ComplaintsforMidwest Property Management

• Initial Complaint

  05/12/2022

  Complaint Type:

  Service or Repair Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  This company represents the buyer of our home that we sold in the summer or 2021. After we sold the home to them we agreed to lease it back for 6 months and a security deposit of $1700 was given to them just to make sure we kept taking care of the home. Once our lease was up we received $80 back from that entire $1700. $500 of the charge was for a dead tree in the back yard that was dead prior to the home sale and the buyer knew it. After arguing and seeking legal action the property group agreed to refund $500 for the tree. Over $600 was kept for repainting walls that were previously touched up but the paint did not match exactly. This was put on the move in checklist. We are also charged for full cleaning and carpet cleaning. When we sold the home they never cleaned anything or did anything to prepare the property for our lease. However they want to use our deposit to fix things that were as is when we sold the home to them. This owner and property management group are taking advantage of people.

  Business response

  05/18/2022

  Notice was sent by text to the departing tenant indicating the day and time of the scheduled move out inspection, that he had the option to be present, and we would change the time and/or date if he wished to be there. The tenant declined to be present at the checkout. I met the owner at the property on April 1, the day after the lease ended. We did our normal checkout, documenting what we felt was above normal wear and tear and what needed to be cleaned, both in writing and with photos.
  
  
  In the backyard was a tree that, from our observation, was completely dead, and we both felt it appeared that it had been damaged, as one of the branches had all of the bark missing and looked chewed up. The blocks surrounding that tree were displaced, rather than in a neat circle around the tree similar to the other tree in the backyard. It was our thought that the tree, and that branch in particular, had been damaged by a dog. We took photos and later compared them to a photo taken by the owner’s Realtor the day that the house went under contract to sell. The earlier photo showed all of the leaves on that tree were green, and it appeared to be alive in the photo. The blocks surrounding the tree were all in place in a neat circle at that time. I did not physically see the tree when the house went under contract or the sale closed. I was only able to view it in the photo provided by the Realtor. The owner, however, was present with the realtor for the final walkthrough before closing, and confirms that the tree was not dead or damaged at that time.
  
  
  Inside the house, we noticed that the tenant had painted large patches, in numerous areas on walls in several rooms, with different shades of paint that did not match the wall color. Some areas were at least 2 feet by 2 feet in size, in multiple rooms, on multiple walls. We understand that the tenant filled out a move in sheet we provided when the lease started, and stated that there were some scuffs here and there, due to the amount of time that they had lived there, which we felt was understandable, but because he touched up and painted large patches with a different shade of paint, the owner was left with no other option than to have those specific walls repainted to match the other walls in the room. The lease that these tenants signed clearly states that tenants are required to get written authorization to do any painting. This tenant did not ask. Instead, he filled the nail holes (where earlier photos taken by the realtor before the sale show items to have been attached to or hung on the walls), then “touched up” multiple walls with large patches of a different color. We know he must have done this, because there would have been holes in the areas where things were hanging in the earlier photos, and there were no holes where we found the large patches of paint.
  
  
  The tenant was only charged for the repainting of the walls where he had painted the patches with a different shade of paint. In the complaint, the tenant indicated that touch up was done prior to listing the house for sale and the paint “did not match exactly.” However, our photos show that the paint he used before move-out was very different from the original color of the walls. I just looked over the entire move in checklist again, and it seems very clear to me that the way the tenant left the walls at move out does not match what the tenant documented on the move in checklist.
  
  
  The realtor for the new owner has also indicated that she can vouch for the fact that the walls did not look, in the photos taken during the move-out inspection, like they did in her photos when it went under contract. Before and after photos and documentation will be provided.
  
  
  The tenant stated that some touch up had been done prior to listing it for sale. He specifically mentioned an area at the end of a long wall in the edge of the living room next to the dining room, and I did notice that touched up area at the move out inspection. However, that section of that wall did not need to be repainted again after move-out, nor was the tenant charged for painting that section of wall.
  
  
  The tenant indicated in his complaint that he was charged for steam cleaning the carpets. The lease that he signed stipulated that he was supposed to have had that done before vacating the house, but he did not fulfill that agreement. Also, based on my experience, this house was left in very dirty condition, and a new tenant would have required that the unit be thoroughly cleaned prior to moving in. Again, we can provide written documentation and photos.
  
  
  The tenant also complained that when they sold the home, we never cleaned anything or did anything to prepare the property for their lease. That is because they were already living in the property, and did not request that any cleaning be done at the end of their ownership/beginning of their lease. Since they were already living there, and did not request anything, we assumed they were comfortable with their own level of cleanliness. However, the owner can vouch for the fact that it was much cleaner during her final walkthrough before closing than it was when they vacated.
  
  
  Their lease required that the carpet be professionally steam cleaned by the tenants upon vacating, but because it had not been done before they vacated, the owner requested that it be charged back to them. Had the owner received the house in this condition when she closed on the house, she would have requested a cleaning credit, because it was so much dirtier than when she put it under contract. Plus, their lease required them to leave it clean upon move-out, and they did not do so. The owner therefore hired a cleaning person to make it ready for the new tenants, and only charged the vacating tenants what she had to pay to have it cleaned. The owner also did some of the cleaning herself, and the tenants were not charged for her work.
  
  
  When it was brought up by the tenant that the tree was not healthy last summer when the house went under contract, the owner and I zoomed in on the photo from last year in order to examine it more closely. We did notice a few branches that appeared to be less than perfectly healthy. We decided that because the health of a tree is fairly subjective, we would refund the expense for the replacement of the tree, and that has already been mailed as a second check to the tenant.
  

*Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business. ↩