Everybody I know has apartment horror stories, so I guess mine is just one more on the pile. Let me just start out by saying: Do not ever, EVER, involve yourself with these people. Here's how my horror story goes:
Things were fine when I moved in, the complex was owned by AIMCO, the largest apartment owner in the US. I moved out of my first apartment and into a much larger one, and recieved my security deposit back at 100% with no hassles. Then at 3AM on the day after Christmas, I awoke in a panic, and looked out my window at an enormous, glowing, billowing cloud of smoke coming from the top of my building. I drag my wife out of bed, get enough clothes on to get out the door, and nearly run into a fireman who was about to axe my door in.
We set outside for a few hours while we watched the building burn out the top story while we froze. Then we were able to go back into our smoky apartments and attempt to sleep before work the next morning.
Almost immediately after the cause of the fire, I began pressing the apartment owners(which were now a newer, smaller group) to tell me what the cause of the fire was. After about a month of my hassling them, they told me that their heating unit had caused it. They couldn't tell me anything they had done to prevent another fire- no inspection, no repairs, nothing. I immediately requested release from my lease so I could move somewhere where I wasn't nervous all the time. They took 2 months to answer that request with a letter simply stating "denied." This was obnoxious, but it wasn't too unexpected for the kind of heartless car sales rejects that usually end up running apartment complexes.
The real trouble happened when I moved out. I cleaned my apartment from top to bottom, all appliances, etc. And never heard from them about my security deposit. Then suddenly I started to get obnoxious phone calls from a collections agent attempting to collect $138 for Chelsea Place!
Aparently, they billed me for $137 in addition to my security deposit, for "cleaning." After I got a lawyer and talked it out, the only real option was to pay it. I am hoping I can follow up this blog with a string of "letters to the editor", and make sure that nobody I care about ever deals with them.
But yeah, theres the venting blog that was bound to happen. I hope it gets number one in the search engines so people find out ASAP.
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