Shoes On, Shoes Off

Hey there all you tenants, landlords, property owners and managers. If you’re like us, you know that there’s two different types of dwellings in this world. That’s right–all houses, apartments, condos, duplexes, lofts and other rental properties fall into one of two categories: shoes on or shoes off. The funny thing is, the category depends not upon the property itself, but on the people who live there. So really there are two types of people in this world. Your in-house footwear regulations say a lot about you and stand for, so this week the Hometown Rant is dedicated to breaking down the difference between the shoe-onners and the shoe-offers.

Landlords and property owners take a bit of a backseat on this one, since it’s nigh-impossible to force tenants, uh, feet, when it comes to what they wear in their own rented home. Still though, you have your own preference, and we’d imagine that most of you fall on the side of the shoes-offers, especially when it comes to preserving the floors in your apartment, house, condo, duplex or loft.

One thing Landlords and Property owners can do to encourage shoes-offers is to put in what’s called a mud-room–basically a dedicated area for donning and shedding shoes and outerwear. Obviously this is only an option if you’re doing remodeling, or if you happen to have a rental property that was built with one in the first place. Still, mud rooms are a great selling point, and also a means of ensuring that it’s easy for tenants to remove their shoes before entering the house. It doesn’t have to be crazy though–the Japanese have a simple, elegant solution to the problem in the Genkan, a recessed area that isn’t a full room but serves as a dirt-trap to keep your home clean.

Tenants, the onus is really on you with this one. You’re going to be living in the house, apartment, condo, duplex or loft, so you’re the ones who have to set the standards for your own domicile. Here at the Rant, we’re shoes-offers, and we’ll recommend it to anyone who wants to retain as much of their security deposit as possible. If your rental property has carpeting, you definitely want to be strict about your no-shoes policiy, since after a certain point no amount of rug-doctoring is going to save your poor trampled floor.

If your house has wood or tile floors, you’re a little safer being a shoes-onner, although you’ll definitely have to clean more. If your shoes-on ideology stems from laziness though, you should weigh the time it takes to remove your footwear against the time you spend cleaning your floors–we’re pretty sure it’s actually more work to not take your shoes off in the long run, so bear that in mind when making your decision. There are upsides to being a shoes-onner–namely not stepping in potential messes and keeping your socks dry, but if you run a clean household, those shouldn’t be problems. The real issue is when you and your roommates fall on different sides of the lines in a battle that has ranged since people started building things to eat and sleep inside. Now you have are take–it’s up to you to search deep within your soul and figure out what it is you stand for.

 Do you have rental questions of your own? Comments? Concerns? Love letters? Hate mail? Come Kick It: Hometownrant@hometownrent.com

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