This letter is intended to document the facts occurred when I contracted a rental agreement with Bennett Property Management and their agent Kim Tracy beginning in May to end in May for a monthly rent of $865.
I took possession of the premises located at 3840 N 43rd Ave Apt. 60 on the first of the month of May of the initial walk through showed that everything was functional and in good shape but, there were missing blinds throughout the property, besides that, the rear sliding door did not open; I had t literally carry a 4x8 glass door to get it to open if I had to leave the premises on an emergency, the place had an infestation of cockroaches throughout the whole apartment and there was a hole in the roof in the bathroom upstairs. After four months of leaving messages to the agent Kim Tracy and the management company, an exterminator was sent to the home, he sprayed chemicals and left some traps and I never heard from him again, it obviously did not take care of the problem. I tried to use as many pesticides as possible unsuccessfully, the health hazard for my three kids and pet made me hesitate to go further with the chemicals and the idea of leaving the premises started to circle my mind. The issue with the door was apparently going to be taken care of after the 7th month of requesting it when some door company contacted me to make an appointment to which they never showed up because there was rain on the forecast I was never contacted again. After the first rain, the hole in the bathroom let enough water in to damage to ceiling and the walls in the bathroom. It was fixed after two months this was requested.
By mid January in the middle of the winter there were several hot water outages for periods of up to two weeks at the time, after several messages left to the management company and their agent their response was that it was not their problem and that it was the home owners associations fault. I have always been on time with the rent and I have also kept the premises in good shape and the very least that I would have expected is a prompt response to my requests (that were never outside the ordinary) but all I got was careless calls and messages from the management agent. The only thing that I actually received from the agent on a timely manner, before the last month of the lease began was a letter asking me to renew the lease for another year and that the rent will go up to around $950 per month. I immediately called her and told her that I was already looking for another place for rent and that I will let the lease fall on a month to month basis until I would find another place and move out, which was agreed on by the agent. On the last month of the lease, the situation of the cockroach infestation and the hot water outages got unsustainable and I decided to leave the apartment, after notifying the management agent and even the actual owner of the property, Silvana Berrios, I proceeded to move out. The week in which I was moving out I tried to get in touch with the rental agent to do a walk through and return the keys and the remote controls of the entrance gate, but she did not answered and it was not until two weeks after I had moved out when she called back to schedule a walk through at the property, at that time I brought to her attention that the doors in two bedrooms have broken and that I will replace them, the cost of each door was estimated at $22 dls each at Home Depot but besides that the apartment was in the same shape I found it aside from the regular wear and tear.
I was unable to set an appointment with the property manager on her terms due to my busy schedule, I have a full time job, I also attend school and have a family to look after. The property manager asked me to leave a key hidden so she could do the walk through on her own. After a few weeks from the date she did the walk through on the property I received a letter stating that the repairs and maintenance fees in the apartment will go up to approximately $1200 dls. And that the security deposit of $1275 I have been required to pay when I moved in will all be used towards those repairs. Even though I had the carpet professionally cleaned when I moved out, one of the fees she charged me was to have the carpet washed, Attached to this letter is a copy of the maintenance list she sent to me. The property manager is trying to have me pay even to paint the walls and it seems like I am being also required to pay for the wear an tear that the apartment had in one whole year of use.
The ordeal I was put through had caused distress to me and my family for a whole year, I have been subject to injustice, treated unfairly and also discriminated against, something commonly seen among the Hispanic community. After I received the letter of the itemized repair list I attempted to contact the property manager and the actual owner of the property with the intention to recover my security deposit money and to arrange a time and date for me to go back and fix the doors that my kids had broken but all I got was a call back from Kim Tracy, the property manager stating that the list of repair list that I had was just the beginning and that more could be yet to come, to stop calling her and that I was free to proceed as I pleased regarding this matter.
The psychological and now economical distress this is causing is now affecting my life in the professional, personal and financial aspects. This is a request for a full refund of my deposit and also an investigation to the management company as well as the agent and their practices to prevent future abuse from happening to other people.
If there is something broken of non-functional in the apartment that could be, in any way, attributed to negligence on my part I will be happy to either fix it or pay for it but I will not agree to have the place remodeled at my expense, everything in that property is just the way it was when I moved in and my security deposit should be fully refunded. I believe I have been a responsible tenant from day one, I believe I have endured a series of abuses and that I deserve to be treated with respect, I believe I have fulfilled my part of the agreement and that no company should take advantage of hard working people specially at times like these.
I am copying this letter to every person and entity I believe can help me, and I will take on a quest to continue on asking for help until I find it, all I am asking is for Bennett Property Management and the property manager to treat me fairly just as I have treated them.
I can be contacted for further questions and clarifications at
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