Freebie Of The Month

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creamIce Cream! I have $25 gift cards from Cream, the popular ice cream sandwich store on Telegraph Avenue. Its one gift card per unit, not per tenant; however, since they only charge $2 for an ice cream sandwich at Cream, a $25 gift card goes along way! At only 2 bucks a sandwich, I fail to see how this place makes money, but fortunately, that’s not my problem.

How Come I Never Advertise My Vacancies?

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I get asked this question quite frequently, usually by tenants of mine who have friends looking for housing and having a hard time finding anything. Well, the answer is simple. It has been a very long time since I had a vacancy. When one of my tenants moves out, a new tenant usually takes possession the next day.

Why? Well, it is not because of the chocolate room. I don’t tell prospective tenants about the chocolate room until we are ready to sign a lease. I don’t want people renting apartments from me just so they can get free chocolate. Of course there is a housing shortage in this area, but I like to think the main reason why I never have vacancies is because my units have more amenities than most rentals in this area.

Washing Machines And Dryers

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There are washing machines and dryers in all my apartments, even the 1 bedrooms. Very few 1 bedroom apartments around here have washing machines and dryers inside them.

I have wondered why do so few apartments have washing machines and dryers inside them. Nobody wants to go to a laundromat or a coin-op laundry room in the basement of the building, and landlords know that tenants are willing to pay extra rent for an apartment with a washing machine and a dryer inside the unit. So why don’t more landlords put washers and dryers in their rentals?

I think the reason is that most landlords are old (like me) and old landlords tend to think about what was normal when they got into the business 30 or 40 years ago. Back in those days, major appliances were a lot more expensive than they are today. I don’t think most college students realize just how expensive household appliances used to be because they are too young to remember. For example, in 1970, a microwave oven cost $500. That’s over $3,000 in today’s money. Today, you can buy a brand-name microwave oven for $50. Admittedly that is an extreme example, but adjusted for inflation, all household appliances are much cheaper today than they were when I got into the landlording business in 1971. However, there is one that hasn’t changed. Back in 1970, everybody wanted a washing machine and a dryer inside their apartment – and everyone still does.

What Household Appliance Uses The Most Energy? Answer: an electric clothes dryer. The average electric clothes dryer consumes as much energy as a refrigerator, washing machine, and dishwasher combined. That is because most of the energy consumed by an electric clothes dryer is used to produce heat, which draws a lot of electricity. Most other home appliances use most or all of their electricity to turn motors, which consumes relatively little electricity. This is why all of my units have gas clothes dryers. Electric clothes dryers cost $50 to $100 less than gas clothes dryers, but they are no bargain. Drying a load of clothes with an electric clothes dryer costs about 30 cents more than drying the same load in a gas clothes dryer. That may not sound like a lot, but over the expected lifetime of a dryer, a gas clothes dryer will save around $2,000 in energy costs.

Unfortunately, most of the clothes dryers sold in the U.S. today run on electricity, and as a result, it becoming increasingly difficult to find gas clothes dryers in stores. Most new apartment houses and condos have electric clothes dryers. Why? Well, as I said, electric clothes dryers are cheaper to buy than gas clothes dryers. And they are also easier to install. With an electric clothes dryer, all you have to do is plug it in. With a gas clothes dryer, you have to plug it in, but you also need to run a gas line to the dryer, and plumbing is expensive. Several of my units have stacking washer/dryers, and stacking washer/dryers that run on natural gas can be very hard to find. When I need one, I usually have to special order it. Most appliance stores do not keep them in stock.

It seems to me that if our federal government had a rational energy policy, Congress would create some kind of economic incentive for real estate developers to put gas clothes dryers in new housing or at least gas connections in laundry rooms. Right now, real estate developers and landlords have absolutely no incentive from the government to install gas clothes dryers or to replace existing electric dryers with dryers that run on natural gas.

 

Chemistry At U.C. Berkeley

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Over half of my tenants right now are majoring in physics or chemistry, so it is time for a little Berkeley chemistry quiz.

HOW MANY CHEMICAL ELEMENTS WERE DISCOVERED AT THESE WELL-KNOWN AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES?

Duke. 0 elements
Harvard. 0 elements
Johns Hopkins. 0 elements
M.I.T. 0 elements
Princeton. 0 elements
Stanford. 0 elements
U.C.L.A. 0 elements
University of Chicago. Maybe 2 elements, maybe none. See note below.
University of Maryland. My alma mater. 0 elements.
University of Virginia. 0 elements
Yale. 0 elements

University of California at Berkeley. 16 elements. Technetium #43, Astatine #85, Neptunium #93, Plutonium #94, Americium #95, Curium #96, Berkelium #97, Californium #98, Einsteinium #99, Fermium #100, Mendelevium #101, Nobelium $102, Lawrencium #103, Rutherfordium #104, Hahnium #105, Seaborgium #106.

