Building Superintendent
As a child, he helped his father maintain apartment buildings for their residents. As an adult, he tried different career paths but eventually found financial security and fulfillment in helping others as a building superintendent.
FAMILY BACKGROUND
The father of Anthony Couvertheier (AC) was a wallpaper hanger and later a building superintendent in New York City.
(Editor’s note: Cue the famous Sinatra song lyrics: “If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere, it’s up to you (in) New York, New York….”)
AC’s brother is a building superintendent. His longtime life partner’s stepfather also works as a ‘super’ (nickname for a superintendent).
CHILDHOOD
AC often accompanied his father after school and on weekends while his father attended to the many duties of a building superintendent, which essentially include maintenance of the physical facility, often involving emergency repairs or summoning experts for complex problem resolutions.
One of AC’s tasks to help his father was taking out the trash from each residential apartment unit. AC also spent many summer days with his father, hanging drywall in tenants’ apartments, during which, he said, “I would always wonder why the hell are we doing this?” The answer, he now understands, was that his father’s job as a super – with a significant rent reduction for his family to live in the same building – was critical for AC’s father to be able to provide housing for his family in one of the most expensive cities in the world.
EDUCATION – PART ONE
After graduating from high school, AC enrolled as a communications major at a nearby university.
FIRST ADULT JOBS ARE NEVER A BINDING CAREER COMMITMENT
AC spent his early adult years trying different careers to avoid following his relatives into the same line of work. He was a tour manager for a hip-hop group, a store clerk at Sprint, then a Home Depot employee.
TAKING ‘BABY STEPS’ WITH NO COMMITMENT TO FAMILY BUSINESS
Never dreaming as a youth of joining the family business taking care of buildings, AC took baby steps toward that career, never wanting to get too deeply committed to becoming a building superintendent.
First, he worked as a full-time porter carrying bags for apartment residents and a handyman by day in a building on the Upper West Side of New York City and as a part-time super in a West Village building.
After five years of part-time jobs involved in residential building maintenance, AC, then a father of six, realized something needed to change when he was hoisting his twin newborns in a double stroller up the stairs to the two-bedroom apartment in a fifth-floor ‘walk-up’ (building with no elevators) which was the crammed-in, family lifestyle for AC, his life partner and their six children.
AC badly needed the biggest ‘perk’ that comes with working as a full-time superintendent in a fairly large residential (apartments and/or condominiums) building: a rent-free apartment.
EDUCATION – PART TWO
Now motivated to continue down a career path he had sampled, liked, and realized he was capable of performing well, AC started taking free courses offered through the national union of property service workers, where he is now a member, and earned certification in every course ranging from fire safety to locksmithing.
‘LUCK’ IS EXPERIENCE MEETING OPPORTUNITY
Nearing completion of the union’s courses leading to certification as a building superintendent, AC was wondering where he would – hopefully soon – find an opportunity to put his new skills to work as a full-time super.
Meanwhile, AC’s energy and willingness to learn his new trade had apparently made a positive impression on a former boss, who told him that the previous super at a building on West 72nd Street was retiring after almost 30 years. Without informing AC in advance, his former boss, and the stepfather of AC’s life partner – a super of 15 years in the building across the street – recommended AC for the job.
The previous super didn’t live in the building full time, but AC knew he didn’t want only a full-time job; he wanted – and needed – to have a home.
Just before Covid-19 deaths and a lockdown would shake New York City, AC took over as superintendent of the 48-unit building near both Riverside Park and Central Park.
TYPICAL DAY OF A BUILDING SUPERINTENDENT
AC’s days as building super are working down a never-ending to-do list, filled with routine maintenance and the unexpected: A call is a crack on the fifth floor. A text is a light bulb switch on four. An impromptu hello in the hallway leads to a toilet that needs unclogging. AC usually sends voice notes of incomplete tasks to his girlfriend to save them in his phone. Sometimes he writes them on a whiteboard calendar, but mostly, he writes his daily to-do list on his left hand, as he drinks his morning coffee and watches sports news on ESPN.
Having at least one wristwatch working always is a job requirement for any building super. AC owns 15 watches. Time is important to a super whose schedule is dictated by priorities. Anything involving water or electricity comes first and everything else can be done in order of importance, a process he’s honed over the years.
AC prepares his daily list using a “should – could – would” philosophy. A water shutdown for the renovation in 2B should take four hours. But he’s also always thinking about what could go wrong and what he would do (call a plumber). If there’s time, he could change a water filter, replace a doorknob, or make copies of keys.
But there are some diversions: When he gets a call from a 78-year-old tenant who works as a psychoanalyst, they talk about the Knicks (pro basketball team). AC eventually gets to know many tenants as friends, genuinely caring about keeping everyone’s living units in good working order.
CAREER SATISFACTION
AC’s job has become a career with significant financial benefits: a steady income and a rent-free apartment for his family. “You get opportunities with this kind of financial stability. And you know, then, make the best of it for yourself, your wife, and your kids.”
A super’s job becomes very important when outside events like a pandemic or nearby ‘civil unrest’ (e.g., riots) confine residents to their apartments. Looking back at being a super when the covid pandemic first hit, AC recalls, “I was a line of defense to make sure I kept them safe. They kind of put their trust in me (to keep their living units functioning). And I felt kind of good about it.”
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This career story is based on several sources including an article written by Gina Ryder, published by The New York Times newspaper on July 16, 2023, plus internet research.
