They Call Me Fred... the Landlord Book

A true and funny look at the life of a landlord. 3 buildings, 7 suites, 45 appliances and 40 illustrations. Add 12 years as a Landlord to that and you get 107 chapters of raw humor.

Fred Miller is about to take you on a journey through those chaotic years and he guarantees you'll never look at life the same way ever again. So buckle up... it's going to be a bumpy ride.

For example... The City Strikes Back

I had received my third and final notice from the City to cut my lawn. I knew it had to be cut, but how do you cut grass that's three feet tall? I'd have to rent a threshing machine from Saskatchewan to do the job.

The City work crew showed up in two vehicles. They had three lawn mowers and a bunch of Weed Whackers going at it. The six of them spent all day working on my lawn. They had to replace the blades on the mowers several times because they kept hitting all my hidden toe-stubbers. They sure were a sweaty bunch who cursed a lot.

I swear I saw some Morning Glory pull a Weed Whacker that was leaning against a fence into its lair. I guess that's Mother Nature's way of fighting back.

The fence fell down and trapped one guy because there wasn't any more Morning Glory left to support it. We got him out OK, but he sure had a lot of splinters on one side of his body. All the commotion caused a whole bunch of grouse to come running out of the long grass. They circled around and then ran back into a thick patch of grass on the other side. I wondered if I was supposed to declare this place a bird sanctuary or something?

Anyway, I was in a resting mode so I sat back and watched the activities unfold around me. I was just finishing the last of my six-pack when the work crew converged on me in my $5 chair. They presented me with a City invoice. It was for the standard lawn cutting fee set down by legislation: $25. I asked them if they would please come back again next week. A few days later I got another letter from City Hall asking for their $25 payment for cutting my lawn. I felt like they earned it and I had every intention of paying, except I didn't have any money. So I wrote back to at least acknowledge their services.

One of the other items their lawn mower blades had found was a boy's bicycle. The blade had slashed the tire and bent the rim. I really didn't care because I didn't want the bike anyway. One of my neighbors offered to buy the bike from me for $25. Sure, I said. He said it would cost about $50 to fix the tire and the rim. I mentioned this in my letter to the City.

A week later I received a cheque in the mail for $25 from City Hall as the "balance owing on my account."

This one lady tenant that I had was real quiet. She had given me a bunch of post-dated cheques when she moved in and in the four months that she was there I never heard from her. Her cheques never bounced, either. (Probably because they weren't those scenic ones.)

I gave her a call to see if everything was all right. Besides, I wanted to check the water heater that I had installed just before she moved in. So I called her and another lady answered the phone. I asked to speak to my tenant and she said she wasn't available and would I like to make an appointment to see her.

"Okay," I said. "How about tomorrow morning?"

She said, "Fine, how about 11:00?" Then she asked me if I'd seen her friend before. Another strange question, but I said, "Yes, about four months ago." She said, "Good. Do you want half an hour or a full hour?" Strange question, I thought, but I told her half an hour was more than enough. "It shouldn't take long to service my little water heater," I told her. She kind of snickered a bit. Probably because my water heater only held 30 gallons.

When I got there the girl that answered the phone greeted me at the door. She told me to come in and make myself comfortable. She also asked if I wanted a glass of wine. A glass of wine, I thought. At 11:00 in the morning? With all the things I have scheduled to do today? I said, "Sure, sounds good."

A few minutes later my tenant entered the room. She was scantily dressed in some lingerie. She was smiling for a second and then her jaw dropped all the way down to her push-up bra. She looked at her friend and cried out, "That's the Landlord, you idiot!"

Well, good grief. I should have known something was wrong when a tenant offered me a drink. Sure enough, I was the Landlord for an escort agency of some type. Fred's Brothel, I thought. Didn't have a very good ring to it. Not in court, anyway. Well, she cried and begged me not to kick her out. "Heck," I said, "you're the only one who pays the rent on time. You're not going anywhere." It only took a few minutes to check out the water heater. It was fine. I just hoped she wasn't going to charge me for the full half hour.