People who rent the places they live in, suck. No doubt any of my vast horde of loyal readers who rent are exceptions to this, but all the rest of them suck. Being a landlord is a form of self-torture so Machiavellian, so depravedly masochistic that we must love agony to continue to indulge in it year after year.

People who buy their homes tend to take much better care of them than people who merely rent them. Of course. They have an investment and they want to protect it. Renters, on the other hand, leave trash everywhere, break everything possible to break and then either never fix it or try to get the landlord to fix it, usually by lying about how it got broken. They skip out without giving notice or paying the rent. The needed repairs always exceed the damage/security deposit, and usually dramatically so.

They sell off the appliances, stove, refrigerator and so forth, just prior to absconding in the night. They get cats that piss and shit everywhere in spite of the No Pets in their lease, they spill liquor and beer everywhere, burn holes with cigarets, destroy the carpet and drapes, leave the refrigerator (if it’s still there) half-full of rotting, moldy garbage. They leave several months worth of trash and garbage piled up in the corners. They accumulate dead, junk vehicles in the driveway that spill over into the yard.

They fight amongst themselves and then take their troubles to the landlord, as if he had something to do with them or was Official Mediator. They make demands that the landlord take this or that action against their co-tenant. They create ill-will with their neighbors, who then complain to the landlord, who is then often visited by the police who make demands of their own.

People who have integrity and a sense of direction, buy their own homes and take pride in ownership. Not Renters. Renters use drugs, drink too much and are often outright alcoholics, at least half their friends are worthless, hanger-on assholes, they go from job to job, drive an old car, are probably on welfare or have conned their way into getting disability checks, have a lot of credit card debt, take advance draws on their paychecks every week, practice unsafe sex with strangers at every opportunity, probably have at least one warrant out for their arrest for everything from unpaid parking tickets to God knows what else, pick their noses in bed and wipe the boogers on the wall, flush disposable diapers down the toilet and expect the landlord to fix the clogged pipe, and pretty much just generally SUCK.