Money is a funny issue – depending on your handling and communication styles, money can either smooth or sink relationships.
On the one hand, having clear expectations and communication can help avoid misunderstandings and set boundaries, on the other hand, being too eagle-eyed or nit-picky about finances can make relationships seem too transactional.
Where does one draw the line? I think everyone’s limit varies, but I think of it this way: agreeing to split the lunch bill is setting clear expectations, refusing to split the bill 50/50 because one entree costs a dollar more than the other is nit-picky (unless you already got separate checks beforehand).
Recently, my kitchen has been experiencing electrical problems. As a result my fridge turned off on a weekend (that I wasn’t home) and all my food, including several pounds of salmon, spoiled. My landlord told me to buy new food, give him the receipt, and he’ll reimburse me for the cost. That’s a nice offer, and with any other landlord I probably would’ve taken advantage of it, but with him, I just didn’t feel right about it.
My landlord’s family and I have developed a fairly close relationship (if you follow me on Twitter, you will know that my landlady frequently brings me food, I’ve had dinner at their house a few times, and my landlord occassionally help navigate my car out of the tricky driveway).
Our relationship is first and foremost based on a transactional nature (i.e. the landlord-renter relationship), but beyond that we have delved into the non-transactional path (i.e. friends). Furthermore, I feel as if my landlord have gone “above and beyond” several times for me. When I locked myself out at 12:30AM, my landlord came to open the door without any complaint or charging a lockout fee (I, of course, apologized profusely). Today I wasn’t feeling well, but with an empty fridge, I asked my landlady for some food. I was a little embarassed, but she quickly offered me a delicious tuna salad sandwich.
In light of our evolving relationship, I feel that there are times when our relationship should have clear expectations (i.e. I pay the rent on time. He takes cares of necessary repairs), but there are also times when being too nit-picky about money, such as the grocery-list, isn’t helpful.
It’s not that we’ll stop being friendly if my landlord have to reimburse me for $30 worth of groceries. But I just feel that in some areas it’s nice to leave the money out – it creates a sense of goodwill.
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You have a great landlord! I also wouldn’t take advantage of it – simply offering to reimburse you for groceries is sufficient. The sad truth is that there aren’t that many nice people out there anymore. People think of themselves too much and don’t seem to care about the general well being of others. It’s rather bothersome to me. Posts like this are extremely refreshing!
I wouldn’t have taken advantage of it either… Unless it was the landlord’s fault that my groceries spoiled. Where I live, there are a lot of trees. The tiniest bit of wind, and you’ve got a tree falling into a transformer. But I would never blame my landlord for that kind of inconvenience. She can’t control the weather. Because it was your kitchen that caused the food to spoil – a kitchen stoked with appliances bought by your landlord and maintained by your landlord – I’d consider the offer necessary. As in, it was right of your landlord to offer to replace the food. You shouldn’t be embarrassed about asking the landlady for food either. One sandwich doesn’t equal $30 worth of groceries. It’s the least they could do.
I agree. The offer is sufficient. I wouldn’t give him a receipt for the groceries. It’s awesome that you have such a nice relationship with your landlord. All I ask as a landlord is that the tenants pay me on time and don’t call. HA!
That is great foresight on your behalf to know when to leave money out of things. Money just has that way of muddying perfectly sound situations, and it is more important, in the Long Run, to keep both the transactional and non-transactional forms of your relationship, in the clear.
Wow. What a fabulous landlord. I definitely wouldn’t take advantage of that relationship.
It can be difficult to judge accurately when you should leave money out of situations, but I think Investing Newbie hit it on the head — it depends on the long run potential of your relationship, and all the other factors that will help you make the correct decision.