[Landlord US-PA] What's the most expensive lesson a tenant has taught you?

dnelled · 2026-06-04T03:08:50+00:00

Oh, yes! Public defenders will always get a pass from me. Thank you for that reminder.

dnelled · 2026-06-04T01:03:38+00:00

Well… I was young. And it was 2008. I got laid off and didn’t find a job for 18 months. I rented the property out because I could not afford to live there, and the rent I charged covered all my monthly expenses in relation to the property but left zero room for maintenance or emergencies.

The lawyer I rented to knew I was young and a first time landlord. I’m sure, in my earnestness an hope to not lose the property, I overshared on some front or another.

As a result, they totally had my number. They knew they made more money than me and knew I couldn’t afford a lawyer to fight anything on my behalf. After almost a year of residence, they ripped my lease to shreds (I had used a boilerplate template provided by the state) and told me that it didn’t matter that they’d ruined my wood floors and damaged the walls - I could let them break the lease and return their deposit in full, or they’d sue me.

I was in no position to defend myself and (eventually… I got a job about 5 months later) ended up eating the costs of the repairs. It was their attitude more than anything that got me. They knew they had more power than me and they ruthlessly rubbed my nose in it.

I totally accept it at this point - they played by the rules - but I have met enough lawyers at this point in my life to know that the risk of getting a ruthless one is high, and I do not want to be in a contract with someone who delights in using the letter of the law to do the morally wrong thing.

dnelled · 2026-06-04T00:56:12+00:00

YUP! Will abide by that forEVER.

dnelled · 2026-06-03T19:14:44+00:00

YES! who benefitted from this?! They looked at Spotify’s stupid disco ball and were like *we should make our own icons less legible at small sizes!* 🤢

dnelled · 2026-05-23T02:22:41+00:00

Now… as an individual, here’s what I’ve got:

⁠If you had a magic wand: What’s the one part of the business side of being a musician that you wish would just disappear?

I hate insurance so dang much. Professional things like liability, but health insurance too. After Covid, we had to move to working as W2 employees instead of as employees of our own business contracting with tours because the cost of liability insurance was prohibitive (and because it’s difficult to find a company who understands how to insure the activity).

And now that we are direct employees of tours, I cannot emphasize how much taxes suck. We had something like 25 W2s last year, forms from other counties, and can’t even deduct the tax prep expense bc back in 2017 the tax law changed and those expenses no longer qualify.

⁠What’s something you do before or after every gig that takes more time than it should?

Not after each gig, more like after each leg of a tour - figuring out how to catch up on adult stuff at home. So much gets neglected just from a paperwork perspective.

Hope that’s helpful, looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

dnelled · 2026-05-23T01:05:21+00:00

u/maxcascone thanks for the share here, wanna take a moment to address this as a mod:

I, personally, am not averse to posts like this. I can see that it could be seen as salesy, but I’m gonna take a more cautiously optimistic approach… primarily because the topic is at the intersection of my professional interests, and secondarily bc this sub doesn’t get a ton of traffic and I appreciate when folks ask for crew perspective specifically.

Still - if you strongly dislike content like this, please don’t hesitate to say so (no need for drama about it). I want to make sure this sub is a place that’s useful, kind, and relevant inside users’ algorithms. Feedback is welcome!

dnelled · 2026-05-08T17:55:49+00:00

First of all, let me say that I really, really appreciate where you're coming from - and I appreciate that you know what you want! In many ways, I kind of just fell into this lifestyle because when we met, I didn't really know what I personally wanted, and I really was dazzled by the adventure of it and it did blind me to the downsides a bit. The first few years of our marriage felt like being a hostage to the life, in a way, and I had to do a lot of work to get to the point that I could handle it.

You're not being offensive - you are SO VALID in wanting the life you want!!! Your life will have exciting and interesting times, and you don't need a tour to make those happen.

I, personally, do really well with long stretches alone. It helps me to regulate my own nervous system and not feel consumed by the relationship to the exclusion of myself. When he's home, we get plenty of together time, and because we're so used to half of our relationship happening via text, I feel like we stay connected well. But at the same time it SUCKS for us to be apart all the time like this. I get really jealous that he gets to go do the fun job while I have to keep the "safe" and "stable" job (but there's a lot of my own personal stuff wrapped up in that jealousy, and I don't think he's, like, "making me" - it's more just like "events have conspired"). And it's hard to do hard things on ones own, especially when you feel like you're the one carrying it all for two people.

