I received a call this week from my son who has been actively seeking an apartment to rent the last couple of months. He was so excited! He was just notified by the property management company that they have completed their tenant screening and he was approved for the two units he was interested in and that he could view one of the units now! In their words it was
Move In Ready
My son felt a little pressure that he had to make a decision right now without viewing the other unit, but trying to find a rental and most importantly in the price range he could afford.... he better go.... Because they said it was:
Move In Ready
On his way out the door he called his dear ole momma (thats me!) for advice on what he should look for when he is doing his walk thru. During our conversation he did mention that the property management company informed him that the front door had a broken lock, but the owner was doing his own work so not to worry it would be fixed soon but to go ahead and go on in and check it out! (Do you see the problem already?)..... So after I gave him my professional property management lecture and then professional mother lecture we said our goodbyes and he headed out to view this apartment that was
Move In Ready
When he reported back to me, he didn’t find the apartment exactly the way he would have liked. In fact, he seemed a little bit confused. He said he started walking through the house and it was dirty and messy. Stuff was everywhere including a torn up old couch. He said it felt kind of eerie and wondered what the heck did the words “clean and ready” really mean to the this property management company? After having enough of an eyeful of disappointment he headed back to the car and ran into a neighbor. The neighbor thought that maybe my son was a friend of the guy who lives next door. My son told him he was here to view a vacant unit that there wasn’t suppose to be a guy next door! They finally put 2 and 2 together and came to the conclusion, the guy next door was a squatter! The apartment was not
Move In Ready
My son called the property management company to inform him of his findings and to please let him know when the unit was really......
Move In Ready
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This situation prompted me to share a couple of helpful tips to prevent squatters:
1) Check up on your property regularly (If the owner prefer to do his own work should not deter you from your responsibility to check on vacant units, who knows when the last time this owner was there!)
2) Communicate with neighbors- Let them know that the property is vacant
3) Take care of your property- In this circumstance I think it would have been to the owner and property managements company best interest to fix the broken lock first
4) Make sure you can say in confidence that your unit is
Move In Ready!!
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