as requested! this is a super super detailed tutorial for the a-z of gifmaking basics, starting from getting photoshop & downloading hq movies/videos alll the way to tagging & scheduling your gifsets on tumblr for max interaction. if you’ve wanted to get into gifmaking but feel intimidated or you don’t know where to start, this is the tutorial for you!!! making gifs might seem overwhelming at first, but with practice, it’s quite easy to get the basics down. for reference, this post is up to date as of nov. 2020. please rb if this helps!
I love lying to my landlord. “We’re currently looking at a comparable unit in the area at $[a hundred dollars less than our current rent]/month, so if your offer has any flexibility to come down on the rent, that would help us reach a decision about whether or not to renew our lease here” and the comparable unit exists only in my own beautiful mind
Actually, no! And since several people have replied asked for my script for negotiating lower rent, I’m gonna share that below, as well as the philosophy behind it. Full disclosure that I’m not a leasing office person or a realtor or god forbid, a landlord—I’m just someone who has been a renter for 10+ years across different states, and I know for a fact that I have saved myself thousands of dollars by successfully negotiating a lower monthly rent on almost every lease I’ve ever signed. (Also, I’ve only ever rented in the U.S., so this advice may not be as applicable elsewhere.)
Step 0: Know Thy Enemy
The key thing to understand about all residential landlords, whether they’re corporate conglomerates or Just Some Asshole, is that their asset—the property—is a Cinderella carriage that magically turns back into an expensive ass pumpkin of a liability any time it’s sitting empty. The property taxes, insurance, mortgage, HOA fees, and maintenance costs all still come due every month/quarter/year whether they have a tenant to cover it all and then some, or not.
Because of this, at the end of the day, their ultimate goal is to fill every unit at all times with someone who will reliably pay the rent on time and in full. And because everything else is secondary to that goal—and because with the exception of Just Some Asshole landlords, the person responding to your emails and writing up your lease paperwork is several degrees of separation removed from the shareholders who profit off your rent money—they’re almost always willing to negotiate with you. As long as it gets the liability converted into an asset faster or keeps the carriage from turning back into a pumpkin for longer, then in the long run, it’s actually in their best interest to give you a better price.
Step 1: Identify Your Leverage
If you understand how supply and demand works, you can figure out how much leverage you have pretty easily. High supply and low demand = you have more leverage, and vice versa. Do they have an “AVAILABLE NOW - MOVE IN TODAY” sandwich board on the sidewalk or a web banner that says “First month free”? Does their website and/or Apartments.com show a bunch of currently open listings? Do you already live there and know at least two families on your floor have moved out in the last several months with no one new moving in to replace them? These are all indications that they have more than one unit currently sitting empty, meaning higher supply and lower demand. No sandwich board and a website that just says “call for availability”? They might just suck at marketing, but more likely, supply is lower and demand is higher.
You have the least leverage if you’re a prospective tenant looking to move in somewhere that has a waitlist. They have no reason to offer you a discount if six other people are already in line to pay full price for apartments that aren’t even vacant yet (but you can still ask!). You also have no leverage to negotiate if you’ve already signed a lease and you’re in the middle of the lease period; you legally agreed to pay $X/month for Y months, so you’re stuck with that until the lease is up.
At the other end of the spectrum, you have the most leverage if you’re a current tenant who has always paid your rent on time and you’re being offered a renewal on your existing lease with higher rent than you're currently paying, especially if they already have some units that have been empty for a while. If you move out, not only is your unit going to sit vacant for at least part of a month, they’re also probably going to have to put in some work to “turn” the unit (repainting, professional cleaning, etc) to get it in move-in condition for the next tenant.
All of this means that if you move out, even if they can fleece you out of your security deposit and find a new tenant the very next month, it’s still gonna cost them at least a few thousand dollars to turn that pumpkin back into a carriage again. They’re probably willing to come down by $100-$200/month or so on the renewal offer rent if you ask, because they know it’ll actually save them money in the long run. Similar situation if you’re a prospective new tenant—if they can’t get you or anyone else to sign a lease and move in this month, that’s $[whatever the monthly rent is] down the drain, and they’ll never get it back. It’s a perishable item about to spoil.
Step 2: Get Their Opening Offer
This is the first number they’ll quote you for the rent—the sticker price that you’ve always just accepted as set in stone. The truth is, they’ve built some buffer into that number. There’s almost always some room for them to come down, and depending on your leverage, they will if you ask nicely. But for reasons that baffle me, most people don’t!
Step 3: Wait, Research, & Counter
Don’t reply to their initial offer right away—unless there’s a waitlist (in which case, you have little haggling power anyway), wait a few days. It makes them sweat a bit, and it shows you aren’t desperate. The person who is rushing to reply is not the one who has more leverage in the negotiation, and making them wait reminds them of that. In the meantime, use Apartments.com or Zillow to get an idea of what similar units in the same area are currently going for. Then you come up with your counteroffer.
