It all started when our stove quit working in the middle of cooking dinner one night. It was beyond repair. We were in the dilemma of trying to cough up $300-$400 for a new stove. Then the thought came to mind - Why not try the new "rent to own" business in town, NORTH COUNTRY RENT TO OWN. Yes, we knew that in the end we'd be paying the price of about 3 new stoves before the rental agreement was through. But still, we didn't have all the money up front to go buy a brand new stove elsewhere.
To start with, upon signing the contract, we made it clear that we wanted to make bi-weekly payments. Needless to say that 75% of the time, their payment collectors were showing up EVERY SINGLE WEEK harassing the ever living hell out of us! Not only did out contract state BI-WEEKLY payments, but we also notified store managers and payment collectors that it was supposed to be BI-WEEKLY. More than once, we'd notify a manager of the issue, the manager would tell us the problem was taken care of, then the next day they'd be at our door wanting money. Our payment was current, and not due until the following week!
Then we get a nasty letter with a threat to have us arrested if we didn't return the stove. Our last payment was on July 8th. Going on a bi-weekly schedule, when does that make us due for payment again?
HELLO, We've already paid for the stove about 2 times over as it is! Why not dry f*k us a little more? A good portion of the people that do business with "rent to own" companies are low income and can't afford a lump sum payment to purchase a large item. So they're forced to make weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly payments on something that has a retail value of 1/4 of what they end up paying. Might I also mention that a lot of the stuff is USED to begin with, still the customer pays an outrageous fortune!
I'll call this an expensive lesson learned. One that cost us nearly $900 for a stove with retail value of $350. I'll NEVER deal with these people again.
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