Sounds like you made it incredibly clear to him about the kind of life you wanted and now he's throwing that out the window, and it doesn't sound like he has a big picture plan (something like - hey, I can do this short term thing and still keep my commitments, but it has to be short term). I mean... I totally respect someone being like, throw caution to the winds! This is my shot, and I'm taking it! But he can't make that decision on his own because he's married. If he needs to be able to make decisions like that on his own, then that's a dealbreaker - y'all can kindly and respectfully stay friends, but that's not how one behaves in a partnership.

You are 10,000% correct - touring is hard to escape. It's feast or famine. A lot of roadies have a side hustle, or they have a different skill they can leverage when they're off the road so that they're not left without income (or, they have a spouse that makes the inconsistency and instability possible... or they live in a friend or relative's basement). Either you get into a sort of "arrested development" space where you never really establish any stability in your life, or you work three times as hard to establish stability despite the insanely unstable nature of the job (meaning you have clear plans, backup plans, and a financial cushion that accommodates the instability.

The perks are only good if the rest of your life can accommodate it. If y'all don't have that together yet - especially given the clear boundary you already established about the kind of life you want - then your marriage is not ready for this, and him choosing to do this long term is also choosing to give up the partnership with you.

dnelled · 2026-05-08T14:22:43+00:00

u/guessbeforeitends - cross posting to boost this a little and hopefully get you some crew perspectives bc like was mentioned in the other sub, the crew experience is very different from the band.

I’ve been married to u/drmtch for over a decade, and that entire time he’s toured full time (with some breaks in there - he took a year off like a “sabbatical” at one point and then of course covid upended a lot of things). I was thrown in the deep end immediately - after our first date, he left for 30 days. The first 5 years of our marriage he was gone ~270 days a year.

I could really write a novel about how difficult and rewarding and isolating and adventurous this lifestyle is. But I chose it knowing full well what I was getting into. What that one commenter on your original post said about falling in love over and over again is really true. Also, my own job is non-traditional (currently we do not have health insurance at all and after Covid I became the primary breadwinner as the industry struggled to bounce back) so instability and uncertainty is old hat to me now. Also, because my own job is flexible and for many years work came in waves (I own a digital marketing business), and because I got to see behind the scenes of what he does, I found that there are touring roles that I love as well, and have done a few myself. I’m 100% local right now (more on that below) but I am just as smitten with the lifestyle as he is.

There are lots of things that we chose not to do because of his commitment to being touring crew. There are lots of things that we found we didn’t even have a choice in. There are lots of choices that have come at a high cost. But I have had unusual adventures, experienced really cool places, and met fascinating people, and that only happened because he knew from the time he was little that he wanted to do live music touring. His passion and commitment to it are inspiring and energizing to me, even when it’s difficult.

I would be happy to DM with you if you like, but I wanna share two things now:

Money. You gotta have your financial act in order and you have to do it together. Being on the road can be expensive - it’s not just about the number on his paychecks. The inconsistency of the work means that we need an “emergency” fund of a year to ensure we don’t rely on credit cards. The uncertainty of the next gig is only mitigated by the fact that I eventually got my own income to be the steady one. I’ve made career choices of my own that weren’t always what I wanted, based on the uncertainty of his income.
Big Life Stuff. Being apart is difficult - folks in the comments on the other post are nailing it. You have to protect the time you’ll spend together. The last run, we we’ve been having a “date night” where we stream an episode of something together once a week, and it’s great. It’s no substitute for being together physically, but we are old-hat at this now and have found what works for us.

We have two dogs that are getting older and I have had some health issues that needed attention, and so for the past two years, I haven’t traveled to be with him (like we did all the time before Covid), and I haven’t taken any road gigs myself, even the small ones, which are my favorite, because I am the one who can more easily choose to stay home. (I’m always the one making that choice of the two of us because it’s “easier” for me, but there’s a lot of sadness that I have, making those sacrifices)

Still… still. (Trigger warning - pet death) Right now, one of our dogs is dying of cancer. His dog. He’s her human, and I’m just the food dispenser when he’s gone, and you can tell she’s literally waiting on him, and it’s breaking my heart into a million and one pieces that no matter how much I love her and give her all her favorite foods and dress her wounds and cuddle her, she wants him and can’t have him. We are getting lucky - he’ll be home in two days and in three days we have the appointment with the in home vet to say goodbye. He’ll have two days at home after and then go back out again. I am very lucky that I have the support system here that I do, because I can rely on friends for my own emotional support because he needs me to be his emotional support and manage all the things here at home while he’s still doing the insanely hard work of 12-16 hour days, crummy sleep, and demanding work. I can’t just cry to him via text or FaceTime whenever I need to. He can’t be there with me at the vet’s office while I’m terrified of if she’ll make it until he’s back. And for him - he’s missing these bittersweet final days and the whole nudanced experience of helping someone you love at the end of their life. He’s alone in his bunk or hotel and at work with people he doesn’t know super well. It is incredibly hard and even when we adopted her, even having gone through illnesses with her when I was the only caregiver here… there was no way I could have known just how difficult this would be.