As a general rule, anything more than about 20-25% below their opening offer (or below market rates) will probably just piss them off or make them take you less seriously. But when we’re talking about your monthly rent over the course of a year or two, even a 10% discount adds up to a lot of money!
When I negotiated our original lease for my current place, I also asked for and got a two year lease term instead of the standard one year. But whatever automated calendar event system they use to remind their leasing office staff when it’s time to send out renewal offers didn’t get the memo about that, so they mistakenly sent me a renewal offer the following year, meaning I got to see how much they would have jacked up the rent if they could’ve. For that second year of the lease alone, my negotiating saved us $3,000!
Step 4: BDE (Big Dick Emailing)
Here’s the tricky part. You need to write an email—always negotiate over email if you can, it’s too easy for a salesperson to bowl you over on the phone and anything they say that isn’t in writing means nothing—which simultaneously makes it sound like you would sign a lease with them in a heartbeat and like you are actively flirting with five other apartment complexes right now who all want you so bad it makes them look stupid, because you are just so sexy and fun and your credit score is eight inches flaccid. You need to make them believe you are both highly motivated and ready to sign on the dotted line and willing to just walk away from the table at any second, but if they could just come down a little bit on that number, you’d delete those other hoes’ numbers forever! Here’s the rough script I use every time:
“ Thank you for [your email/the tour/sending over the offer letter/etc]. I have had a chance to review and consider it. I think [name of apartment complex] would be the perfect fit for me, but I am also exploring and touring other options in the area, including a comparable unit nearby at $[a little below your counteroffer number]/month.
If we could come down to $[your counteroffer number]/month on the rent, I would be prepared to sign the lease today. Let me know your thoughts. Thanks! "
Step 6: You Win Either Way
Sometimes they really do just accept your counteroffer without question and send you over a revised lease to sign. (When this happens, I make a note for next time that my counteroffer was probably too high and I should’ve asked for more!) More often, they get approval from The Powers That Be and come back with a number that’s higher than your counteroffer but lower than their initial offer. Assuming I can afford it, I always accept this offer; you’ve achieved your goal of saving yourself money from sticker price, and they’re likely to lose patience if they have to keep going around and around with you. And sometimes (though only very rarely), they may come back and say the price is firm—in which case, guess what? You still didn’t lose anything by asking!
THIS!!! Exactly this. I didn’t mention it above because I just couldn’t fit it neatly anywhere, but once while negotiating a lease renewal, I got as far as receiving their counteroffer, which was basically “price firm :(”, but then life happened, so I forgot to respond and accept. The email sat in my inbox for a week. And then, completely unprompted, they magically replied again saying, “actually, nvm, how’s $[number that is lower than our opening offer] sound?”
To them, it looked like I was staring them down cold as ice like
I was literally just busy with other stuff! and they were sweating!!! BULLETS!!!
This is great - but I have a big question. HOW do you figure out WHO TO EMAIL for Step 4?
I tried negotiating a lease once before, not even on the price but on some minor clause that was unreasonable and probably illegal to enforce anyway. But the property was owned by one of these landlord corporations, you know the type.
So I was sitting there with the representative (Property manager? Sales associate? who knows) and said, "This clause [abc] here seems unreasonable, can we change it to [xyz]?" and she looked at me with the most blank, baffled expression and said, "Change... it? You can't change it..."
It became evident quickly that she wasn't stonewalling me; rather she didn't seem to be familiar with the concept of negotiating a lease. To her, if it's printed on letterhead it's written in stone, and SHE certainly didn't seem to have the authority to sign off any changes to the contract—nor did she have any idea who would.
So back to the original question: How do we figure out the right person to contact for Step 4, especially when dealing with a big corporate landlord?
Modifying the actual language or clauses of the standard lease is kinda beyond the scope of this tutorial (it would involve them contacting their lawyers.) But as for negotiating lower rent, if the person you’re talking to about leasing the place (whether in person or by email—again, ideally you always wanna be doing this by email) just straight up doesn’t understand what you’re talking about, you ask for their manager. If they are the manager, you take your leverage and walk away from the table—either they will very quickly demonstrate that they actually do understand how negotiating works by chasing you down the proverbial block to give you a lower price, or you’ll dodge the bullet of having to live somewhere run by dunces who will no doubt be just as (un)helpful about fixing your plumbing when it breaks.
Secondary question! This advice is really good, but what about when you have already been living in the apartment and your renewal comes up? I've sadly JUST signed mine so I wont be able to try and negotiate until next year, but its always good to get an idea of what and how I would be negotiating ahead of time.
Calculate your leverage as written in step 1, their initial offer is whatever they quote you for renewal rent, follow steps 3-6 with the slight language modification of “I would really like to stay, but I have also been touring other options in the area,” “I would sign a renewal lease today if,” etc. I intentionally wrote the instructions above to be just as applicable for renewals as they are for move-in leases
I have so many questions about Cait Sith in Rebirth.
