Warning! This will be a long post regarding renting from Mike Maynard and We Rent Marion!
January 2017
At the beginning of the yearI fell in love with the description of the house we are currently in. I asked lots of sighted people to check out the pictures and make sure that visually nothing was like horribly wrong and got the go ahead to let We Rent Marion know I was interested in the property. An appointment was made to come do a walk through of the house.
While doing a walk through with individuals from We Rent Marion and a sighted person that drove me to Marion a few issues were pointed out that needed to be fixed. For example, missing doors in rooms, nails poking out the the walls, needed fresh paint, broken windows and so on. At that time I was assured that those things would be fixed.
Move in day came which was about 2 weeks later and guess what, those things were not fixed and we discovered even more issues that because it was freezing cold during the walk through they were overlooked. However, they were immediately brought to the landlords attention. For example, a heavy window that when you open it, it falls out, there are little and big holes in the floor that are not safe for not only a blind couple, but definitely not for a little baby, there are vent covers that are hanging off the wall, there’s water damage to the floor in the bathroom that’s weakening the floor, meaning when you step on it, it sinks in and electrical outlets that needed to be checked.
Now in case you are wondering how did these things get missed during the walk through it was because they didn’t have the hit on during the walk through so the house was freezing cold, some of the holes are in areas that you don’t immediately notice, but with having a child that’s crawling around and having to assure their safety, you quickly find them.
Now, at this time around Febuary 2017 they had a maintenance guy also named Mike who was suppose to look into the issues. Well, guess what? For the hole month of Febuary he ignored our calls. We knew he was still around because his children went to the same day care as our son.
March 2017
Nothing has been done about any of the things that needed to be fixed in the house yet. Continued to try and reach Mike the maintenance guy and finally learned he no longer works for We Rent Marion. How nice of them to let their tenants know, right? So, give the landlord a call and find out what’s going on and when would the issues be looked at.
Hey, guess what? That phone call was never returned. We didn’t hear anything for all of March.
April 2017
Finally, we hear from We Rent Marion and they take down the list of things that need to be fixed and claims that someone will be in touch to see what can be done.
The person named Greg does come out, but he only fixes 2 things, the carpet on the stairs and a board in the upstairs livingroom that was coming apart and making the hole in the floor bigger.
Seriously, with that hole big list they only fix 2 things!
Greg tells us that We Rent Marion should be in touch in maybe a week about the rest of the items. So we wait! And we wait! Hey, and we wait some more!
May 2017
I give We Rent Marion a call and leave yet another messages about things in the house that need to be fixed and what is going on. I of course get no answer.
June 2017
I’ve finally had enough and send an email to We Rent Marion and this time I make sure that Mike Maynard gets a copy of my complaints. I list every single thing that needs to be fixed in the house and voice our concerns about the house being nsafe for a newly starting to walk baby that could seriously get hurt. I let them know that now if we don’t hear anything and things don’t start getting fixed that we would be within our rights to find another place to live since they are not taking care of the property as they should and are suppose to. I wrote that email at the end of May and didn’t hear anything for maybe 2 weeks.
Jane, Mike’s assistant calls and says Mike wants to meet with us ASAP so we set a time. But hey, guess what? You probably guessed it, he never showed up and didn’t even bother calling.
Another week goes by and I hear from Jane at We Rent Marion again claiming that someone would be by on a Monday to look at the house. So a time is set and we reschedule our plans to mae ourselves available. But…you guessed it, they don’t show up at the appointed time. But, they do show up hours after the fact, no appology, no nothing. Just, things ran behind. Seriously!
The person that came out was Mike Maynard the actual owner of all the We Rent Marion properties. He noted every single issue that needed to e looked at on his phone and even commented that some things should have been done before the house was rented again.
Like seriously, in my opinion maybe you should check on your properties more often instead of just believing what people tell you and then ignoring when your tenant files complaints.
One of the biggest things we pointed out to Mike Maynard while he was here was that one of the electrical outlets in the kitchen blew out and wasn’t working for a week or so. He goes over to the one that wasn’t working, notices the light is green on the breaker which I assume means it’s all good, plugs in the can opener and of course it works. His comment then was, “well, it works now so all is good there” and doesn’t note that in his file of things to look at.
So the end of June maintenance people come by and we schedule them to come by on a Friday morning to get started.
Ready for the routine?
Friday which is the last Friday of the month and there’s no maintenance worker here. We again get no phone call, no nothing
July 2017
Someone else decides to step in and try and give us assistance in reaching these people and getting through to them that they need to step up and fix their property. They were told that if nothing was done then they would be reported to the health department. Surprise surprise, we get a call from the maintenance guys who claimed it was a miscomunication and that they lost our phone number.
i’m sorry, but if you couldn’t find the number, then why didn’t you call your boss and get it from them? That was a horrible excuse for not doing your job.
So, it is scheduled yet again for them to come on Monday and we change our schedule yet again to accommidate. We should not have to keep doing this!
Oh look, they actually did show up then and stayed the hole day. They did fix a few things, like the nails in the porch, finally putting the doors in 2 of the rooms, putting screens in the windows. Well, some of the windows and cleared up the vegetation that seemed to be taking over the front and back porch. When they were done at the end of the day they told us they would be back the next day, which would have been on a Tuesday, July 11th. Things were finally looking pormising!
Ugh, got our hopes up too high. It’s now Wednesday July 19th and the maintenanc people are no where in sight. We have not received any phone calls attempting to reschedule or apologize for not showing up, nothing.
Remeber that electrical outlet in the kitchen that I said Mike Maynard ignored because it started working again. Well, today is Wednesday July 19, 2017 and we just had the fire department out here because that same outlet heated up and made the prongs of the appliances too hot to touch. The outlet stayed hot for almost a hour after we unplugged everything and turned off the breaker. The fire department told us not to use that outlet again and try and get our landlord out here. Once we told them who our landlord was, their response was not very encouraging.
Hearing, “your landlord isn’t Mike Maynard, is it” is not something you really want to hear from a fire department. It does not make you feel safe about whom you’re renting from. So then we were told to get the health department involved and try and get an inspector out here to check things out.
As a blind couple with a 11 month old son we do not feel safe in this house any longer and it’s way past time to start looking for safer accommidations before something really bad happens due to We Rent Marion and Mike Maynard ignoring our concerns.
