My wife and I moved in to RW SELBY Granville Apartments and boy do I wish I had just wrote "RW SELBY" into google before we did :( ...http://www.yelp.com/biz/rw-selby-and-company-los-angeles There is just a taste of what other poor innocent previous apartment residents warned us about. Basically we were advertised a new rennovated unit but what we got was the most disasterous apartment you could ever imagine. At fist when you move in you are given 3 days to list any problems with the apartment so that you are not liable for the damage and it will be fixed within 'reasonable time" (as stated on the lease). Reasonable time as indicated by my real estate attorney is a day if the required fix is unnihabbittal or within a week if it's just a nuance fix. So our complaints were as stated:
- broken storage box with no lock handle (aka a dirty broken door that anyone can open and steal)
-paint chipped walls from original painters applying NO PRIMER
-immediate issues with plumbing (the bathroom water if put on hot would spew out red rusted water as well as the bath tubs in ability to drain the water and within 2 minutes of a shower you were basically taking a dirty bath.
our mailbox was not secure (meaning you could place your thumb over our lock and turn to open it; ANYONE could steal our mail).
-the toilet in the bathroom needed to be replaced (apparently an eldergly gentlement had lived in the property prior to us and everything else in the apartment was supposedly new except for this rancid smelling, scratchedup toilet, that left such a fowl odor we were embarrased to have people come over and always had to leave the window open in the bathroom to air out).
-The closet doors in our bedroom could not open or close because the track that it was gliding on was broken from day one which kept us form being able to ever close the doors and mount our tv over it so we could have a televesion in our room.
-the paint on the doors, door frame, and kitchen also peeled and needed to be replaced with quaiity paint and coat of primer.
-the calking in the bathroom was peeling by the end of the first week.
-The doorbell didn't work since during these "quality renovations" someone cut the cords to the doorbell so it wouldn't work ever again. (We also had a steel safety door in front of our main door so virtually no one could knock that we would hear so we had to leave the door open all day while waiting for these "so called" repairs."
-and lastly since their "quality" renovations were done so poorly of course the cebinet doors in the kitchen or hallways wouldn't fully shut.
My wifes mother is a general contractor and when she looked at the apartment even she stated that is was the cheapest renovation she had ever seen. They basically just painted an accent wall, threw in a new carpet, and then tried to apply paint over all the old appliances and then called it new.
*Did i mention after speaking with my neighbor I was paying $1000 more than anyone else.
Now here's where the problems came. The office manager for our building division GISELLA (since it's a small 8 unit building no staff is present unless called) said she would send people on numerous occasions requiring myself or my wife to wait for them to come to do the fixes. We have more than 5 documented episodes where they did a no show and didn't bother warning they wouldn't be coming or returning our calls to confirm they were going to be a no show for that day. And then to top off the most rediculous end of this they would send someone on a random day that we were both working and then claim that they had come to do the fix but no one was at home as if we were the irresponsible party who wasn't there for the repairs.
Now about 2 months into all of thise NONE OF WHICH WE REQUESTED HAD BEEN FIXED NOR HAD THE SLIGHTEST ATTEMPT ON THEIR BEHALF HAD BEEN MADE TO MAKE ANY OF THIS RIGHT. Except of course for this one time the 2nd week into living there we came home to find our kitchen sink had backed up and was leaking all over the kitchen and then flowing into the living room carpet with all the backed up sewage from the kitchen and bathroom pipes.
We tried exercising our rights to not pay the rent until they made our necessary fixes but as they claimed none of our issues were technically uninhabbitable and one of the maintenance guys told me since there were so many UCLA students moving in on their other properties they were most likely going to ignore our fixes until everyone had setteled in which wouldn't be for another 3-4 months. Keep in mind were paying for the storage box that were not getting, as well as the full rent for the apartment that I can't fully utilize because they won't do the neccessary fixes to bring the apartment up to shape as advertised. Boy do we we feel stupid and taken advantage of now. We got letters and calls from the management property nagging us that they were going to move forward with an eviction process if we didn't pay the rent, I clearly explained to them that we had the rent and were not paying until we were receiving all the ammenties that we were originally advertised and were paying for unless they wanted to reduce our rent temporarily until the fixes were made. NO SUCH COMPORMISE WAS MADE ON THEIR BEHALF. So we paid and I made a call to the corporate office to whom I was greated by the most dishonest women I've ever spoken to, her name was Yella, she claimed to be the property division operation manager and insisted that none of the fixes were urgent and that our complaint with her was as far as it could go. We later on found out that she was merely the customer service relationship manager and was indeed supposed to further send our complaint to her higher ups so that the problem could be properly addressed.
