Of all the people in the world, who s more detested than the landlord? After all, he

puffs big cigars, sneers, wears a black cape, drives a Cadillac car, dallies with divorcees,

runs down little kids, drives unfortunates from their homes, ignores all tenant com-

plaints, keeps at least one family of roaches in every unit, loves the fresh air which bro-

ken windows provide, and welcomes rodents of all kinds to make their homes in his rent-

als.

And if that landlord happens to be a landlady--well, then, everybody knows what

she s like! She s got a nose longer than Pinocchio s, larger than Durante s. Her ears rival

Dumbo s. She s got Big Brother s omniscience, and she blabs every bit of it. She s de-

vised ways to pinch her pennies that Jack Benny never dreamed of, and while there may

not be snakes growing in her hair, big pink rollers sure do.

You re a landlord or landlady, aren t you? Don t these descriptions sound just like you?

They don t?

Aha! Then you must be a scrupulous landlord or landlady. Wonderful! Thank heavens

we found each other! You re pretty difficult to recognize, you know. You re not at all like

the characters described above, those weird mythological creatures. You look and act

reasonably normal. Well, that s just great because this book was written with you in

mind!

Being quite normal yourself, you have probably wondered how the landlords and

landladies of this world ever got such terrible reputations in the first place and why they

get so little sympathy from most people today, no matter what the situation, no matter

who s at fault.

They got such bad reputations deservedly years ago because they were largely unfet-

tered by laws (what laws there were, were of their own making) and could easily take ad-

vantage of their tenants, and so some did, arbitrarily controlling their tenants lives like

petty dictators. They were feared for the power they wielded and naturally they were

hated, becoming folklore villains who were always portrayed as being insensitive, cruel,

thoughtless, heartless, and greedy to an extreme.