Can We At Least Do It For The Aesthetic?

After a few weeks of apartment hunting, I look at an apartment in a fairly new building. The building is owned by a larger housing company, with only a property manager on site.

We finish the apartment and building tour, and I follow the manager to her office to look at the lease. She sits down at her computer and opens a PDF copy of the lease. After reading through the entire document (because yes, I am one of those people) and asking a few questions that come up, I decide to sign. Instead of printing a copy of the lease or grabbing a pre-printed copy, the manager takes an electronic signature pad and stylus out of her desk drawer, plugs them into the computer, and then opens the lease in a PDF editing program.

Manager: “Great! You can use the stylus and pad here, and it’ll copy your signature onto the PDF.”

Me: “Do you have a paper copy?”

Manager: “No, everything is electronic. [Company] is trying to go all paperless, so we use e-signatures. You’re welcome to print off a copy for yourself, but all of [Company]’s records are kept electronically.”

Me: “In that case, thanks for showing me around, but I think I’ll pass.”

Manager: “Oh, but I thought you liked the place. What’s wrong?”

Me: “I’m not comfortable with only having an electronic copy of the lease. Electronic documents can be edited after they’re signed, and that’s not something I’m comfortable taking a chance on if something goes wrong.”

Manager: “[Company] would never do such a thing! Is there anything I can do to convince you to sign the lease?”

Me: “Print off a paper copy, we can sign it in pen, and you can scan it back into the system for your electronic records?”

Manager: “I can’t do that. I told you, [Company] is all paperless. I don’t even have a printer or scanner here.”

Me: “Okay, then. Thanks, but bye.”

I walked out of her office and never looked at an apartment owned by that company again.