Review History for exploitedmuse

Black Lake Apartments


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exploitedmuse

Resident 2000 - 2002

1/26/2003

Overpriced fleabag

Stay Away!! <br> <br>Upon moving out of the Black Lake Apartments (BLA), they kept my deposit and charged an additional $560. They sent me a nasty letter about the $560 before they even sent me a bill, so at the time I had little clue about why I was getting mysterious nasty letters from some place called “Investco”. I actually had to request a bill because I didn’t know why I was getting nasty letters about all this money I supposedly owed. The charges were mostly for things they should have paid for themselves – over $100 for painting the walls to start...which seemed really odd because I´m sure that the walls were covered only in primer. If you lightly rubbed your finger against it, it would flake. The lease said nothing about painting the walls upon move out, nor about paying for anyone else to do it. Washington state tenant law states that the walls are supposed to be painted every 2-3 years. I lived there for about 2 and a half years. The managers also said that my apartment was "still dirty" after I hired a professional cleaning service upon moving out. Because it was "still dirty", they charged an additional $70 (not covered by my deposit). <br> <br>Some of the $560 was for damages into the apartment, and I’m willing to accept that. Some of their charges, however, were just plain stupid. <br>My last month’s water/sewer bill was sent to Black Lake Apartments as soon as they received notice that I was moving out –but I had already paid my bill. Black Lake Apartments included those charges with their already over-the-top bill. I explained to them that I’d already paid the water/sewer bill separately. The conversation went something like this: <br> <br>Me: “Hi, I shouldn’t have to pay <dollar amount> because I paid it separately already. <br>Them: “But they sent us a bill.” <br>Me: “Yes, but they also sent ME a bill and I paid it. I got their bill before I got your bill.” <br>Them: “But they sent us a bill.” <br>Me: “Why should I pay the bill twice?” <br>Them: “They sent us a bill.” <br>Me: “The bill has been paid. It’s the same bill you got. I don’t see why I should give the money to you so you can give the money to them when I gave the money to them in the first place.” <br>Them “But we sent you a bill.” <br> <br>And so on and so forth. They then suggested that I pay them so that they could pay the water/sewer company (who had already been paid) so that I could then call the water/sewer company and get a refund. For some reason, it made no sense to them that I could just NOT pay them, since I would just be getting a refund, anyway. I haven’t called Viterra for my refund yet. To be honest, I’d be surprised if Black Lake Apartments ever paid them up since they don’t really owe anyone anything…anyone except me and many other tenants. <br> <br>The apartment was infested with fleas at move-in. My cat, then 5 years old, had never had a flea and hadn’t set foot (er, paw) outside in 3 years. Within 2 weeks of moving into Black Lake Apartments, she had quite an infestation. I have several years of veterinary records that all mention that she was flea-free until moving into Black Lake Apartments. At one point when my cat wasn’t even living there, you could actually see fleas crawling around the bathroom floor. They had been left over by a previous tenant, and the managers never had the place exterminated. I twice attempted to exterminate the fleas in my apartment. I had very little luck, and I had to thoroughly spray the place down every few months just to keep from being bitten half to death. My cat and I are in another apartment now, with no flea problems whatsoever. I give her no flea medication, and I don’t have to use flea bombs or sprays anymore. <br>I did cause some damage in the apartment. My deposit covered most of it. “Investco” gave me an itemized list of the charges, and I gladly paid up the little bit that wasn’t covered by my deposit. They still wanted an extra $372.66 for items that were NOT “damage” but things that were wear and tear or completely unnecessary: the aforementioned cleaning, water/sewer bill, painting the walls, cleaning the carpets, etc. They charged me to replace a blind that had been replaced a couple of months before. The original blinds had been damaged by my cat and they harassed me into changing them even though I knew she’d damage it again. To prevent this, once they changed it I kept the blind up the whole time and covered my windows with fabric so as not to damage the blind. The blind had never even been touched since installation and they were charging me for it. When I confronted them to tell them that the additional charges were strictly for wear and tear (or simply ridiculous), they retaliated by making up MORE random charges. They said that I’d never paid my pet deposit (I have the cancelled check to prove that I did) and they charged me for their extermination of the fleas…assuming that’s possible in such a fleabag. If anything, they should be paying ME. I got half of my blood sucked out of me and I paid my own money (twice!) to exterminate that awful place. Anyway, even THEY didn’t know why they were charging me so much money. I received 4 different totals from them, and they all included different things. They are VERY confused people. <br> <br>I should have known that the Black Lake Apartment complex was bad news when I had to jump through so many hoops just to move in. They made things difficult for me by repeatedly saying I didn´t make enough money. I believe that this had more to do with me being a college student than anything else, because my parents were paying most of my rent (they co-signed the lease) and they make well beyond the requirements of “6 times the monthly rent” per month. They always wanted more and more bank records and more and more information about my parents and me. I was eventually allowed into Black Lake Apartments. Despite adequate size, the apartment was laid out so badly that there was barely room for anything. The living room, for example, was long and narrow; my television and loveseat fit in fine, but with those 2 objects there was no room even for a normal-sized coffee table. <br> <br>Every time I went to exercise in BLA’s poor excuse for an exercise room, I’d be repeatedly asked about my age or if I lived there. No matter how many times the same person saw me, they’d ask the same ridiculous questions (I saw other people in the exercise room, and I never saw anyone else get interrogated), so I came to dislike the staff. <br> <br> <br> My building was right by the freeway, so it was noisy pretty much around the clock. I could also hear my neighbors televisions, conversations, plumbing, music, etc, which proved to be a nuisance late at night. <br> <br>Lastly, Black Lake Apartments are much more expensive than far nicer places in town. By the time I moved out, I was paying $580.00 a month for a one-bedroom, and they didn’t pay any utilities. If you do, however, make the detrimental mistake of living in Black Lake Apartments, keep copies of EVERY little bit of business you do with them so that you´ll be prepared for your inevitable court date.

    Review 138 out of 146

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