(DISCLAIMER) This picture has nothing to do at all with my post...
http://god-gives-us-strength.blogspot.com/2009/12/lords-prayer.html
If you've never heard Andrea Bocelli sing The Lord's Prayer, you have to go listen to this. He sings with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir ~~~ Pretty heavenly!
Sorry I've been MIA the last few days. My mother in law has not been feeling well, and now she's in the hospital with severe anemia. Please keep her in your prayers.
I've been working my tail off this week, too, trying to get ready for a foreclosure sale of all the tenants who are not paying their storage rents (I manage 2 self-storage facilities). Recession even hits self-storage! We usually stay about 95-98% full, but our numbers are down and the number of foreclosures is UP. I hate to see people lose their stuff cuz they can't pay, but I tend to be a softy, and try to work with people to help them get caught up, and I usually wind up losing money on them.
I've learned to be tough. I've been working here for 7 1/2 years and I've heard it all. I've always been so gullible & always believed everything people told me (still do), but I've had to become a bit cynical. Looking back, there have actually been very few people that have had extenuating circumstances that they couldn't pay. I've always believed the best in people and believed all the hard luck stories, but this is a business and we are not running a charity here. If you can afford nice cars, gold teeth, diamonds on your acrylic nails, designer purses, and bling-bling on your state of the art cellphones - you can afford to pay your self-storage bill.
There have been a few times that I've had a person die, or someone has gone to the hospital, or something like that and I've tried very hard to work with that person or their family and help them get caught up and move out. Most people, unfortunately, give me the runaround and self-storage is way down on their list of priorities & bills to pay.
It seems that the people who can least afford self-storage are the ones who wind up getting it. Yes, there are good reasons for self-storage - , divorce, when you're building a house and need a place to stash your stuff, of course moving, putting a loved one in a nursing home and needing storage until you decide what to do with their things. I've even had a couple of people go to jail and leave their things in storage while they're incarcerated. Oh yeah, I've got a couple of people in the armed services that leave their belongings here while they're being deployed. But for the most part, people think they can just get a storage unit and keep extra "stuff" in it, and they get behind ONE month, and never catch up. And they come in here and give me some cockamamie hard-luck story that I'm supposed to believe.
I've heard EVERYTHING why people need a storage. I've had a couple of women that came here running away from abusive situations at home with their children and they don't want their husband/boyfriend to know they've got a storage (which is against the law for me to disclose that anyway). I've had people come in here to my office crying. It's really sad. I try to help as best as I can. I feel like I'm a counselor sometimes because people are running away or bereaved & I guess I have a friendly face.
It's been interesting to say the least. I have a huge dumpster outside on the parking lot that I check regularly to see what people are throwing away. You wouldn't believe what I've seen. I have to make sure there are no chemicals, tires, paint, etc., in there. But people throw away some great stuff. I got an old antique floor lamp out of there to put in the farmhouse, had the wiring checked and found an old shade with little dingle-dangles on it at a garage sale for it. I found an antique accordian in the trash AND an old silver plated clarinet. I also found an old oil painting print of a big red barn and horse and buggy that I re-framed and put in my bedroom at the farmhouse. All for free!
I'm always digging old books out and just this week somebody put a bunch of old tin plates with flowerdy designs that I've never seen before. There were some old pitcher crocks and a beautiful old vintage green and pink cookie jar that somebody dropped in there and it was broken into about 5 pieces. Made me so MAD!!! I wanted it bad. But it was too far gone. I also found some pretty little green and yellow square ceramic salad plates (I guess) that were really old, too.
The funniest thing was one time when this couple got a divorce, and the wife dumped all her husband's small tools and electic tools into the trash cuz she was mad at him. I dug an electric sander and a whole bunch of other small tools and packages of sandpaper & other carpentry stuff, etc., and took them home to my husband. Two decent lawn chairs, ummmm, let me see....Oh yeah - one time I had to cut a lock on a storage that we were about to foreclose on, and when I opened up the door, there was a lifesize Elvis Presley dummy in there - standing up! Scared the pee-diddle out of me!
Oh, and you should see what goes on sale at a foreclosure sale - if you've never been to a storage foreclosure sale, you should check it out. They're published in the newspaper usually in the public notice section. Sometimes you can get some NICE stuff CHEAP! We sell the entire contents of a storage for one price. They can be broken down, but it's too time consuming. I've got my eye on one of the storages here that's got two beautiful leather couches and a nice sized generator in it. I imagine the people will redeem their property and come pay their past due account but Man, wouldn't that be nice! Sometimes it's just junk but you never know. One man said a friend of his bought a storage unit at a FC sale and when he went through everything he found an antique brooch that he sold for $10,000. It had genuine diamonds and gemstones in it. People will use their storages to hide stuff that they don't want anyone to find - like a few thousand dollars that somebody hid in a dresser. OR, a body that somebody hid in a plastic garbage can and duck-taped the lid on. (that wasn't at MY storage)
Ok, there you have the skinny on the self-storage industry. I have an office that has bars across the customer window. I guess I'm safe enough but I don't wear jewelry cuz you just never know what kind of people are gonna come in here. Well, I guess that's all for today. I'll be scant around this weekend - I'm sure we'll be spending lots of time at the hospital. So ya'll have a good one & go check out those storage foreclosure sales - and keep your gown down!
