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Thanks to Andrena Zawinski for contributing this poem to the Boom website!
(See the bio below)

THE NEW GOLD RUSH
or
The How-To on How to Become a San Francisco Bay Area Landlord

Cross the land mass from the right coast to the left. Get a job. Get a good job.
A really good job--in the Cyberspace Gold Rush. One with DotCom stock options.
Struggle it out working even in your sleep, just until you get vested. Spend a lot.
Spend a lot of money you don’t have. Spend it on tapas and martinis and in upscale
clothiers specializing in the downwardly mobile chic. You can afford to pay later.

Cash in. Cash in your stock options. Buy a house. Pay too much for it. But buy it
anyway because you want it, you want it now. Fix it up. Or have someone else fix it
up. Doll it up with Deco fixtures and Victorian frills, all the accoutrements of
excess. Chop it up. Chop it in half, maybe less, to get some rent; and cut corners--
skip that laundry or the bath tub, park your car in the garden until someday later.

Advertise it. Use creative language. Put your years of training in euphemisms
to work. If the place is a tool shed or garage, call it a cozy cottage. A root cellar
can become a ground floor in-law. A crawl space can be an efficiency, studio, junior
bedroom, even a small flat. Suggest it’s ideal for professional couples. (DINKs,
double-income-no-kids, need only apply.) Say it's near transportation, even if it is
only a troll mound under a freeway. Call that din and dark: kinetic art. Claim it is
convenient to all points; so what if it’s a twenty-minute walk to an infrequently
running bus to the weather-driven ferry or to some supposedly rapid transit stop.

Advertise it at what The Market will bear. Check salaries nonprofits offer, then
make rent equal that, so no artists nor humanitarians need apply. (They can bail
themselves out begging for a tax dime.) But do treat this seriously. Treat it like
an application for employment. Require rental resumes that indicate lists of aromatic
spices favored, favorite radio stations played, year/make/model of vacuum cleaner,
as well as waking hours applicants will find it absolutely necessary to occupy
the home. Demand on-the-spot handwritten essays on why each is the perfect tenant.

Try to be honest. Let them know the apartment may be partially furnished--
why should you pay some Stash ‘n Store to keep your old office bean bags and broken
fus-ball table? After all, you are the landlord. You’ll be living there while they
pay your mortgage. And don’t forget to hint that the neighborhood is up-and-coming
so they will not question those pawnshop lockup bars decorating local homes.

Do have fun with it. You can act like a movie producer--hold an Open House cattle
call, roping off a portion of sidewalk around the block for those who can afford
to arrive on a rainy December Friday between ten and noon. Charge a $30 cash
application fee from everyone in line. Refuse credit reports or personal checks
they have in hand. Someone’s got to cover the cost of advertising and your time.

And when you send them off wringing their hands and wondering if they will make
the final cut, offer it to someone who makes more money than you do. Offer it
above the original advertised price due to unanticipated popularity. Make it
available within a day of showing, so you can collect rent on the key and so
tenants can prove they can afford to pay you while honoring an existing lease
and thereby any future increases as might be demanded by The Market.

Aspire to greatness. Become that landlord dressed up in a month-to-month lease,
flying a petition against tenants’ rights, and living on the expense account
of the soul of a city. Then sell. Sell the place to a relative who will sell it
back to you in a year. Evict everyone. Put in that tub or laundry you skipped.
Turn that backyard garden into a detached office space with solar lighting--
no electricity. Then double the rent!

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Andrena Zawinski, born and raised in Pittsburgh, PA, has been living in the Bay Area
under sticker shock since 1999. Her writing has won awards for poetry of social
concern, free verse, research based nonfiction. Zawinski's poetry has appeared
in Santa Clara Review, Quarterly West, Rattle, Slipstream, and others including many
digizines. She is Bay Area Co-Chair of Poets for Peace and is Feature Editor at
PoetryMagazine.com