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The Haggler
In early July, a physician who lives on the Upper East Side — and who, for reasons that will become clear, will be identified only as “the doctor” — decided that it was time to get his Persian carpet professionally cleaned. After he conducted a cursory web search, a man named Eric Shab, with ABC Rug Cleaning, showed up to provide an estimate. The doctor was not home. Mr. Shab told the doctor’s wife that the rug was in terrible condition.
“At first my wife told me that she’d agreed to pay $5,000,” the doctor recalled in a phone conversation with the Haggler in September. “A week or two later, she admitted that it was $20,000. Then she said it was actually $30,000.”
As it turns out, $30,000 was just the down payment, secured on an American Express card. The actual cost of the cleaning and repair would be just over $42,000, the doctor learned. Mr. Shab departed from the doctor’s house that July morning with both an agreement and the carpet.
At this point, dear reader, you probably have some questions.
“O.K., did you make up this story?”
No.
“Is that number, $42,000, a typo?”
No.
“Is the doctor’s wife insane?”
No, but the doctor did acknowledge that decisions she made that morning have led to marital stress.
“What did the rug originally cost?”
About $38,000 when it was bought in the late 1990s.
“What should a rug cleaning in this instance have cost?”
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