I sent the below email to the corporate office on 3 separate occasions, and I received no response. The corporate office also doesn't answer their phones, so I figured it would be a waste of time to leave a message on their machine. I suspect they are in the business of discrimination by requiring higher standards for anyone that is a different race, color, ethnicity, or whatever. Again, this is only a suspicion based upon my negative experience with the company, but I urge all new applicants to post on this website if they have a similar experience. This is the only way you can possibly stop it from happening because most people don't have the time nor money to launch an undercover investigation of their leasing practices.

----- Original Message -----
From: Dave
To: corporate@alliedgroup.net
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2006 3:38 PM
Subject: Cascadian Apartments Review


Hi,

My wife and I are looking around for a 2br apartment in the Bellevue area, and we found one of your properties (Cascadian Apartments) on the net. When I called to inquire about vacancies, I spoke to a woman named Rosa who told me our combined income must be below 37 thousand in order to qualify. I told her my wife makes 23,500 and works at Farmer's Insurance in Mercer Island, and I work 20 hours at a bike shop and make $8/hr. She said that sounds good, and she asked me to be at her place at 9 am to fill out the applications.

This morning, after a 20 mile bike ride from Lake City, I arrived at the Cascadian and met with Rosa. One of the first questions she asked me was how long my wife & I had been working at our current jobs. Right away, she discovered we hadn't been working at our jobs for a continuous year, and she told me I would DEFINITELY need a co-signer in order to be approved to move in.

She handed me a piece of paper entitled "Rental Application Criteria - Section 42," and she explained that this piece of paper explains their income requirements. When I read the employment section of the requirements, it left a lot of room for interpretation, and it said nothing about DEFINITELY needing a co-signer in order to be accepted. She told me that even though it doesn't explicitly say that, this is what will happen. She said she was trying the best she could to save our $72 by providing me with some unwritten rules. No matter whether her intentions were positive or not, the way she delivered her message combined with her lack of written support in the rental application criteria, led me to get a second opinion.

Under the heading of Employment it states that you require either 1) 12 Months on the job, or 2) Continuous verifiable employment, or 3) Verifiable, Guaranteed source of income for 12 months. Then, underneath, it says "If employment is less than 12 months, or if there is lack of employment verification, this MAY result in a conditional approval requiring an INCREASED DEPOSIT >OR< CO-SIGNER. The recommendation will be dependent on rental history, credit history, and income requirements."

My wife & I moved from San Diego in February. We had to leave our jobs in order to move to Seattle. However, we both have continuous verifiable employment. So we definitely meet the criteria for #2. It could also be argued that we meet the criteria for #3 depending upon what one would consider at guarantee. We all know that there are no guarantee's in life, but some might consider the fact that my wife has a permanent full-time position at Farmer's Insurance with an income of 23,500 a guarantee. Of course, the only real guarantee (if you're worried about getting your money) is if we just paid out the lease for 6 months ($5000). Anyway, even if we didn't meet #2 & #3, the fine print underneath says that it MAY just result in a conditional approval which would require an increased deposit OR co-signer. Why not just charge us an increased deposit' Our rental history is spotless, no late fees, no complaints, and you can call and talk to anyone who we rented from and they will tell you we always paid our rent on-time or early.

Furthermore, we just applied to a very nice apartment in Mountlake Terrace (Lakeside Apartments), and they approved us with flying colors. They said our credit is above average.

So, I'm not sure who to direct this email to, but I figured I would give someone at the corporate office a chance to clear up any misunderstandings that may have been communicated with my meeting with Rosa this morning. After 13 years as a leasing agent, I doubt she could have made a mistake, but I have seen less likely things happen in my life. She told me that Allied Group makes the rental standards and gives those standards to MOCO to do the drudge work. I'm assuming I was quoting Allied Group's standards above which is why I'm writing you.

By the way, some of the things I read about Cascadian Apartments on www.apartmentratings.com led me to be curious about what is true & what is not. Of course, it's sometimes difficult to tell when someone is writing a fair evaluation or just venting their feelings. Cascadian appears to be a very nice place to live, and we would love to have a fair opportunity to live there.

Dave

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