Greedy scammers

We knew there would be a lot of cleaning to do when we moved out of our old apartment. Ted lived there for eight years, so almost nothing had been replaced or tended to in that time. We both cleaned the place for several hours during our final day there, and Ted continued cleaning until 3 am that morning. We had received our list of what we needed to clean and we made sure to do all of those things.

Unfortunately, we made the mistake of trusting our apartment managers. We have dealt with them a lot in the past few years and always thought they were great people. When Ted talked with them on the phone, they told him not to worry about cleaning the blinds because they would all be replaced. They also said the walls would be primed and painted, so we got the major scuffs off, but not every little mark. Finally, they told us we only needed to vacuum the carpet, as it would all be replaced. We trusted them when they told us all of these things.

When Ted got his damage deposit check in the mail, he received a whopping $8.64 out of $500! They charged us for every little thing, including the unclean blinds, the marks on the walls (they supposedly spent 12 hours cleaning the walls alone), and the carpet. Ted immediately called the apartment owners and complained about the charges from the managers. The owners completely backed up the managers, but Ted got them to back down a bit when he threatened to take them to small claims court. We did have in writing that we did not need to do a thing to the carpet, so we knew we had a great case for court.

While we could not prove the cases for the blinds and walls, we did at least get them to refund the money for the carpet. We also discovered that the managers keep whatever money is not refunded to the tenants. Conflict of interest? Hmmmm.... Scammers. I will never again trust people in this position. The owners also said that they are no longer willing to give us a positive recommendation. It's hard to believe that people are so deceptive and greedy.