If you read many real estate books and talk to different landlords all over the map, the general advice is often to spend as little as possible on buildings.  Overspending is considered a cardinal sin.  If you’re a landlord and a tenant will pay x to live there fixed  up or not, why fix it?  It just costs you money.  And the tenant won’t appreciate it anyway.

We just don’t agree with that.  The saying “ugly houses attract ugly tenants” is probably true, so we try to avoid having ugly properties.  We also find that residents DO appreciate it!  Not only do we fix up the apartments, we believe in going the extra mile by adding amenities that our residents truly enjoy.  Our company, quite frankly is young and stupid enough to defy conventional wisdom.  So far, we have no regrets.