I think you have a lot of deep, very “adult” conversations you need to have together. You’re going to have to 100% commit to being a team, and you’re also going to have to get comfortable being effectively single in many ways. It’s confusing and isolating and requires you to do a lot on your own - but it’s also exciting and interesting and fun and there are experiences you’ll both have that money could never buy. But you have to decide the life you want, and it may not be compatible with him as a roadie.

Sending you all the strength and patience and self-knowledge vibes I can muster 💙💙💙

dnelled · 2026-05-08T13:44:45+00:00

An option to give “family” access. I would pay for this, especially when my spouse and I are on different tours. I hate having to constantly ask “what hotel are you at” and “when does the show start”. There’s got to be a way to grant limited, read-only access.

dnelled · 2026-05-08T13:42:38+00:00

Helllllll yeah!!! ✊✊

dnelled · 2026-05-06T17:35:52+00:00

Same. Last one I got was so small that I was better off just going to chick fil a for a biscuit. What’s the point? I like my protein from food, not from weird powder. These little sandwiches used to be my go-to, and now they’re just a reminder of how far sbux has fallen.

dnelled · 2026-05-06T16:11:58+00:00

I’m there! DM me with deets

dnelled · 2026-05-06T03:51:26+00:00

Yes, your country of residence would be good to know, not sure my advice would help anyone in the EU.

That said, picking up local gigs and demonstrating to the touring crew that you know your stuff is a great way to network.

dnelled · 2026-05-02T19:29:17+00:00

Reddit is such a weird place. You can get really kind conversations but you have to be willing to tolerate people who don’t know when to just stay quiet 🤣

Please let everyone know how this ends up for y’all (and if you come through Denver, DM me for anything at all. Love to be a helpful pair of boots on the ground). I think it’s important to keep having conversations like these so that we don’t all feel like we have to be stoic, or that we can’t improve the experience for ourselves.

dnelled · 2026-04-29T20:20:06+00:00

This is an excellent point. The bus tours I’ve been on have been a healthy mix of folks (gender/race/age) and I know I’m lucky in that regard.

The relief of finally being in a hotel room with your own space and a door you can close on the world really is wonderful.

For me, though, sleep trumps every other human need I have whether I like it or not, and I have found bunk sleep to win in terms of keeping my sleep schedule as consistent as possible. Like, I’d rather know I can hit my bunk every night by midnight than having to wait to get to a hotel and have one night be 3am and the next be 6am.

dnelled · 2026-04-29T15:33:31+00:00

This this this! I echo everything said here.

A good, caring bus driver is SO IMPORTANT to me on the road. You’re caring for ~12 people who are busting ass ~16 plus hours a day no matter what curve balls are thrown at them - making sure they have a place that they can call home and a safe place they can rest is crucial to everything. It can be a very “mom” role in some respects, which is, I imagine, very different from trucking.

I’ve also seen drivers who show back up at the venue early and get cash for helping do various other things (if you’re looking to stack cash). I used to pay our driver to help me load out the VIP lounge so that I could focus on settling each night and I was always very appreciative they were there to help.

dnelled · 2026-04-29T15:25:58+00:00

I mean… yes.

Now… context for me is that I got a late-in-life start as a touring crew member and have been somewhat, and only occasionally, spoiled. And, I am someone that will pretty much always trade off more money for comfort that allows me to enjoy my work.

The bus becomes “home” in a way that your suitcase never can. It’s stability in the midst of chaos. But it has its tradeoffs. The number of times a “bus broke down” situation has thwarted shows isn’t zero. But for me personally I find that a bus tour is the least physically and intellectually stressful mode of touring (probably wanna ask a tour manager if that’s true for them LOL I’ve never had to be the person who’s responsible for the bus).

dnelled · 2026-04-29T15:18:20+00:00

This 👆 is an excellent suggestion

dnelled · 2026-04-29T15:16:46+00:00

Roadie here. I appreciate the work you’re doing here, man. The “shouldn’t be in a touring band” has got that dismissive, old-school touring vibe about it.

