|
About a year ago a rather peculiar older lady contacted our office about renting a studio apartment. This lady gave us a story about how hard she was struggling to make it while attending night classes at a local junior college. She stated that this was the perfect rent amount and that she needed it right away. After careful examination of her application we decided that we would let her move into the property. Like most residents, she came into our office to sign the lease. I went in to sign with her and I noticed that there were lipstick marks ALL OVER the office window. I also happened to notice that it seemed to be the same color she was wearing. I could not prove anything and in fact I asked her if she had been the culprit, which she denied. She just seemed like the sweet older lady that could have been anyone's grandmother. It was just something about her that had me on edge. Little did I know that this lady would be my worst NIGHTMARE! I informed my staff to be careful at that point because something about this person was "off". It only took about 5 days for this lady to start showing her true colors. She called our office repeatedly during than day (over 20 calls) and asked "who we worshiped". Obviously this was a questions that had most of my staff scared to answer one way or the other. Finally my staff transferred one of these call to me and and explained to her that she needed to stop with the harassing phone calls. At that point she screamed a few obscenities at me an hung up. I was mortified. It seemed I was not the only person that she was yelling it either. We started to get calls by the masses from residents in her community saying that she was asking the same questions to them. In fact, she sprayed one tenant down with Windex and claimed that she was cleansing him in the name of the Lord. This ended with her going to jail overnight. I would like to say that things got better after the assault scare, but it didn't. Things got even more weird when she called and stated that she was having electrical issues. I asked her to explain the issues, and she said that aliens were living in the attic and controlling her power. She also said that these aliens were breaking into her apartment at night and opening all her water bottles and filling them with flavoring. My guess was that she bought flavored water, but either way it was clear that this tenant needed help. We tried to help her find that help over the next few weeks, but she refused. She also refused to pay rent and her utilities due to the fact that "aliens" were controlling her utilities. We even went so far as to send an electrician over to the unit with her home and show her that no one was controlling her power, cable, etc. Despite seeing this she still refused to pay rent! Obviously if you don't pay rent, you can't stay in our properties...so she was eventually evicted. She actually went to the court and tried to fight with the judge over the alien issue, and the judge simply said that aliens were not an excuse for not paying rent! Let this be a lesson for anyone out there....even if aliens have invaded your house, you still need to pay the bills! In hindsight, this tenant may have been better off trying to get the aliens to split the bills with her. Just another day in the life of a residential property manager!!!   
1 Comment
For awhile I have been toying with the idea of creating a book based on the funny situations I have experienced while managing properties. These are the types of things that take place and leave you asking the question...DID THAT JUST HAPPEN??? Instead of trying to create a book I have decided to share some of these stories on my blog. This first story is probably my favorite. It is the prime example for tenants who will do everything they can to stay in their property (besides pay their rent). Around 3 years ago, we placed a tenant in one of our properties. She has great credit, excellent references, solid job history, income, etc. The one issue that caused some concern was that she was in the mortgage industry which at that time was at the APEX of instability. Everything was going fine for a few months, and then BOOM...she couldn't pay her rent. Most tenants in this situation will offer to pay some of the rent if we can work with them. Not this tenant. She always promised to come in tomorrow with the entire amount. This went on for the entire 50 days it took to get her out of the property. 50 days is a key number here because usually it never takes that long. The last part of the legal process is to serve a "Writ of Restitution" which basically lets the tenants know that they are being evicted and possession is being given back to the owner of the property. When the constable went to the property to serve the Writ, he could not find the address anywhere. We kept explaining were the property was but he explained that the address was incorrect and that he could not serve them the notice. We immediately sent a representative from our office to the property and could not believe what we saw. The tenant, in an effort to avoid being evicted, had glued another hand made address plate over the existing one. We had to send all the data back to the court and it allowed the tenant to stay for an extra 7 days. It seemed we were not the only victim either. When I went to check the water box in the front yard she had filled it with rocks and inside was a note asking the water man to "Please don't turn off the water" and promised "I am on my way to pay right now". Needless to say she also left a huge outstanding water bill with the city. It just shows that you can screen people up and down, yet if they really want to deceive you they can. This person clearly knew what she was doing, and it is very sad because it caused nothing but trouble, stress, and major expenses to the owner.    When homeowners associations were originally developed it was mainly because they wanted to keep communities looking nice, maintain value in the surrounding properties, and enforce the CC & R's (Conditions, Covenants and Restrictions).
I for one enjoy living in an HOA, even though I still have my frustrations. For example, I wanted to have the exterior of my house re-painted to the same colors as my neighbor one street South of my home. To do this I have to submit a form, as well as the name of the contractor, paint colors, brand, etc. I submitted all of this over two weeks ago and still haven't heard anything. Despite the fact that I am the most impatient person I know, I have remained relatively calm. I contacted the office and after several attempts to get in touch with my community manager, an assistant of his returned my call and informed me that I will have to wait another three weeks for the next HOA meeting to approve my paint request. I wanted to scream! Being a property manager I understand that he doesn't make the rules, but it was still very frustrating. Sometimes, in my mind (and the minds of a lot of my clients) HOA's become more interested in going on a "witch hunt" then helping to provide support for the owners that are paying their salaries. They scavenge through their communities in hopes of writing someone up on the most petty violation. This should be a major concern for home owners, and I won't be surprised if you see a major uproar in the next few years against HOA's. The power seems to have gone to their head! Here's another example, in March we saw a ton of rain in the valley. Not just a day here and there, but it would rain 3-4 days consistently, take a short break and then rain 3-4 more days in a row. Combining this with the constant sun led to a major weed issue valley wide. Rather than drive the neighborhood and think that "wow, it has been raining for almost 10 days straight, so it must be hard to pick weeds right now" these HOA's used it as a way to once again "flex their muscle" and issue a huge amount of notices. During this period we received over 40 notices pertaining to weeds (we usually get about 5). The worst part is 5 of the properties had landscaping services on them. The problem is you can't landscape a wet yard! I actually called a few of the HOA's personally and tried to explain that it would be impossible to pull the weeds, or at least very inconvenient. All but one of the HOA's got very defensive and were quick to point out that they could send a violation notice after even just 1 small weed pops up. Again they were quick to exert their power and put me in my place. The sad thing is that this has been my experience with a lot of the HOA's that I deal with on a regular basis. I am worried that the only way these people will see the light is for communities to start removing them altogether. As much as they bug me s, I still believe that they are an important ingredient to the recipe for a great community. I just feel that they also need to have a better way of interpreting each issue that is both reasonable and fair for everyone. For now, I am just forced to humbly call them and beg for there mercy so that my clients can stay out of their crosshairs. It's a new day for West USA Property Management and The Pruitt Team. We are pleased to launch our new website.
The decision to do this was made for two reasons: 1) Create a more user friendly site for our clients. 2) Provide more information to our clients that they can actually use. What I am most excited about is the new search feature. You, as the consumer, can actually get up-to-date MLS listings. To my knowledge this has not been provided on any other major site. Most people are really upset to find that the home they found on Realtor.com or Zillow.com is no longer available. This is the big issue with websites that are not using up-to-date listings. The other feature that I am really excited about is that if you find a listing that you like, you can "share" it with friends through Facebook or Twitter. For those who are interested I am going to try blog about various Property Management and Real Estate issues that I come across. If you have something that you would like to ask please don't hesitate in doing so. Enjoy the new website! |
David Pruitt
Realtor, Property Manager, New Blogger Archives
August 2014
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed