AVALON MANAGEMENT

During our quarterly walk throughs the inspector reguarly commented that our house was the cleanest that he has inspected. Our rent payments were always on time and paid in full, yet we were treated with hostility. Since we have been doing business with Avalon Management Company we have had numerous problems. The first incident occurred shortly after my wife and I moved in. We received a letter from Avalon Management company stating that we were required to mulch the front yard or we would be fined. Not wanting to cause problems we spent a couple of hundred dollars adding mulch to the yard. We later found out that mulch is considered landscaping and not part of normal lawn maintenance and comes under normal wear and tear such as painting the house. We didn't mind much as we take pride in the way my house looks. Little did we know that that was just the beginning. On another occasion my wife?s grandfather passed away and we had to fly to Spain on extremely short notice. I tried to write a check a week before rent was due and politely asked if she could hold on to it and cash it with the rest of the rent checks at the beginning of the month. Angela Gerard, the manager, refused and began to lecture me that it was ?illegal to postdate a check?. I tried to explain to her that there was no such law, only that banks may or may not honor the date on the check. Angela was not pleased with this response and began to raise her voice. When I calmly told her that there was no need to yell and that she was acting in an unprofessional manor, she began to get so enraged that she literally started to break out in hives. I was mortified and embarrassed for the next 30 minutes as Angela berated me in their lobby, saying that we were trying to be difficult, ungrateful and rude to them. Repeating this mantra and refusing to cite examples or specific problems, instead talking in generalities. This surprised me, as until that point in time we had very little contact with them. Yet another incident occurred when my water bill had jumped significantly from one month to the next. I called Avalon management to inform them that I believed that there might be an issue with the pluming. They told me that they had taken it upon themselves to change all the watering zones from 15 min per zone 1 X a day to 30 minutes per zone 2 X a day, and this was during June, July the rainiest months of the year. I was shocked that they would do this without informing me. The next incident was when Avalon Management wanted to show my house to potential renters. I requested that I be present anytime strangers were let into my house. They told me that they would show the house at 9:00 am during a weekday morning. I had asked if they could do it during noon or after 5pm when I would be available. Angela told me that she does not work during her lunch or after 5:00pm. She refused to reschedule and entered my house against my specific request not to do so. This shocked me that the Management company could enter a house that by all rights was legally mine against my explicit instructions not to do so. After taking the lease to my lawyer she informed me that they were able to do so as it was provided for in the lease, but she had never heard in the 20 years of dealing with landlord/tenant cases of a landlord entering a premise against the explicit wishes of the tenant for the purposes of showing the property. Now that we have purchased our new home and have moved out we are still fighting with Avalon Management Company over our deposit. Even after we had the house professionally cleaned! Luckily we had anticipated this and took our own video of the house and had a witness do an independent inspection before we turned the keys over. We will be taking Avalon Management Company to court to recoup our deposit, and filling a complaint with the Better Business Burro. In summery. Avalon management employees are extremely rude, unprofessional and resort to unethical practices to try to retain as much of your deposit as possible. Please avoid headaches such as these and stay away from Avalon Management Company.