Ive never had to post something like this before(forgive me its long and this is the short version), thought really long and hard about it, but I feel like I need to share my experience with the company: Better Homes Dare to Compare. The owner, I will call him Richie and his assitant Tina made our lives HELL. We fell victim to their fradulance and learned many valuable lessons in the process and I would very much like to prevent this from happening to anyone else! October of last year we saw an ad on kijiji for brand new condos for rent $1000 per month or $900 if you provided your own appliances. We scheduled a time to go look at the condos, fell in love with unit 103. After a couple days and some emails back and forth with Tina, we came to an agreement of $925 per month and we would meet up to look at 103 one more time(just to make sure!!) and pick up the lease. Tina was so laid back and accommodating.. she told us to just take the lease home and bring it back when we have our damage deposit(which we agreed to pay in $500 amounts until paid in full.. $2000 deposit total.. I know I know). It was also agreed we would move in Dec 1. During the few days we had the lease at home we did some research, couldnt really find much information on the company, but the lady was just SO nice and the condo was so beautiful we decided to sign the lease and withdraw $500 to go towards the DD. While I was at work my boyfriend met up with Tina in the parking lot of the condominium to give her the lease/money and she said she would give us a copy within a couple days. Two days later I recieve an e-mail from her saying the first 3 pages are missing so we will have to meet up to make a new one. We plan to meet, we go and wait for 25 minutes and she doesnt show up and doesnt answer any of my emails. Two more days go by without hearing anything and I decide to call her to see what happened and to reschedule.. She stated that they really needed to send off the lease to the bank so she typed up a new one and took our signatures from the original. Red Flag, this is when my inner Judge Judy kicked in and I started documenting everything. Dec 1 rolls around we get all moved in, I send her an e-mail saying that we would like to pay rent and she can stop by whenever to pick it up. I give her the money $925 rent, $125 condo fee and $500 for the DD, everythings great! I send another e-mial a couple days later asking for receipts and a copy of the lease and asking when the gym will be completed etc etc.. No response for the rest of December. Jan 1st rolls around and the owner of the building is in the parking lot so we paid rent to him and same thing heres $925 for rent, heres $125... And he says ahhh you know rent is $1300 right? Long story short we were later told by one of his construction workers that Richie pays Tina to do this to people. She changed the amount on the new lease she typed up and used our signatures from the original. The Rentalsman had absolutely no record of this guy or his company or our damage deposit. There were MANY other things that happened that made this experience even worse but I just wanted to get the jist of my story out there. They post these condos on Kijiji all the time and I just cringe thinking about it. It was the most stressful 4 months of my life, we fell for it and never again!! My daughter was only 1 year old at the time and it put a huge strain on my relationship. Just a huge mess. Dont do it!! They didnt stop harrassing us until I confronted them with all the evidence I had against them and havent heard from them since. Now I live in a small and older 2 bedroom apartment saving to buy a house.. no dishwasher, no gym, no private entrance but I couldnt be HAPPIER!! *Whew* Glad I got that off my chest, thanks to anyone who took the time to read this, I hope it helps someone.
Posted on: Sun, 07 Sep 2014 05:52:21 +0000