I've been flatting on and off for about 10 years now. Over that time I've lived with 25 different flatmates. Some I love dearly and am still very close to, some I love and still catch up with when I get the chance, some I can't even remember their names and a couple I will never forget, but really wish I could.
But this one, he took the cake.
When he answered our TradeMe ad he was great - nice, happy, funny (and those who have met him also say attractive, but I never subscribed to that idea)... he stood above the rest and was actually our favourite.
We offered him the place, explained how the finances worked, told him we'd like him to pay a bond and a couple of weeks' rent in advance, and let him know when he could move in.
The money went into the flat account, he moved in - it was dandy.
But, as it turns out, that was all the money he planned to pay.
Over Christmas we all got busy - he headed out of town for a few weeks, I went on holiday and our third flatmate was working pretty flat-tack. It took him a couple of weeks to realise the FMFH had neglected to pay any more rent. Thankfully, we had a bit of a buffer in the form of his bond and I pay my rent monthly, while the third flatmate pays weekly, so that went a long way to making the rent go through week to week.
But as we entered the New Year and normalcy began to return, we started to chase him up. At first his excuse was actually pretty believable - stupid, but believable. He told us that he'd accidentally been paying the money into his ex-flatmate's account and she'd spent it over the Summer period. To be fair I've had an old flatmate do that in the past and while it's a little bit stupid - it happens to the best of us.
So he said he'd sort it out and that the money would be in our account on Thursday when he got paid.
Thursday came and there was no money. We hit him up again. Apparently he'd put the cash into his girlfriend's account.
Honestly, how hard is it to use internet banking, right?
I gave him the account number again and just told him to get his girlfriend to put it straight into the account - no harm, no foul.
The next day however, no cash, no excuses.
By this time the flat bills were starting to come in - he owed internet, phone, tolls and power on top of the rent.
Thursday. It was going to be in the account on Thursday.
We decided we were going to get that in writing - and because of all the problems he apparently had with technology, we'd also demand it in cash. By this time he owed $1,000 and we were facing the probability of not making rent.
We rang the landlord and explained our situation. She decided it was time for a flat inspection, and also raised the possibility of getting the place managed (which, for the record, I'm not a fan of - I prefer to deal directly with the landlord).
Thursday came and we didn't see him. He was at a work dinner and would give us the cash tonight.
Friday came and he told us he'd deliver it the next morning.
Saturday arrived. We had the landlord around. I made it clear to her that with or without this payment, he was getting his marching orders - I'm taking on the lease and responsibility for the bills soon and I just couldn't handle having such a liability in my house.
That afternoon we gave him his notice - he had a week to get out of our house. In talking things out with the third flatmate, we also discovered we'd both been having food go missing on a regular basis. I knew the FMFH had been responsible for some of my food going missing (easy to put the blame on one person when the other isn't even in town) but the third flatmate had had mince, eggs, bread, rice and pasta all walk out of the cupboard. He originally thought it was me, but couldn't work out why I wasn't asking like I usually did.
On Sunday we got a text message saying he'd been at his parent's place in Napier trying to sort out his mess. To be honest we were relieved - even though I don't like to rely on my parents or ask them for help, it is good to know that when everything hits the fan, they'll be there for me. I'm lucky like that, I assumed he was too.
But Monday night we got what I can only assume was the truth - it's so completely stupid it has to be.
Apparently, he had had $800. He wanted to pay back the money but he was $200 short. So he did what every rational, normal person would do... he went to SkyCity and attempted to turn that $800 into $1,000. When that inevitably failed, he got drunk for the rest of the weekend.
Thankfully by this stage we had a document signed by him stating he owed the money, we'd smoothed things with the landlord and we'd arranged for a friend to take the room downstairs, so we escaped mostly unscathed, but it was still a bit of a sting to see him spending his money on things like alcohol and burgers without even making an attempt to pay us back.
We still owe the landlord a week's rent - and that is absolutely our priority in terms of moving forward - and both the third flatmate and myself are owed money for bills, which to be honest I've all but written off.
There were mistakes on both ends in terms of checking account balances and letting things drag on for so long but now we are faced with having to go through legal channels to get our money back, and to pay the landlord.
It's an unfortunate fact of life that the bills need to be paid and maybe I'm lucky in that the 24 other flatmates I've had - despite their pitfalls - have all had the one single most important quality in common, in that they made sure the rent was paid. We've all made mistakes, we've all gone with less because the money wouldn't stretch as far as we'd like it to, but this just takes the cake.
By late morning Sunday, we hadn't seen or heard from FMFH. I was reaching the end of my tether and had started to threaten to put his bed in the garage, dump his crap on top of it, wheel it all to the side of the road and change the locks. The third flatmate and a friend were both very keen to watch me do this - I have a lot of patience and compassion, but God help those on the end of my wrath when I have had enough. (Un)fortunately, he did collect his belongings, return the key and leave us.
But not without delivering us a very strong warning about the trust we put in those we live with.
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