HPDBC Chapter 21 Extremely Short of Money
Chapter 21 Extremely Short of Money
Yesterday, Mao Xiaoyu tricked her parents out of another 2000 yuan, which made her feel a little more financially secure. But she had no choice; another 7,000 yuan was gone in a single day. Considering that she still had to pay 6000 yuan in rent in a few days, Mao Xiaoyu had to find a way to squeeze some money out of her parents.
Therefore, even if Mao Xiaoyu's parents didn't mention buying a phone, Mao Xiaoyu would still find other ways to get money from them. After all, it's always easier for children to get money from their parents.
Of course, if Mao Xiaoyu had any other way, she definitely wouldn't have cheated her parents out of money, but since she had no other options, and she didn't know anyone in Shanghai (people she knew before her rebirth, but hadn't met in this life), she could only try to get some money from her parents now.
However, this money was meant for her parents to buy her a cell phone. To appease them, she definitely had to buy a cell phone. So, the next day, after leaving home, Mao Xiaoyu went to the cell phone store to buy a cell phone.
Fortunately, there are expensive and cheap mobile phones available now. After looking around for half an hour, Mao Xiaoyu finally decided to buy a Nokia 3100. After all, this phone is priced in the middle range in the current mobile phone market, and it has a very big brand reputation, not to mention its durability.
After Mao Xiaoyu finished buying the phone, she also bought a SIM card at the phone store. The price was very reasonable, and the phone and SIM card together only cost her about 1000 yuan.
This price is already very cheap. You should know that the Nokia 3100 phone was launched in 2003. At that time, the peak price of this model was more than 2000 yuan, and the normal selling price was more than 1800 yuan.
Sure enough, two years later, the price dropped, and now you can buy a Nokia 3100 for only 899 yuan. I also spent 100 yuan on a SIM card, so the whole phone and SIM card cost less than 1000 yuan.
After buying the phone and leaving the phone store, Mao Xiaoyu first called her father to tell him that the phone was ready and that he could call this number if needed.
After finishing her phone call with her dad, Mao Xiaoyu checked the money in her pocket. With the money her parents gave her yesterday, the rent, and the remaining money, she had over 1500 yuan left. That was more than enough to buy a bed, so she didn't need to go to the bank to withdraw more money. Instead, Mao Xiaoyu rode her electric scooter to the secondhand market to buy a bed.
So, after spending more than two hours visiting two new flea markets, I finally bought two single beds and four double beds. As for folding beds, they're probably not commonly used by ordinary people, and I didn't see any at either of these flea markets, so I'll have to wait until next time to buy them.
Of course, when buying the bed, in order to save some money, Mao Xiaoyu also bought four desks and ten chairs. As for these four desks and ten chairs, they were not for use in the rented room, but for use in the storefront. After all, there was nothing in the storefront, so she definitely needed to buy some desks.
However, precisely because of this, Mao Xiaoyu has almost spent all of her 1500 yuan.
It can be said that Mao Xiaoyu now has less than 20 yuan in change on her body, apart from the 1000 yuan in the bank. However, she has bought almost everything she needed and doesn't need to spend much money anymore.
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Now that she had bought the items, Mao Xiaoyu asked the owner of the secondhand market to load the bed onto the truck and deliver it to the rental house. As for the remaining office supplies, she had already told the owner that they would be transported away later.
And so, with a whirlwind of activity, the car arrived at the rental house. Then the workers carried the bed upstairs. When Mao Xiaoyu and her group reached the third floor and opened the door, they found that the house was empty.
Mao Xiaoyu knew what was going on. After all, both the tenant surnamed Jiang and the He family of three were there for medical treatment or check-ups. At this time in the morning, both groups of people were definitely at the hospital. They would only come back after the hospital closed. Therefore, it was normal that no one was in the rented room!
Mao Xiaoyu didn't have time to deal with this. She simply had the staff put the beds together and place them in each room. After everything was finished, she left her home with the staff from the secondhand market.
When they arrived at the secondhand market again, they loaded up the goods again, this time desks and chairs. It took half an hour. After the staff at the secondhand market finished loading the desks and chairs, Mao Xiaoyu led the way and started transporting these items to the storefronts.
The journey was a bit long this time, taking 40 minutes to reach the destination. Then, the staff started unloading the goods and moved the desks and chairs into the storefront.