At this point we had had enough and not to mention we discovered an infestation of drain flies that were coming out of our drain and were feeding off of our garbage disposal and becoming literally 4 times the regular size of a typical fly. Also we discovered coacroaches from our bedroom closest that were infesting my wife's shoes above our clothes in the closet with the broken door. So of course we sought out a new location to live since they apparently had no interest whatsoever in making us happy tenants from day 1.
By the end of the 2nd month we exercised our right for early termination by advertising the apartment to several appllicants to take over the remaining lease of 9 months since we were leaving at the beginning of the 4th month. Of course RW Selby upsold the tenant for a new year lease and then received a brand new deposit from them as well. During that time maintentaince people came 2 weeks prior to our move and fixed literally every issue and complaint that we had since day 1 to make us look like that crazy tenants. LUCKILY WE HAVE EVERYTHING DOCUMENTED: PICTURES, LETTERS, AS WELL AS RECORDED DATES FOR TIME OFF WORK TO WAIT FOR THESE FIXES. Now that we're fully moved out and we left 5 days early we were technically owed 6 days of pro rated rent plus our security deposit and since the new tenant was to take our apartment AS IS like stated on the early termination contract we were to recieve our full deposit and any money owed to us upon moving. Of course as you can tell this is not how our sad story is going to end. The property manager Gisella complained that there was crumps in the cooking rack and stated that the walls were chipped and our fault (keep in mind we had stated this was their fault from day 1) and took out over $1,250.00 from our security deposit which we still haven't cashed because were currently in the process of filing a small claims suit while recruiting other unsatisfied tenants to join in with us on a class action law suit for renting out a drain fly, cockroach infested, and poorly renivated apartments to seek penal damages as well as opportunity cost for time spent off work.
We're nearing the holidays and of course money is tight sense we had to come out of pocket and pay an unnecessary new security deposit (since we didn't get last the one back) moving truck, relocation fees, etc. I can't wait until this hits court and if anyone has anyone questions or would like to join us in our class actions that has viable documented evidence, please e-mail message me here and I will give you further information as to how to file with us on the class action. Looking into RW Selby's past this company is infamous for not returning security deposits, iterating fee's that make no sense, and being sued in both small claims and superior court in what looks like over $100,000 in punitive damages to which my wife and I and any other party who's been treated the same by them to come forward and stick it to these guys like they deserve in the court of law.
R W Selby & Co Inc Reviews
My wife and I moved in to RW SELBY Granville Apartments and boy do I wish I had just wrote "RW SELBY" into google before we did :( ...http://www.yelp.com/biz/rw-selby-and-company-los-angeles There is just a taste of what other poor innocent previous apartment residents warned us about. Basically we were advertised a new rennovated unit but what we got was the most disasterous apartment you could ever imagine. At fist when you move in you are given 3 days to list any problems with the apartment so that you are not liable for the damage and it will be fixed within 'reasonable time" (as stated on the lease). Reasonable time as indicated by my real estate attorney is a day if the required fix is unnihabbittal or within a week if it's just a nuance fix. So our complaints were as stated:
- broken storage box with no lock handle (aka a dirty broken door that anyone can open and steal)
-paint chipped walls from original painters applying NO PRIMER
-immediate issues with plumbing (the bathroom water if put on hot would spew out red rusted water as well as the bath tubs in ability to drain the water and within 2 minutes of a shower you were basically taking a dirty bath.
our mailbox was not secure (meaning you could place your thumb over our lock and turn to open it; ANYONE could steal our mail).
-the toilet in the bathroom needed to be replaced (apparently an eldergly gentlement had lived in the property prior to us and everything else in the apartment was supposedly new except for this rancid smelling, scratchedup toilet, that left such a fowl odor we were embarrased to have people come over and always had to leave the window open in the bathroom to air out).
-The closet doors in our bedroom could not open or close because the track that it was gliding on was broken from day one which kept us form being able to ever close the doors and mount our tv over it so we could have a televesion in our room.
-the paint on the doors, door frame, and kitchen also peeled and needed to be replaced with quaiity paint and coat of primer.
-the calking in the bathroom was peeling by the end of the first week.
-The doorbell didn't work since during these "quality renovations" someone cut the cords to the doorbell so it wouldn't work ever again. (We also had a steel safety door in front of our main door so virtually no one could knock that we would hear so we had to leave the door open all day while waiting for these "so called" repairs."
-and lastly since their "quality" renovations were done so poorly of course the cebinet doors in the kitchen or hallways wouldn't fully shut.
My wifes mother is a general contractor and when she looked at the apartment even she stated that is was the cheapest renovation she had ever seen. They basically just painted an accent wall, threw in a new carpet, and then tried to apply paint over all the old appliances and then called it new.
