My Horrible Experience with RentKCNow (sales, apartments, rental)

[bomberman760]

As a beacon of warning to others, I am writing this as 18 months of nonstop aggravation for owner and tenant alike come to a close. In DEC 2011 I signed an 18 month lease with RentKC Now because the owner was having problems selling, and in the interest of future sales wanted our lease to end in Spring.

To begin with, it was clear that the property manager knew very little about the house, even going so far as to tell us there was no AC even as we were standing next to the compressor outside. There were some stipulations that came with us signing and they were put in the contract, but no one told the owner, so the items to remain after the lease was signed were taken. Their response: "Oh well, sorry." Should have walked away then, but I started work two days later and had no time left.

We made an initial list of all items needing immediate repair, which was promptly ignored for almost three weeks. The manager apologized and said that the agent handling that house had been fired. Imagine my surprise when, two months later, the same person was answering my messages.

The contractors used for all but one repair ended up costing the owner much more in re-visits. One contractor has been a three-time no-show, and they still use him, expecting someone to take-off another half day of work to wait. Got to the point where the owner asked that I simply contact him for maintenance so we can handle it ourselves. Since excluding the very people he pays to manage the property, it has been much smoother.

The claim of 24-hour emergency service is no true. The manager will answer texts 24/7, but if the emergency is between 6 PM and whenever the service opens, too bad. She argued that there is not one serviceman in KC who will respond at midnight (when our house was 42 degrees and dropping this winter), but I had no problem finding a handful immediately. She said alright, but she cant use them because they charge an extra fee after hours. NO KIDDING!?

The sheer incompetence of the entire office is such that they all use the same e-mail address, but do not talk to each other. So if you reply to someone's e-mail, you will have to argue back and forth with the manager because she can't be bothered to read entire e-mails, or talk to someone next to her.

In closing, I'll add that I have been renting homes and apartments for over 15 years (mostly active duty Army) and have never encountered a management group so incompetent, and with such contempt for their tenants, and such apathy for contractors who give them a bad reputation. I'd be absolutely surprised, but I'm sure someone out there may have had a better experience. Happy for you, but it has been nothing short of maddening for my wife and me.

The silver lining is that as a landlord myself, I am much more cognizant of what potential pitfalls may be encountered by my own tenants in the future. Happy rental hunting!