During this time, Xiao Liu, the shop owner next door, came over to take a look and greeted Mao Xiaoyu. Mao Xiaoyu took advantage of the situation, said a few nice words, and shamelessly borrowed a pen and a piece of paper from the shop owner next door. She then wrote a job posting and posted it on her storefront.
There's no other way. After all, Mao Xiaoyu has never worked in a real estate agency before. Now that she's starting one, she definitely needs manpower!
But where will the manpower come from?
Of course we're hiring!
So Mao Xiaoyu's first task was to recruit staff.
Once the job posting was up on the storefront, Mao Xiaoyu was satisfied and rode away on her bike. On her way back to her hospital apartment, she saw a shop that specialized in making GG signs. Thinking about her own agency's signs, Mao Xiaoyu couldn't resist going in to ask how much it would cost to make one.
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"Holy crap... this isn't brand building... it's outright exploitation! It's shady... shady, it's really outrageous."
Half an hour later, Mao Xiaoyu walked out of the GG store looking sullen, cursing under her breath.
Unfortunately, Mao Xiaoyu thought it would be cheap to make a canvas GG sign without colored lights, since the real estate agency's storefront was going to be demolished in a few months. Mao Xiaoyu felt that making it too fancy was unnecessary.
So I'd like to ask the people at GG stores how much it would cost to make a canvas GG sign without colored lights, and to keep it as simple as possible.
Who knew that just making a canvas GG sign without colored lights would cost 5000? The staff even said that it included design fees, pattern cutting fees, typesetting fees, and all sorts of other miscellaneous fees!
Moreover, they shamelessly said that if you want a nicer-looking lantern, you can get one for eight or nine thousand, and the staff kept recommending that Mao Xiaoyu make a lantern for eight or nine thousand.
They said that such a GG sign can be clearly identified from a great distance, that such a GG sign is extremely conspicuous when the lights are on at night, that such a GG sign is incredibly good, and so on...
Okay, all this talk and hype, this kind of recommendation, in Mao Xiaoyu's opinion, is all utter bullshit!!!
Forget about making any fancy lights or GG signs. Just make a canvas sign with the name of a real estate agency on it. Do you really need all this nonsense? And it costs 5000? Mao Xiaoyu thinks even 1000 is too expensive.
Not to mention those who make lanterns, doesn't Mao Xiaoyu know that lanterns look good? Aren't they eye-catching? Everyone knows that!
But now there's an even bigger problem: we don't have money.
In short, it all boils down to not having money. Otherwise, would it be necessary to make a canvas?
Faced with this, Mao Xiaoyu could only helplessly leave the GG store, and had no further thoughts about turning her shop into a real estate agency under the GG brand!
Let's just make do with this for now. If things get really bad, we can always make a wooden sign later.
Thinking about this, Mao Xiaoyu felt that the money she earned was really not enough. You see, apart from the fact that the storefront sign could be postponed, the more important thing was that the business license for the real estate agency had not yet been obtained.
Honestly, if the staff hadn't casually asked if the GG brand name matched the name on the business license, Mao Xiaoyu would never have imagined that she would need to get a business license.
After all, in her previous life, Mao Xiaoyu only owned a barbershop. Before opening the barbershop, the entire shop's renovation took one or two months. During that time, she was in charge of all the renovation work, while her friend was in charge of handling the necessary permits and licenses. Therefore, Mao Xiaoyu never really thought about getting a business license when she opened the agency this time.
If the staff hadn't casually mentioned it earlier, Mao Xiaoyu would have been ready to open a real estate agency right away.
Thinking of this, Mao Xiaoyu became annoyed again. Damn it, how much does a business license cost?
However, Mao Xiaoyu thought that it might be difficult to obtain a business license for this intermediary. After all, it is a service industry, and obtaining a business license would cost at least one or two thousand yuan. Thinking of this, Mao Xiaoyu thought about the money in her savings account and felt her head was getting bigger.
I still have to pay over 6000 yuan in rent in a few days, and it also costs money to get a business license here. The problem is that I only have 1,000 yuan. Sigh, I'm so short of money!
Thinking about this, Mao Xiaoyu felt even more motivated to make money recently!
Next, I don't have much to think about, just find more tenants and make more money!
