at first, after all, they are much more reliable than an alarm clock.  But over the first weekend in our newly reclaimed house, we realized that unlike the electronic alarm clocks, the winged ones sound their cooing alarms on weekends as well.  This of course meant war.

A roofer was duly called.  The flock flew out without saying their good-byes, leaving all their shit behind, literally.  The roofer guy blocked all entrances and exits off the attic, glued the loose shingles, and served us with a bill.  I’d easily suggest that the bill was worth the weight of a pigeon in gold.   Following the roofer, came the exterminator, who collected all the birds who were left behind, the young and the old, and the wounded.  He took them out and put them in his car.  I’m sure that they are all doing well somewhere in Southern Florida.  He also took care of all the entourage associated with the winged rats – lice mainly, but other small animals as well.

The next morning we heard sounds coming out of the attic.  We knew that we still have an infestation of something upstairs, but confident that all birds were out, we were simply afraid to open the attic door, and we rushed the exterminator back in to the house instead.  Despite his vocal protest.  Turned out, there were two defectors who survived the first and the second roundups.  They were taken as well.  Southern Florida no doubt.

And then the real problem showed up.  It was different.  This one actually had style, it didn’t plan to take no for an answer.  It saw the house as his, and no took part in no argument or discussion we had with its colleagues.  It was a good looking, apparently young, dominating, male pigeon.  And it was not interested in the attic.  It settled down in the front porch.  The most strategic point of the entire house.  Second floor, main street view, easy access, fully protected from the elements.  Good choice.  In just a few days, the floor disappeared, and instead a carpet of crap appeared.  I had no idea that one small animal can produce such large amounts of crap.  I must admit here, that we, the tenants of the house, helped in creating a nice home for this pigeon guy.  We put an empty Pepsi box outside, that our son used for some creative artistry work, an old mirror, and a piece of board we stopped using years ago.  Apparently, these three elements were enough to create a home, for a mobile crap manufacturing unit.

Yesterday, I cleaned the porch spotless.  I also spread “Fly Away” (glue that is believed to be hated by birds) on the rail.  When we came back this afternoon, the pigeon was sitting on the fixture, seven feet up, doing his semi-liquid, multicolor, stinking business on the floor.  The next step was Fly Away on the fixture.  I suspect that his next move will be to hover in mid-air and crap down.  Indeed, uncomfortable, but some do go the extra mile to make a point (or a poop).

If you drive by our house, and you see a “for sale” sign, please understand.  It’s not the economy, it’s not the neighborhood, not even the neighbors.  It’s our winged landlord who decided to finally, after we finished cleaning and remodeling the house for him, throw us out.

On a more serious note.  If you rent your house to a nice young couple, with a beautiful daughter and one on the way, make sure that they have a job, that they have references, and most importantly, that they are responsible for the maintenance of the house.  Don’t be shy, be specific.  Put it in the contract and send someone you trust, once in a while, to make sure that your property is being looked after.  Otherwise, you will come back to a new landlord.  Wings optional.