Horrible Move-out Experience
From:
-Anonymous-
Date posted:
5/29/2007
Years at this apartment:
2006
-
2007
1 response
1 photo
I was a resident at Champions Green Apartments from March 2006 till the end of February 2007. When we first moved in the management was great and we were very excited. We knew the apartments were a bit old, but were confident that the management would fix any problems we had. During our residence the management company changed at least twice, and mostly within the same couple of months. The current management company is very unreliable and irresponsible with things like: keeping track of paperwork, documenting rent and deposits, following through with maintenance requests, and taking responsibility for their mistakes.
We lived in a unit with the solarium, and let me tell you.. that was a huge mistake. The amount of windows and shoddy insulation and seals on the windows and doors made our utility bills sky high. Our highest bill in the summer was in excess of 350 dollars. And this is for a ONE bedroom. Another thing is that through the management changes, the company that handled the water bills changed also. When we moved in the management lady told us that the water would be no more than 15 dollars a month, but usually about 12. Then around month 6 the water company changed and the water bills were consistently around 24 dollars a month, just for a one bedroom with 2 people in it. To put it in perspective, ask someone with a house and a family how much they pay for water, and you will know that 24 dollars a month for an apartment is really high. Especially considering all of the water problems that other reviewers have mentioned, and I can confirm.
The construction of the actual apartments is quite old. Our apartment had multiple water leaks in the ceiling, and when it would rain for a day or two (as it does in Houston quite often) the front door jam would swell and the door would become extremely hard to open and close. The different management companies tried to fix the problems, but as far as I know it still isn't fixed. Another ongoing problem was the fact that rain water would hit our front door and wind up inside the door on the tile, making it very unsafe and slippery to walk in at night. I was told repeatedly that the sweep needed to fix the door was on order, but it never arrived.
Beware if you have pets that you want to move in, when we got a kitten we had to pay a 300 dollar pet deposit, PLUS 10 dollars more a month for rent. I think this is a bit excessive.
But even if all of this was aside, I still wouldn't recommend Champions Green to anyone because of the serious problems we had during move out. Originally we wanted to move in order to be closer to work and when we decided this and found a new place that we loved, we put in our move out notice, a full 2 months before the move out day. (CG only requires 30 days notice) As our move out day became closer we received paperwork attached to our door two different times telling us that we needed to apply if we wanted to renew our lease. I called them both times to remind them that we had put in a move out notice already.
We planned our move out to our new place with 3 days of overlap of our leases so that we had time to move out all of our stuff, and then come back with plenty of time in our schedules to clean the apartment and get it ready for move out. We moved our belongings on a Sunday, and left our cleaning supplies and a little bit of stuff behind that we could get later, because.. hey.. we had time. I even borrowed my mother's expensive Dyson vacuum to make sure that the carpets would look the best they possibly could. So on Monday night after work we went over to start the cleaning process and when we opened the door we smelled wet paint. There was tape on all the fixtures and the apartment had been painted. Then a few minutes later I noticed that things were missing, including the Dyson. I was extremely confused because our lease was not up, our keys were not turned in, and our rent was paid in full. They took quite a few things, but not everything.. and I was extremely upset. We called the police and filed a theft report. The next morning I went to the office to find out what happened and they seemed very confused. I kept telling them that our move out day was Wednesday and they had that notice. They took my copy of the notice and made another copy for themselves. It turned out that they had "pre-leased" our apartment to another resident and they were supposedly "trashing out" the apartment after we "had left". But we hadn't left.. and we had done everything correctly. When I listed everything out it turned out they stole around 700 dollars worth of items, including the Dyson. They took everything we left to clean up with so there was no way we could clean up before the real move out day. They conceded this and said that we would get our security deposit back because they took our time and items to clean with. The regional manager told me that I would be completely satisfied with the outcome and that they would try to get our items back. Their attitude about it that day was actually sympathetic and concerned for us, but after that day the main manager that I had to deal with had a horrible attitude, and made everything after that the equivalent of pulling teeth. She was so bad that the other ladies in the office would whisper that they were sorry because of the way she treated us.
They ended up giving back the high dollar items, like the Dyson, on Wednesday. After that I had to struggle with the management to get the rest of our things for about a month. They decided after I wrote a stern letter to them that they would take it upon themselves to replace the remaining things with items purchased from Wal*Mart. These things were not the same as the things they had taken from me, and were worth about 1/3 as much.. but I took what they gave me with the concession that they would pay to replace a bowl that was taken from the dishwasher that broke the set of our wedding dishes. I purchased the replacement from Ebay and sent them the invoice, as they requested, and still have not been compensated for it.
I was told to expect the refund for our security deposit within 30 days.. but I actually received it on May 24, 2007.. which is QUITE a lot longer than 30 days after February 28.
I do not recommend this apartment complex to anyone. I am so happy that I do not have to contact them or deal with them any longer now that this whole ordeal has been solved. I never expected for them to break the lease and take our things after we had been such good residents and always paid our rent in full on time every month, and were following the move-out procedures ourselves. They are so disorganized and take it upon themselves to assume whether you have truly moved out or not, which should not happen. This may be a one time occurrence that only happened to me, but I assume that it truly isn't.
|
|
I'm the author!
Free estimates on moving trucks
Free quotes on movers
