VACATION PROPERTIES REALTY

This is the worst experience I have had with any contractor or business. I purchased a condominium November 2013. The previous owners used vacation properties to manage the building including financials and maintenance. I became the condo association president and inherited a terrible management company. My experience with them was from Nov 2013 to October 2014 They did very little to maintain the building. This may have been in part due to the previous condo board, but we formed a new board and wanted help fixing problems in the building. When asked to help us fix problems, the managers Barry Swanson and Rachael Cunningham had very little knowledge of how to even find someone who could help us. Barry seemed like a nice guy always apologizing, but even after a year, he did not know anything about the building or our account. How many times will an apology overcome total incompetence? There was no accountability for anything. Rachael's attitude was extremely unprofessional--if you complain, too bad. Find someone else. When asked a question Rachael sent me an e-mail stating if you are going to complain, manage the building yourself. --- which we did. And to our surprise,the owners do a much better job of administration than they did. Instead of spending money just to bill ourselves for maintenance fees, our money can go into much needed maintenance. They would send contractors to give estimates, but the contractor would come and say they were not qualified to do the work. Vacation properties would then charge $37.50 for the visit. Vacation properties would then nickle and dime us to death. Even when they found a subcontractor, there was no follow up and the subcontractors never showed. Work was left undone. Vacation properties took no responsibility. There were plenty they charged us for. For example, I had a leak in my unit. I called a plumber, who billed me. Vacation properties also billed the association for the same work and up charged it 15% "for handling". Our unit is winterized and closed down during the winter months. The electricity was supposed to be turned off. That winter I had huge electric bills, because the maintenance man did not know how to turn off the thermostat in my apartment. In March, when he finally figured it out, they had the nerve to charge me for the visit. As far as managing our financials, there was a lot of little charges for things like postage--seemed excessive and every time someone came out for anything there was a $37 charge--even if no work was done. Vacation Properties is rumored to be reorganizing with a new name--and focusing on only large condos with 30 to 40 units. I guess it is easier to hide incompetence and overcharges if the condos are large. Even now, that we stopped doing business they are sending us a bill for $50--for "transferring" our information. All they did was put everything in a box and leave it out for pick up. When I complained, they said they would remove the charge--only to then harass our current maintenance provider for the money.