I own a couple of rental properties. Small potatoes stuff, no Donald Trumps around here. A single family home and a duplex in which I live in one side. I've owned them for about ten years, enough to have been through eviction court and have dealt with a few other problems unique to landlords, but nothing greater than building on the 'soft skills' of dealing with different people.

The tenant with whom I share my duplex has been there for over two years. Not a bad guy, really. A divorced dad, with three older children. We had words two summers ago over the oldest child, a son who threw parties while Dad was at work. "I'm codependent," said my tenant later, "I let them walk all over me." And how do you respond to that?

The son quieted down after that, but there were other problems with him. A DUI which totaled his car, and an attempted rape charge (dropped). I was relieved when he left home for college, but unlike me at his age, he is home every weekend, stumbling up and down the stairs at 3am, peeling in and out of the drive in his dad's old car. His father doesn't know; he's at one of his two jobs.

When his oldest daughter turned 16, my tenant bought her a car. A used Kia with a bad muffler. The seller ran a kennel for golden retrievers and as part of the deal for the car, my tenant asked for a puppy, which was requested. He came to me, "Hugshyhermit, I did something the other day and I hope you don't mind." He opens like that, my stomach always drops, imagining admissions of damage. And then instead of continuing by way of explanation, he turned and went inside, bringing out a tiny orange bundle wrapped in his arms, docile, with deep dark eyes and a sleepy expression.

Of course it's fine for you to have the dog, I said. He named it Maverick. But shortly afterwards, the problems slowly began. First there was the dog poop, then there was the digging. I couldn't bring myself to dislike the dog for it, this is what little dogs do. He tore boxes and plastic bottles from the recycle bin and triumphantly galloped with them around the yard.

Up came all the plantings, the ivies and the lillies I'd planted that spring, long strands like spider legs dangling from his muzzle. But he was so happy to see me when I would come out on the back porch!

Then the daughter hit another car. The car was in the back when I returned from Indianapolis one weekend, a smashed front bumper and crumpled hood stained with a different color; a socket where there had been a headlight. A few days later, my tenant had the bumper and hood off, leaving the front open to the engine, and a few days after that the car took up permanent residence in a corner, the front covered with a blue tarp, where it has stayed ever since.

So today, when he stopped by to the pay the rent, I said I needed to update him to a few things.

"I don't know if you've noticed, I have folks stop by to give me some quotes. I'm probably going to put in a new driveway." In which my tenant agreed he'd noticed some folks wandering about with measuring tape. "Yes. Well I still don't know whether I'm going to rent both sides or try to sell. There's a few things I need to take care of before I do one or the other, so I think I'm going to have need of your place. Now I don't know what your plans are, but if I asked to have that side vacant for May, would that give you enough time to find another place?"

I saw my tenants' eyes change focus; I think this surprised him. "Yeah I was going to start meeting with banks again to see about buying a house."

A few more statements, some small talk, and that was that. I felt a little guilty, and told my boyfriend so. He had been sitting inside and had overheard everything, "The only thing I might have done differently is that you seemed to spring it on him out of nowhere."

Had I? I had left a voicemail telling him that I wanted to bring him up to speed on my plans (without specifically mentioning he needed to move, true).

This approach avoided my mentioning the holes in the yard, the muddy pits where last spring there was a yard, the TV cable pulled out of the house and chewed through, the carcass of the Kia, the drunk son carrying on at 3am every time he was home. "You don't think he knows?" I thought.

And maybe he doesn't. Some are wilfully blind to such things and how they might or must appear to others.

But no need to remind him or point it out to him, either.