Paying the Rent At the 6 Park Avenue Apartments
Imagine you live in a city in which most everyone resides in fairly average-looking apartment complexes. You do too. Your apartment is OK, but not great. There’s just something kind-of shabby about it. It’s a little bit cramped. A little bit run-down looking. Blandly landscaped. Under-maintained.
But there’s this one complex in town, the 6 Park Avenue Apartments, that’s way better than all the others. It’s got great landscaping, spacious units, nice design — everything’s just much nicer than the other apartment complexes around town. And it’s the only complex like that, at any price. You know if you lived at 6 Park Avenue, life would be better. You’d feel better about your place. Everyone would like you more. You’d have better friends, better dates, better relationships. You’d just be a whole lot cooler, and everyone who saw your place would know it.
So one day you walk into 6 Park Avenue’s plush leasing office and speak with the cute girl on duty. “I’m paying nearly $500 per month at my current residence,” you say, “How much to rent one of your units? $1,000 a month? $1,500?”
“No,” she says, “our units rent for about $600 a month.”
“Really? Wow! I can afford that! That sounds almost too good to be true — what’s the catch? No available units?”
“We have plenty of units available,” she says, “but there are a few catches.”
“I thought so. Please do tell.”
The girl explains: “The rent isn’t actually $600 a month; it’s $20 a day. And you have to pay the rent daily.”
“Oh... OK,” you say, “Can’t I just pay the full $600 at the start of the month?”
“Nope, sorry. We don’t work that way. You have to pay daily. And you have to pay it, not somebody else. You can pay by check, cash, or card, but you have to pay either in-person here in our office, or you can phone it in with a card. But it has to be you on the phone. We’ll know if it isn’t, and refuse payment. And we don’t keep your card info — you have to read it off every time.”
“I see. What if I miss a payment? Monster late fee?”
“No, there’s no late fee.”
“Cool!”
“And in fact, if you miss a day, we won’t even accept payment for that day. You just start paying again the next day.”
“Huh? How can that be? What happens if I just stop paying?”
“Oh — if you miss three payments in any 30 consecutive days, you get evicted. And it’s really immediate; you get your stuff out and leave that same day. Can’t fight it either — the contract’s really bulletproof.” She pops her bubblegum.
“But I can skip paying two days every month, and save $40 that way? And be paying just $560 per month, right?”
“Yes — but if you miss just one more day, even by accident...”
“I see. I might need that safety buffer. Now I’m beginning to see why everyone doesn’t live here; it must take some real discipline to pay that way.”
“Yeah, that’s about the size of it.” She rolls her eyes.
“Hmmm. How do you keep people from renting one of your units for a couple days, like an amazingly cheap hotel?”
“You have to pay three months rent before you can move in. Then you pay $20 a day to stay. Nothing’s refundable!” She smiles winningly.
“Okay then! Now I’m starting to see the catch. If I get evicted for missing three days, do I have to pay a three-month deposit again before I can move back in?”
“Not necessarily. If you keep paying $20-a-day after your eviction, we’ll generally let you back in within a couple weeks, maybe less.”
“That’s good to know. Still, you must make a lot of money off of people who pay the three-month deposit and then get kicked out after a few weeks and never come back.”
“Not really. Those people pretty much can’t meet the deposit.”
“But lots of people have $1,800 sitting around. I could probably write you a check for that amount right now. In fact, I think I will.” You start to get out your checkbook.
“Sorry — we can’t take it.”
“What?! Now I’m really confused. Why not?”
“We take payment only as $20 a day. For three months. Then you get to move in.”
You stand there for a few seconds, momentarily stunned. “Well, I really would like to live here,” you manage to say. “Let me think about it. I’ll come back.”
The cute girl smiles again. “I hope so!” she says.
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