The Principles of Wing Tsun and Real Estate Management

Universal principles that cross disciplines are few. The Wing Tsun Kung Fu School in Giza is not unique in being a family business. We use humor to deal with the fact that some of our clients are family members, some of our teachers and students we have known for years, and our students often recruit their family and friends as new students. That is why today we will talk about the principles that many of us learned in martial arts, that apply to making a comprehensive post possession agreement.

In Wing Tsun Kung Fu we learn to strike when the time is right – not too soon, before the opponent is ready. At the same time we have to be aware of what is going on around us and stay ready to react like a coiled spring as soon as the opportunity presents itself. The same principle applies when you retain your real estate lawyer. If your tenant defaults, or if they are ten, twenty, thirty days past due, you should already be directing them to your lawyer. They can start drafting a post possession agreement so that if you reach the point where the tenant can be served, there is already a plan and a strategy in place.

On the other hand, in Wing Tsun we must be patient. The time must be right. We cannot move from patience to aggressive action without the right moment. Moving before can put the Wing Tsun practitioner at risk. It is the same thing with real estate. We must often be patient dealing with the tenants and the issues that continue to arise of cracks in the apartment building above the tenant; claims of bugs or snakes or mice in the tenants apartment; broken appliances, and leakage, broken toilets, clogged drains and similar issues. Again before things can come to a head the tenant must be allowed the time to fix things themselves. It is only after this is not done that we can move to the next step which is the Negligence Letter or letting the tenant know in a very calm and collected way, that they are breaking the lease agreement, that they must comply or face a court action to evict them.

The Wing Tsun practitioner learns decision making skills. A good Wing Tsun practitioner knows when to hit hard and when to inflict just enough pain to teach the opponent a lesson. It is the same in the apartment. Too few landlords realize that for the same charge as the first notice of default letter, you could be hiring a personal injury lawyer or a traffic violation attorney. The fact of the matter is that landlords often miss out on a lot of money because they don’t think it is worth it to hire a lawyer to write a letter to the tenant to warn them that they are breaking the lease agreement or that they have one week to correct the situation. They may think that they can do it themselves and then when the tenant ignores their letter they either wait yet another month to make a decision or they jump the gun by having friends and family members go over to the tenant and threaten them – all of which put the landlord at risk of violence.

In Wing Tsun the student must always be ready to defend themselves as well as attack. A well prepared Wing Tsun practitioner is a dangerous adversary. They perceive openings, weaknesses in the opponents defense strategy and decide where to hit the opponent so that the opponent is most damaged by their actions. It is the same thing with the landlord. A good landlord who knows how an eviction works, or has been through the post possession agreement several times, does not need to rush or play games with a tenant who has not paid the rent. A good landlord can start using reasons and logic to help frighten the tenant into paying the rent – even though that is not the job of a landlord. The landlord could simply start asking for money in preparation for the eviction. It can be mysterious and foreboding such as, “I need you to pay me $500 or you will be in real trouble.” It can be rather direct, “I need you to pay the rent or I am going to evict you.” It can be a threat, “Failure to pay the rent is grounds for immediate eviction.” The point is, it is done without needing to hire a lawyer to start a court action to evict the tenant. Doing it without needing to evict the tenant makes the landlord a predatory adversary.

At the Wing Tsun Kung Fu School in Giza we also believe that communication is key. We keep in mind the principle of maximum harmony and minimum obstruction. We do not answer the tenants phone calls, waited since November for a response from a tenant before serving a Negligence Letter, moved ahead with an eviction action without texting or calling the tenant to see if the rent would be paid shortly or the tenant had a plan for paying the rent. In Wing Tsun we learn that sometimes blocking the blow or deflecting it is the safest action. We also learn that the no contact rule holds true in Wing Tsun. If the opponent blocks or deflects, then we do not attack with full force. That is why communication is so important. Again mistakes are made on inaction which holds up the recovery process. And we have lost a lot of money in the past seven years because we have been so patient with tenants who because they do not have a dollar to their name, can just wait it out and save up each month until they have saved the entire sum of rent owed. Without any incentives to pay, the landlord could lose years of rent and not even know the tenant was living rent free.

In life as well as in Wing Tsun we must be prepared well in advance for the fight. A good Wing Tsun practitioner does not wait until the opponent has their back turned to attack. A blind man does not wait until he can see the street in Mexico City to apply for a passport. It is often necessary to prepare for things that the individual cannot see. In Wing Tsun we also learn to anticipate what our opponents next move will be. Here the landlord must anticipate that the tenant will say they cannot pay the rent, that they are in the process of moving, or that they will pay the rent within a few days. The landlord must not fall for the trap with which they have dealt with substandard tenants in the past. Does the tenant really pay the rent one time and not speak again for six months or are they just waiting until the eviction action is dismissed for failure to appear in court?

In Wing Tsun the landlord or individual student must appreciate how they should move forward. Sometimes without even remembering, the student must throw a punch in order to signal that it is time for the fight to be over. The same is true in a bad tenant situation. After six months or more of a tenants promises and written guarantees, the time has come for the landlord to move ahead with an eviction action. That is the reason this month we are writing about the missing post possession agreement and how it applies to residential and commercial properties and why they are important in making sure you do not end up in court. It is also the reason we have decided to explain the principles in plain language for the benefit of the school’s students and teachers.