*Did i mention after speaking with my neighbor I was paying $1000 more than anyone else.
Now here's where the problems came. The office manager for our building division GISELLA (since it's a small 8 unit building no staff is present unless called) said she would send people on numerous occasions requiring myself or my wife to wait for them to come to do the fixes. We have more than 5 documented episodes where they did a no show and didn't bother warning they wouldn't be coming or returning our calls to confirm they were going to be a no show for that day. And then to top off the most rediculous end of this they would send someone on a random day that we were both working and then claim that they had come to do the fix but no one was at home as if we were the irresponsible party who wasn't there for the repairs.
Now about 2 months into all of thise NONE OF WHICH WE REQUESTED HAD BEEN FIXED NOR HAD THE SLIGHTEST ATTEMPT ON THEIR BEHALF HAD BEEN MADE TO MAKE ANY OF THIS RIGHT. Except of course for this one time the 2nd week into living there we came home to find our kitchen sink had backed up and was leaking all over the kitchen and then flowing into the living room carpet with all the backed up sewage from the kitchen and bathroom pipes.
We tried exercising our rights to not pay the rent until they made our necessary fixes but as they claimed none of our issues were technically uninhabbitable and one of the maintenance guys told me since there were so many UCLA students moving in on their other properties they were most likely going to ignore our fixes until everyone had setteled in which wouldn't be for another 3-4 months. Keep in mind were paying for the storage box that were not getting, as well as the full rent for the apartment that I can't fully utilize because they won't do the neccessary fixes to bring the apartment up to shape as advertised. Boy do we we feel stupid and taken advantage of now. We got letters and calls from the management property nagging us that they were going to move forward with an eviction process if we didn't pay the rent, I clearly explained to them that we had the rent and were not paying until we were receiving all the ammenties that we were originally advertised and were paying for unless they wanted to reduce our rent temporarily until the fixes were made. NO SUCH COMPORMISE WAS MADE ON THEIR BEHALF. So we paid and I made a call to the corporate office to whom I was greated by the most dishonest women I've ever spoken to, her name was Yella, she claimed to be the property division operation manager and insisted that none of the fixes were urgent and that our complaint with her was as far as it could go. We later on found out that she was merely the customer service relationship manager and was indeed supposed to further send our complaint to her higher ups so that the problem could be properly addressed.
At this point we had had enough and not to mention we discovered an infestation of drain flies that were coming out of our drain and were feeding off of our garbage disposal and becoming literally 4 times the regular size of a typical fly. Also we discovered coacroaches from our bedroom closest that were infesting my wife's shoes above our clothes in the closet with the broken door. So of course we sought out a new location to live since they apparently had no interest whatsoever in making us happy tenants from day 1.
By the end of the 2nd month we exercised our right for early termination by advertising the apartment to several appllicants to take over the remaining lease of 9 months since we were leaving at the beginning of the 4th month. Of course RW Selby upsold the tenant for a new year lease and then received a brand new deposit from them as well. During that time maintentaince people came 2 weeks prior to our move and fixed literally every issue and complaint that we had since day 1 to make us look like that crazy tenants. LUCKILY WE HAVE EVERYTHING DOCUMENTED: PICTURES, LETTERS, AS WELL AS RECORDED DATES FOR TIME OFF WORK TO WAIT FOR THESE FIXES. Now that we're fully moved out and we left 5 days early we were technically owed 6 days of pro rated rent plus our security deposit and since the new tenant was to take our apartment AS IS like stated on the early termination contract we were to recieve our full deposit and any money owed to us upon moving. Of course as you can tell this is not how our sad story is going to end. The property manager Gisella complained that there was crumps in the cooking rack and stated that the walls were chipped and our fault (keep in mind we had stated this was their fault from day 1) and took out over $1,250.00 from our security deposit which we still haven't cashed because were currently in the process of filing a small claims suit while recruiting other unsatisfied tenants to join in with us on a class action law suit for renting out a drain fly, cockroach infested, and poorly renivated apartments to seek penal damages as well as opportunity cost for time spent off work.
We're nearing the holidays and of course money is tight sense we had to come out of pocket and pay an unnecessary new security deposit (since we didn't get last the one back) moving truck, relocation fees, etc. I can't wait until this hits court and if anyone has anyone questions or would like to join us in our class actions that has viable documented evidence, please e-mail message me here and I will give you further information as to how to file with us on the class action. Looking into RW Selby's past this company is infamous for not returning security deposits, iterating fee's that make no sense, and being sued in both small claims and superior court in what looks like over $100,000 in punitive damages to which my wife and I and any other party who's been treated the same by them to come forward and stick it to these guys like they deserve in the court of law.