Note: Americium and Curium were first identified at the Argonne National Lab at the University of Chicago during World War 2 by a team of scientists from U.C. Berkeley led by Glenn Seaborg.

Chocolate News

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isisIsis Chocolate will soon be changing the company’s name. Isis Chocolate, a high-end Belgian chocolate company, will be changing its name to Libeert in January. The company has been in business for nearly a century and has a worldwide reputation for superior chocolates, but sales have been hurting because of the Islamic state group in Iraq and Syria with the same name. Apparently some people think that Isis Chocolates is some kind of fundraiser for the Islamic state. Can you imagine anyone believing that? Can you picture heavily armed Islamic terrorists setting up card tables in front of Giant supermarkets and selling their own brand of chocolate bars next to the Girl Scout cookie and the Boy Scout popcorn tables?

aydsAyds. This story reminds me of what happened to Ayds. Ayds diet candy was a popular product back in the 1960s and 1970s. The company claimed that if you ate an Ayds caramel 30 minutes before a meal, it would suppress your appetite. Ayds ads were everywhere, and Ayds sponsored a number of TV shows. However, the company went out of business when the disease AIDS came along. Their slogan seemed to reinforce the erroneous but widely held belief that you could get AIDS by eating Ayds caramels. Ayds slogan was: ‘With Ayds, you’ll lose weight!’
 

New In The Chocolate Room

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Cinnamon Toffee Almonds. This is the traditional snack sold at Oktoberfest in Munich, and they sell literally tons of them. In Germany, they are called ‘gebrannte Mandeln’, which means burned almonds; however, these almonds are not actually ‘burned’ as Americans would use the word. It would be more accurate to call them highly roasted. Almonds are more expensive in Germany and throughout Europe than they are here in California. That is because most of the almonds sold in Europe are grown in California. California produces 80% of the world’s almonds. California also produces almost all of the walnuts and pistachios grown in the U.S. and most of the macadamias.

Butter Toffee Mixed Nuts. This is a mixture of nuts coated in butter caramel. They also sell a lot of these in Munich during Oktoberfest. This mixture contains no cinnamon or hazelnuts. Hazelnuts are extremely popular in Europe, but Americans don’t seem to care for them. Aside from Nutella, hazelnuts and hazelnut products don’t don’t sell well in the U.S. In the South, hazelnuts are commonly called filberts, but hazelnuts and filberts are the same thing.

Christmas Gift Table

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My Christmas gift table is now open for business. Please come on over and select a gift of your choosing. It’s one gift per tenant, not one gift per unit, so if 4 people live in your apartment, your group is entitled to 4 items from the gift table. There is some nice stuff on the table, and its first-come, first-served, so for the best selection, you should come sooner than later.

Red Bull Will Not Give You Wings

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Red Bull is the biggest selling brand of energy drink in the world. It is sold in nearly every country on Earth. The company’s slogan is ‘Red Bull gives you wings’, and they have been using that slogan for over 20 years.

In a class action lawsuit, Red Bull was sued by a group of U.S. consumers on the grounds that they thought that by consuming Red Bull, they would grow actual ​wings or be able to fly as seen in Red Bull’s animated television commercials and print ads. They won their lawsuit.

In October, 2014; Red Bull announced that they will send refund checks to anyone who bought Red Bull in the belief that by consuming their energy drink, they would grow wings or be able to fly​. Red Bull agreed to pay out $13 million. That does not include the millions that the company spent in legal fees.

The company also agreed to stop using the slogan ‘Red Bull gives you wings’ and will stop showing people with wings in their ads. See: http://www.businessinsider.com/red-bull-settles-false-advertising-lawsuit-for-13-million-2014-10

I think this story illustrates very well what is wrong with this country’s litigation system. We used to have a legal concept in America called the ‘reasonable man’. It asked the question ‘What would a reasonable man think or do in this​ situation?’ Today, plaintiffs in lawsuits can win their cases no matter how unreasonable or irrational they are acting, and what kind of society can operate on a basis like that?

It is easy to laugh at stories about absurd lawsuits like this one, but there is a very unfunny side to this story. We are all paying for this kind​ of nonsense, and we are paying a lot. The cost of frivolous, silly lawsuits and liability insurance is built into the price of everything you buy, including rent.

​All landlords buy liability insurance, including me. Landlords are sometimes sued for the most ridiculous reasons, and even though few people win these lawsuits, we still have to defend ourselves, and landlord lawyers are very expensive. I know mine is.