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Although it took more than forty minutes to get from the flea market to the storefront, the journey from the storefront to the hospital was shorter. So, after deducting the time wasted at the GG store, Mao Xiaoyu only spent 25 minutes on the road to get back to the hospital.
"It smells so good!"
As Mao Xiaoyu approached the door of her house, she smelled the aroma of stir-fried dishes coming from inside. Needless to say, someone in the house was cooking.
As Mao Xiaoyu guessed who was cooking, she walked into the house.
Upon entering the house, Mao Xiaoyu first went to the living room, then glanced into the kitchen and saw that He's wife was cooking.
"So it's Aunt He cooking. How is it? Is the child in the hospital yet?" Mao Xiaoyu said as she walked seriously toward the kitchen door, but stopped there.
Actually, asking this question was pointless. Mao Xiaoyu just wanted to strike up a conversation with the He family's wife. After all, if the child hadn't been hospitalized, the sounds of the child and adults would have been heard in the house long ago. Now that it's so quiet, Mao Xiaoyu doesn't even need to think to know that the child has already been hospitalized.
"Oh, it's the landlord. The child has already moved in. The child's father is at the hospital taking care of the child, so I came back to cook some dishes." Aunt He had already seen Mao Xiaoyu, but she had been busy and hadn't had time to greet her. Now that she heard Mao Xiaoyu speak, she replied politely.
"That's good, that's good. There's only half a gas cylinder left. If you run out of gas and I'm not here, just call the gas exchange number on the door. You can pay for it for me in advance, and I'll pay you back later. After all, I'm not always here, but I'll definitely pay you back that day since I come here every day."
When Mao Xiaoyu bought the gas stove yesterday, there was still about half a tank of gas left in the gas cylinder. Since Mao Xiaoyu didn't know when the gas would run out, she told Sister-in-law He about it so that she wouldn't run out of gas and have to cook if she had to.
"Okay, landlord, it's alright." Since it was agreed that she could cook, Aunt He wasn't embarrassed at all, so she readily agreed when Mao Xiaoyu said that.
"By the way, how many of you are sleeping here tonight? If only one person is sleeping here, then you only need to pay for one person. But please confirm the bed allocation later, because I need to rent out the spare beds this afternoon," Mao Xiaoyu asked.
"We only need to rent one bed, just the single bed against the wall in that room." Aunt He must have discussed it with her husband, so she answered directly when Mao Xiaoyu asked.
"Okay, if you want to rent for a longer period, you can pay for several days' worth of beds in advance. After all, it's troublesome for both of us if I come over every day to ask. Paying all at once will save us from having to ask again." In order to get the money sooner, Mao Xiaoyu planned to increase the frequency of collecting bed rent.
"We're not entirely sure, but we'll need to rent it for at least a few days. We need to wait for the child's test results before we can determine what to do next."
Because the child's physical indicators haven't been checked yet, the exact time for surgery can't be determined at all, so Aunt He can't be sure how long she can rent the place.
Of course, they definitely hoped for a longer time, since a longer time meant the child could have surgery. If the hospital finished its examination in three to five days and refused to admit the child, then there would be a big problem. Therefore, when Mao Xiaoyu asked, Aunt He really couldn't answer for a moment.
"That's alright, just pay for one day today. We'll discuss the rest once we've finalized the details. Oh, by the way, I'm going to the other tenant's place now. Once you've finished cooking, just pay the money. After I collect the rent from you, I'll be leaving."
Hearing that Aunt He wasn't sure, and hearing some commotion outside, Mao Xiaoyu figured that the tenant surnamed Jiang should be home, so she decided to go to Jiang's place to collect the bed rent first.
"Okay, wait a moment, I'll come and give you the money once I've finished cooking!" Aunt He replied.
Upon hearing Aunt He's words, Mao Xiaoyu went to find the tenant surnamed Jiang. When she found him, she asked the same question. Jiang told her that he planned to stay for two more days because he had finished his examination today and needed to wait two days to get the report. He also needed to show the report to the doctor, so he needed to stay there for the next two days.
Mao Xiaoyu didn't say anything about it, but collected two days' rent from the other party, and then collected one day's rent from Aunt He. Only then did she take her rental sign and prepare to go out for dinner to do business.
After all, we're so short of money, we need to work hard to earn more!