The Cigarette Butt Test
Sometime recently, John Gruber linked to an article on the staff that keeps Disney Parks clean. This reminded me of certain other places, like the DC Metro System, which repaints and cleans stations with much more regularity than other systems, and it really shows. Boston is horrid in comparison.
But my favorite thing has to do with my apartment building. If you walk up and down my block, you’ll see a lot of people who smoke. In front of most buildings, there is literally a layer of cigarette on their grass. But not in front of the three buildings owned by my landlord. Our front lawns are pristine. It isn’t because noone in our buildings smoke or throw butts on the ground, but because they’re always picked up by the next day. This sort of ethic seems to carry over into the maintenance inside. Any requests I’ve had have been quickly filled. They’ve been much better than the other places I have lived.
Thus, my “Cigarette Butt Test” for apartment buildings. If you see a lot of cigarette butts in the front lawn, the landlord doesn’t care about appearances and he probably won’t care about problems in your apartment either. If there’s very few or none, you’ve got a good landlord.
