We've been at Granada for soon to be 4 years. I've paid my rent on time every month. We had a studio apartment before our current 2 bedroom, and when I vacated that studio, it was in better condition than when I moved in. Bottom line: Any reasonable place would know you dont want to lose me as a tenant. I have heard the war stories about tenants not paying, keeping the apartments like garbage, etc.

Our 60 day notice for our latest lease has come around, and we are looking to buy a house. We kindly asked for some flexibility (either a 3 month lease or a reasonable penalty to go month to month). We got neither.
They offered us an 8 month lease or a 20% penalty to go month to month. Thats $1840 a month for a 35 year old 2 bedroom apartment.

Here is why this is totally unreasonable:
1) The parent corporation is Equity Apartments. "Equity." Their whole gimic is that you can put 15-25% of your rent spent towards a house when you are ready to move. It turns out, there are no places anywhere near Massachusetts to use this credit. It is available in Florida and some other southern states. They don't tell you that on their banners. You would think that since this credit is not usable or relevant in this area that they would at least consider making it a bit easier in our current situation (given our history with them).
You would also think that in my case, where I am trying to buy my first home in a very inflated market, they would "reward" me with a reasonable penalty for a month to month lease. They are completely unwillingly to be helpful in this regard.

2) This is a buyers market. A 20% penalty puts this apartment equal to our hopefully soon to be mortgage. It is absolute robbery to pay this kind of money for a 2 bedroom apartment.

3) This is not some sort of cash strapped organization. Equity is supposed to be one of the biggest apartment companies in the country. Granada has 920 apartments. This extra $310 a month does nothing for them - it only burdens us.

In short, if you need any type of flexibility, stay away from Granada Highlands. They try to act nice in the office, but when it comes down to caring about people and the tenants they are leasing apartments to, there is absolutely no flexibility.

User Responses
From: DESIBANDHU	Date: 04/08/2005
MY QUESTION TO YOU: IS IT CLEAN, NICE AND SAFE TO LIVE HERE?
From: lsp79	Date: 04/09/2005
I've never not felt safe, but I have heard mixed things from other buildings. Nice and clean is another story. I keep my apartment amazing, but people keep the common areas like crap (people have written grafitti on freshly painted words (curses too). People don't take care of the place. Its certainly not the worst place to live, but for these prices, it better be awesome.

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