Ha! I just found out that our terrible renter neighbors will have to move out soon!
Earlier today I noticed that there was a washing machine and a dryer sitting on their front porch. Now, since our washing machine up and died in August we’ve been doing without and taking our laundry to a laundromat (and drying it at home).
I knew that the renters were also going to a laundromat to dry their clothes because their dryer isn’t hooked up for some reason and possibly doesn’t work. So I saw what appears to be a new looking washing machine and dryer on their porch and I thought that the home owners might have bought new appliances for the house.
So I called the home owners to ask them about it as I was hoping that if they were replacing these items that maybe we could have the old washing machine if it still worked. Hey … a used one is better than ours that doesn’t work at all, right?
What I found out is that the home owners didn’t know anything about the washer and dryer sitting on the renters porch, AND, that the renters haven’t been paying their rent!
The home owners were just over there a few days ago to ask them for the rent. They just moved in in September and I don’t know if they paid first and last rent (with the home owners history I suspect they only paid the first months rent), so it’s possible that they missed both Octobers and November’s rent.
The home owners are in the process of trying to evict them. The lady said to me – you know I think they lied about their jobs too. I asked if they’d called the employers that they’d listed and she said they called the numbers they were given and talked to people that the renters had told them to ask for. I suggested that she just call the human resources department of the workplaces that they’d listed but she said “what’s the point now since we’re trying to evict them”. Dumb, the fact that they lied about having jobs might help the home owners evict them sooner.
I guess the rent isn’t the only bill that they aren’t paying. Ever since they moved in I’ve noticed that they keep a lot of windows in their house open. I figured they’d stop doing that once it got really cold (like now!) because their heating bill would be sky high … well they haven’t … so I’d bet that they aren’t paying the heating, electricity or their other bills. It won’t be long before they’re cut off.
I’m pretty sure they aren’t paying their cable and internet bill.
I just checked my internet usage (from Rogers) and it’s way up! Rogers, my internet provider only allows us to use 60 GB per month. Prior to our scuzzy renter neighbors moving in my usage averaged about 8 to 10 GB per month. However I just checked our usage for November and it’s up to 52 GB! They’ve been stealing our bandwidth!
Now I thought that our Linksys Router was secure, but it seems that I turned it off a few months ago when we were traveling and I hooked up to another wireless service. Duh – that was dumb – or well, dumb not to make my connection secure again!
I just made our router connection secure again so they can’t steal our internet coverage! Ha, and I renamed our system “No more free internet for you!” LOL So now when they see wireless connections in their area (say when they’re wondering why they can’t connect) they’ll see my message for our wireless connection … the one they won’t be able to get into anymore! HA!
I learned my lesson! Always secure your router connection! I just hope they didn’t use the internet a lot today and push us over the 60 GB monthly limit! My usage report only goes from November 1st to 29th, so I don’t know how much they used today before I cut them off. If they did push us over I’ll have to pay extra on our internet bill.
Like I said it was really dumb of me to not make sure our internet connection was secure. That won’t happen again!
Now that they’re cut off, the scuzzy renter neighbors will have one less form of entertainment … maybe that will help them move out soon! Then the nightmare will be over – no more locking even our screen doors all the time and not leaving the house empty for long (we fear they’ll rob us if they know we’re out since the guy has apparently robbed his own parents and sister!).
I hope it doesn’t take the home owners too long to get them kicked out. I think the renters are on a monthly lease, but still .. the laws here in Toronto make it hard to evict people even if they haven’t paid their rent in months.
When I was talking with the home owner this afternoon I suggested that once they get these people out that they raise the rent. I mean, they’re renting a whole house in a great neighborhood for only $1000! That’s unbelievable … but no wonder the two renters they’ve had so far turned out bad. If they raise the rent to $1400 or $1500 (still a bargain) they’d likely get a better class of renter. Anyway, she said they’d likely just sell the house after this as the ‘renting” experience was just too stressful.
I hate bandwidth theft !!!!!!!!
Bandwidth theft is a crime. they have to imprisoned.
Loved the post – Bad washing machines, internet thieves and bad neighbours are among my top three hates! That said though- at least renters will move on eventually – pity those who have bad neighbours who own the house and have no intention of leaving ever!
I’m not that internet savvy and never really thought about someone stealing bandwidth on your connection. I had a talk with my computer guy at the local and he said people even drive around looking for what he called open connections! Oh well…at least I’m not out rent too like that house owner! LOL
Love the naming of your wireless network! Am stealing your idea for our network here in Ottawa. PS–We’re on Rogers and if you go online you can see daily bandwidth. We saw the drop when we re-secured our network.
Poor little post doc yes I know you can go online and check your usage at Rogers. That’s how I found out that I’d almost reached my 60 GB quota for the month. Yikes! Luckily I stopped them from using our bandwidth before it went over.
I’m on the computer 16 to 18 hours a day, and on weekends my husband is on the other computer at the same time – often looking at youtube videos to get ideas for posts for his guitar blogs. Even though we’re both online quite a bit our usual monthly usage runs at about 8 GB to 10 GB … so going up to 54 GB was crazy!
It was obvious that someone else was regularly stealing our bandwidth and since this has never happened before and the scuzzy renter neighbors just moved in at the end of September (and we know they weren’t paying their house rent) I figured that their internet got cut off in November and they latched on to ours. They must have been downloading movies, music and or games (a lot of them) to get it that high!
I just hope that if they were downloading stuff online while they were stealing my internet connection that they didn’t do anything illegal as I’ll be the one that gets in trouble for that! GRRRRR
Oh and BTW they paid up their rent so it looks like they’ll be able to stick around for a while longer. Damn damn damn damn. LOL Can you tell I want them out of here ASAP?
That is really a good news. I hope that it comes true.
Hooray. I’m sure you’ll have the flags out!
bad neighbors are always a pain
Actually this kind of neighbors are a bit scary. Lied about their background, tapped an internet connection (without permission) and rob their own relative? How crazy the world can be right?
Just be safe always!
Bad neighbors are the pits indeed. Hope things get worked out soon. I think the eviction thing takes a while. Good luck
sandy
hello!
i envy you
it seems that i’m going to live with mrs money eater for the rest of my life!
bad neighbors should be deported to planet jupiter
what do you think?
Hate it when bad renters ruin a good neighborhood, we had this happen to us in our condo near the golf course in Myrtle Beach last year. Needless to say it was a nightmare but they were soon kicked out.
LOL…hopefully they don’t read your blog 🙂
Actually just reading this post because I read the follow up one first. Like I said be careful around these people. I failed to mention my parents rent out homes as well and they’ve seen just about everything. These people sound like trouble.
i read the other post and came here to follow up — good luck.
bad neighbors are always a pain 🙁
Funny name for the wireless network. I read somewhere the other day that somebody was going to rename their wireless network to something like “FBI surveillance van”, lol. Anyways, good luck with your neighbor situation, of course, this post is pretty old, maybe things are much better now.
-Shaun