My Opinion. Take a look at the Red Bull ad below. It shows a man with wings. He is flying among the skyscrapers of some big city. It seems to me that the wings on the back of this man are far too short to support his weight. I would guess this guy’s weight at around 170 pounds, plus of course the weight of his clothes. I don’t believe that this man could really fly with wings that small. I also think it would probably very uncomfortable for him to sleep on his back. What do you think?

redbullTHE WORLD’S WORST APPLICANT.

That’s Discrimination! I once received an application for an apartment from a college student named Andre. He told me that he was living at his mother’s house in Richmond, CA. Andre desperately wanted to move out of his mother’s house and get his own place. I understood exactly​ how he felt. When I was Andre’s age, I was living in my step-mother’s house, and I was very, very anxious to get out​. Andre was a full-time college student with a part-time job. After reviewing Andre’s application, I said: “Andre, as you know, the rent on this apartment is $900 a month, but according to your application form, your income is only $600 a month. If I rented this apartment to you, how would you pay the rent?” Andre looked at the floor, thought about it for a while, and said: “I don’t know.” I said: “Do you have any other financial resources that you could use to pay the rent?” Andre said: “No, I don’t.” I said: “Well, I don’t rent apartments to people who can’t pay the rent.” Andre looked shocked with his mouth open. Then he said: “That’s discrimination! You’re refusing to rent this apartment to me just because I’m poor. You can’t do that!” I said: “Well, actually​ I can.” Andre was angry. He threatened to sue me on the grounds of discrimination, but that​ didn’t happen. I knew that Andre didn’t have any​ money to hire a lawyer, and I thought it was unlikely that he would be able to find a lawyer who would take a case like this on a contingency basis. Even with a good lawyer, Andre would have lost. A landlord has a legal right, even in Berkeley, to refuse to rent an apartment to someone who lacks the ability to pay the rent. – and says so.

 

How To Make Cheese Sauce.

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This recipe is fast and foolproof!
My first job here in Berkeley was managing the Mel’s Drive-In restaurant downtown. Mel’s Drive-In restaurants are long gone, but the name may sound familiar. A Mels’ Drive-In was featured in the movie American Graffiti, which launched the careers of many famous actors. After Mel’s went bankrupt, another company bought the name and now has Mel’s restaurants in several Bay Area cities, including Berkeley. I learned how to make cheese sauce when I was managing another restaurant in Berkeley, The Station.
Cheese sauce is used in a lot of popular dishes: macaroni & cheese, nachos, potatoes au gratin, etc.; however, most people never make cheese sauce because they don’t think they are up to it. Most cheese sauce recipes start off by making you make a roux, and making roux is tricky. If you don’t cook the flour in your roux long enough, your sauce will be lumpy and pasty. It you cook your roux too long, it will burn, and roux burns very easily. This recipe contains no roux.
The secret to foolproof cheese sauce without roux is Wondra flour. Wondra flour is sold at all supermarkets in the baking section. Wondra looks like regular wheat flour, but it is different. Wondra is precooked flour. That means that when you use Wondra in a sauce, you don’t have to make a roux. You just put everything in the pot and heat it up. To make a professional, restaurant quality cheese sauce, put all the following ingredients in a small pot:
1 cup cold whole milk
2 tablespoons Wondra flour
2 tablespoons butter
dash of salt and pepper
Heat the mixture to a boil over a medium flame, stirring constantly. When it comes to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer for 1 minute, stirring continuously. Turn off the heat and add:
1/4 teaspoon dry mustard powder
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
Stir it up. The residual heat in the mixture will melt the cheese. When the cheese is melted, you’re done! That’s all there is too it.

You might be surprised at how many spiffy, expensive restaurants use Wondra to make their fancy sauces. And No – I am not going to name names. My lawyer would yell at me if I did that, and he reads my tenant newsletter. But I know its true. I have seen containers of Wondra flour in the kitchens of some very famous restaurants.

Calling Me On The Telephone.

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When calling me on the telephone, please remember that before I answer my phone, I always check the Caller I.D. screen first. If my Caller I.D. screen does not identify the caller, or if it tells me that the call is from ‘Private Caller’, ‘Out of Area’, ‘Unknown Name’, ‘Toll Free Caller’, ‘Name Not Found,’ ‘Blocked’, ‘Unavailable’, etc.; I will not answer the call. If you are calling me from a telephone that does not identify you as the caller or you have caller I.D. blocking, just leave a message on my voice mail. Do not hang up without leaving a message or call back later. That won’t do you any good. I check my messages frequently, and I will reply to legitimate voice mail messages. I am sorry if this seems rude, but I get a lot of robocalls and calls from crooks and scammers, and this is the only way I can control this problem.

You should do the same thing I do about this. When you answer a telephone call from a robocaller, you are informing the computer that called you that your phone ​number is live and active and that you answer your phone when calls come in from robocallers. Doing that gets your name put on the robocaller’s sucker list, and they sell their sucker lists to other robocallers.