Leaking refrigerators, misunderstood lease agreements and windows without locks are just a small list of woes some University students have experienced at their off-Grounds dwellings.
Student tenants of a D.M. Rothwell Co.-owned Cabell Avenue apartment reported a leaking refrigerator to their landlady upon move-in. It was not fixed, however, until just before Thanksgiving when the appliance broke down and leaked an inch of water over the floors, fourth-year College student Mike Nye said.
"We had told them about the leaking problem and nothing was done," Nye said.
The result: a flooded apartment.
Nye said he felt the fact that he and his roommates are college students affected their power to deal with problems in non-University housing.
"Most of the time with college students, there's really nothing they can do - they're powerless against the people who are nominally responsible for fixing things," he said.
Landlady Betty Edwards said she was familiar with the Cabell Avenue apartment refrigerator case but defended her company's reaction to the problem.
"Every work ticket that comes to this office is taken care of, and that's all I have to say," Edwards said.
Third-year College student Zene Colt, a Brandon Avenue Apartments resident, said he and his roommates have had problems not only with maintenance repairs, but also with money.
Colt said representatives from his realtor, Management Services Corporation, changed the rent on his apartment after the lease was signed by crossing out the agreed-upon rent and writing in an amount for $20 more.
"We were just sort of taken aback by it," he said. "It was only 20 bucks - but it's just the principle."
In addition, the phone jacks in the apartment did not work at first, and Colt said he and his roommates had to do the legwork of getting the jacks activated, something which he said should have been MSC's responsibility.
He encountered other problems with the apartment, such as a missing heating duct and getting charged to repair a garbage disposal that he said was broken by previous tenants.
"I've really just had a sort of sour impression of both my landlady and the realtor, and needless to say I'm not living there next year," Colt said.
MSC's Regional Manager Connie Dunn said when she examined Colt's file she saw no complaint calls from him about any of the matters he had mentioned.
"The first one was changing his rent. There's no record here that this was changed. There's no cross-through, and there's no different number," Dunn said.
But Colt defended his position.
"We know what we agreed to," he said. "And just again, it's about the principle."
As for the phone jack issue, Dunn said MSC rewired the entire building at the corporation's expense as a result of the tenants' complaints.
She said that she also was dubious about Colt's claims about the garbage disposal .
"The notation here says we removed a piece of glass and a bottle cap, and [the garbage disposal] was jammed because of these items," she added. "If it were indeed a former resident, over the course of two months, that would mean they had not used the garbage disposal since July. It doesn't seem logical to me to go for about four months without using the garbage disposal."
Fourth-year College student Cate Mansfield, who lives in an apartment on Gordon Avenue that is rented out by a private landlord, said repairs to her apartment were not finished by the time she moved in, causing her to fear for her safety.
Mansfield said she first requested that locks be installed on the house's windows in August, when she moved in. But it took until December for her property manager to send over a repair crew to finish placing locks on all the windows.
According to Charlottesville building code, landlords must have locks installed on all windows.
Over Winter Break, while Mansfield was away from the house, an unknown individual attempted to break in, as evidenced by the ripped screen and broken door and windows left behind - a problem she said her landlord attended to right away.
Mansfield said she should have examined the apartment more thoroughly before signing the lease. She said she felt another part of the problem is that property managers have little money available for repairs.
"The property owner - he doesn't want to put money into the property," she added.
Mansfield's landlord could not be reached for comment.
It is also important to remember the landlord's perspective in dealing with landlord-tenant conflicts, Wade Apartment's Property Manager Tammy Garrison said.
Garrison listed parking and towing complications and maintenance problems as chief complaints she and fellow landlords field from Wade Apartment tenants. But she also said that sometimes tenants are overly alert to problems.
"Several of our residents are super-sensitive. Every minute thing they can be squeaking wheels about it," she added, citing things like an apartment's heat level to be very subjective.
Garrison said good communication is of the utmost importance in negotiating with a landlord.
"How you're approached has a big influence on how the situation shapes out," she said. "When they come to you in a confrontational manner, you're automatically on the defensive"
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