How long has he been at the Gold Saucer? Did he show up for work two days before the party, or has he been working there for a while? He's relatively high up in command at the Gold Saucer - how did Dio (aligned with Shinra, willing to fight the Turks to let the party escape) react to having a robot cat forced upon him as an employee? Does Cait Sith handle their account books in addition to MC-ing?
Is there merchandise for Cait Sith? Are they selling Cait Sith plushies to the general public? Do visitors to Reeve's office think he's a fan of the mascot at the Gold Saucer?
Do people who know of the Gold Saucer think it's weird the Saucer's mascot is running around with a group of terrorists?
Who in Shinra knows about Cait Sith specifically? The Turks know from Crisis Core, Rufus probably knows the specifics - but Scarlet? Heidegger? Is the rest of the Board aware there is some sort of spying unit in Avalanche? Do they know it's Reeve's work?
I cannot wait for Revelations, in which none of these questions will be answered except maybe the Board one.
Pet owners, what kind of name does your pet have???
A food-item (Waffles, Peanut)
A color (Pinky, Hazel)
A real-life person (Marilyn, Paris)
A fictional character (Eevee, Simba)
A type of flora (Rosie, Willow)
Animal-like (Kitty, Gator)
A trait (Lucky, Buddy)
Something else
If you have more than one pet, choose the most applicable listed (ex: you have three pets named Cookie, Cream & Rocky, so you choose the “Food” option). Also, would be interested if you reblogged your pet’s name(s) in the tags and the reason why you chose it ^^
Pet owners, what kind of name does your pet have???
A food-item (Waffles, Peanut)
A color (Pinky, Hazel)
A real-life person (Marilyn, Paris)
A fictional character (Eevee, Simba)
A type of flora (Rosie, Willow)
Animal-like (Kitty, Gator)
A trait (Lucky, Buddy)
Something else
No pet
Voting ended onJun 11
If you have more than one pet, choose the most applicable listed (ex: you have three pets named Cookie, Cream & Rocky, so you choose the “Food” option). Also, would be interested if you reblogged your pet’s name(s) in the tags and the reason why you chose it ^^
Incredible book alert for you all, since I know how many of my friends and followers are also neurodivergent. I've been requesting that our local library buy more ADHD and autism-friendly cookbooks aimed at adults, in an effort to find one that might help me with fixing my extremely broken relationship with food. And for a while it was a bit demoralizing because a lot of them are more recipe-focused, so I'd read them and go "Wow, this book is aimed at people like me and I can't eat any of this stuff, I must be even more broken than I thought"
Enter "How to Eat Well for Adults With ADHD" by Rebecca King.
I am about to sound like a sponsored ad, but this book is absolutely incredible. It's written by a nutritionist with ADHD, and does include some recipes, but they only make up a part of the third section of the book. The rest of it is focused on practical, broadly applicable advice for neurodivergent folks (and frankly, other disabled people) on unlearning internalized ableism around food, how to best organize your kitchen and meal plan (and what to do when meal plans fail), the connections between food and dopamine and how best to use food for stimulation in a healthy way, how hyperfocus and time blindness can get in the way of eating well, how to make sure you're eating enough while on stimulants, the fact that many ADHD people also have ARFID (and the book even emphasizes that ARFID is an eating disorder, not just "picky eating"!!), and takes the strong stance that we should do away with the idea of "picky eaters" altogether in favor of a more compassionate stance on people's complicated relationships with food and eating.
It is strongly anti-diet culture while still emphasizing that good nutrition is important. It has extremely specific tips that make my ADHD heart sing a little, like how best to store specific vegetables so they last the maximum amount of time in your fridge (since we are all very good at forgetting they are there) and what tools can make doing the dishes more manageable. And perhaps most importantly, as someone with severe sensory sensitivities and some very real trauma from having them ignored as a kid and being shamed for them, it made me cry a little bit with how understanding and compassionate it is.
Anyway. I am going to buy a copy of my own immediately, and I cannot recommend it enough. If you, like me, are trying to unfuck your eating habits and neat someone to hold your hand a little in the process -- while still making you feel like an adult, and still offering actionable tips along the way -- this book could be a lifesaver.
(And for those of you who use Instagram, the author has an account that's equally helpful and affirming over there, too, that I followed immediately, @/adhd.nutritionist)
tbh i think the funniest phenomena that's been happening in the last couple years is "youtuber, having gone too deep into the research hole, has been made an investigative journalist against their will"
this guy started out poking fun at australian politicians and ended up investigating the firebombing of his own home, during which he uncovered connections between the same politician he was making fun of + major organized crime
JasperDasper started out just curious why everything had suddenly become about trans people and questioning some of the sources used in a book. He came out of it, 4 years later, with a 5 hour long video that connects all transphobia to less than 60 people. (I'm not joking. literally every single transphobic rhetoric and bill passed is because of these 50 or so people.)
If you wanna watch it I cannot recommend it enough; I just warn that it covers a LOT.