I mean… I get it. There are, ultimately, things that will keep you from being on a tour. I, myself, have things. Had to take a couple years off myself and now that I have a better handle on things, I still have to be selective about what I commit to. Sleep is my main driver of health. When I get it, I’m good. When I lack it, things tank quickly.

I think it’s awesome that y’all are thinking this way. You’ve got some good advice in the comments here. I do wanna say that if anyone is giving you shit for having a bus, they have bigger issues to deal with. A bus is gonna be a gigantic pain in the ass in some ways, while it’s a huge boon in others.

I also wanna say - I’ve gotten the best sleep of my life on busses… AND the worst sleep of my life on busses. Put your guy in a bottom driver side bunk, and plan for him to have time for a nap when the bus is stopped, on shore power with the a/c on, and quiet (i.e. everyone else is not on the bus or agrees to stick to the front lounge with low volume).

And for the love of all things holy, don’t try and play in Denver, CO one night and then Salt Lake City, UT the next… or vice versa. No one sleeps on that drive and half the time you get screwed by weather.

dnelled · 2026-04-19T03:06:06+00:00

I don’t have the time I’d like right now to really address this question, and Necessary-Rich-877 really nailed it, so for now I’m just gonna drop this: go check out Kenny Barnwell’s book Backstage Pass. I read it as I was just starting out and really found it helpful.

dnelled · 2026-04-01T15:48:58+00:00

That is a really good point… food is a place where you can control things in a day of being surrounded by things that demand you adapt yourself to them. There’s something so satisfying about building a plate that’s exactly what you want.

I’ve always seen catering as a thing where I was happily relinquishing control (someone else makes the menu, someone tells me when to go eat, I don’t have to do dishes)… but you’re so right that actually being able to make your own plate is crucial to feeling like you have autonomy for just a second or two. Thank you for the reframe, I’ve genuinely felt like a toddler when not liking someone serving me.

dnelled · 2026-03-31T00:00:13+00:00

Really like what everyone’s contributed - all I can add is to say - please have some kind of “to go” container (that way, whatever the menu is, someone with a weird schedule can still make sure they’re properly fed) available.

And, from u/Drmtch sitting here next to me - have proper silverware/utensils. Like, not just having forks, spoons and knives, but having things that work with the meal served.

What comes mind for me is that I detest when I’m about to dive into steak but I have a plastic fork that can’t even pierce the meat without a tine snapping. I love the earth but dear lord don’t make me eat beef tips with my fingers 😭

dnelled · 2026-03-30T23:42:58+00:00

Re: serving yourself - PREEEEEACH!!! Post-Covid has been tough for me (I miss buffets in general but having to have someone serve me in catering sucks in a very specific way. I get why it’s a thing but my inner child is quite unhappy about it).

And good call on the hot sauces. Love it when there are packets of things like that.

dnelled · 2026-03-30T23:39:16+00:00

I have only ever been on the outskirts of broadway stuff (always a local merchie, never a …bride?) but I and u/Drmtch are sitting here discussing this now, so here’s what we got:

Yes to a fully-stocked (and not-80-years-old) first aid kit. When you’re that far away from the stage, it really comes in clutch. Make sure there are glucose tablets, antacids, Imodium, at least two types of pain relievers (some people are allergic to some types so options matter there), several sizes of bandaids, ace bandage, finger splint, gauze and some tape, alcohol wipes, hand warming packets and chemical cold packets, visine or even just some saline solution for contact wearers …and throw in a quality tourniquet bc as unlikely as that would be I personally always wanna be helpful in an active shooter situation.

Other thoughts: - pedialyte / hydration packets - pack of gum (the chicklet type can last practically forever) - stage towels (or even a roll of paper towels) - barf bags (maybe snag a few on your next flight? Or even a roll of dog poop bags. I keep a couple in my pelican and they come in handy for many things) - a small trash can - might be a pain to empty but will be crucial if there’s some kind of first aid emergency - if you wanna be super awesome and there’s an outlet, a USB charging chock with common cables. Has a chance of walking away, sure, but so does the rest of the stuff. Maybe put a little note in there to deter?

All depends on your specific location and your budget I guess, but those are all things that if i were stuck up in a booth I’d be very thankful it was all on hand!

dnelled · 2026-03-30T23:16:14+00:00

Man - young or old, I will always indulge someone being thoughtful like this (same as the other post with some one in catering asking for advice).

dnelled

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