Keller Williams Advisors

Please see my responses below.The concerns that we sent in the last correspondence were not addressed except for Item # For your reference all of our concerns are below: Response #1: This is incorrect that they were not aware that we didn’t view the property prior to moving inFirst of all, they knew that we were out of state (and out of the country) and relocating at the beginning of June which is why they pushed back the lease start date for usThey also knew that from our rental application addresses and documents we submitted during the application process that we were both relocating to the areaAdditionally, please see below for a text message that was sent to [redacted] on May 31st She had been our primary point of contact, the person who showed us the house via Skype as she knew we were out of state [redacted] had originally asked [redacted] in person at [redacted] on this date and he was told that John couldn’t do it [redacted] texted Kathy (which had been primary mode of communication up until that point) and she never respondedSee screenshot attached in previous emailAs agents, [redacted] and [redacted] represent the owner of the property and work on their behalfKathy Bronkhorst, another agent at KW, represented the tenantsThe fact that the tenants had not seen the property in person was never expressed to us by either the tenants or their agent.Response #This is also incorrectAs stated above, he had come by to request to see the place and to drop off checks for rentAt that time, they told us we needed a cashier’s check for deposit and rent and it was never stated in any of the paperworkWe then spent the following day trying to get the cashiers check as quickly as possibly and you can imagine that we were pretty frustrated at this point as well.We spent: $for Fedex Overnight delivery or Cashier's check+ $Bank Fee for Cashier's Check$in ATM withdraw fees for [redacted] trying to get cash out for a money orderWith regards to the reference to the several emails that we had back and forth all of the email communication was done on our part and not on [redacted] partThey were simply responding to our emails and not ever setting anything up or reaching outJune 3rd I sent an email to John and Kathy: Attached in previous email June 8th I sent an email to John and Kathy: Attached in previous email At this point we were extremely frustrated by the lack of communication on behalf of [redacted] This lack of communication lead us to already be frustrated with the company on several occasions prior to modayAttempts to contact the company and get these concerns heard were ignored and thus we just moved forward in the process as we needed a place to live upon the beginning of our jobs hereWith regards to the video tour we may have seen— This FaceTime showing was conducted via Video by Kathy on Monday May 9thKathy is a Relator/Leasing Agent working for [redacted] and therefore shows that [redacted] did in fact know about the video showing.Each agent at [redacted] operates (as most Realtors do) as an independent contractor..As I stated before, it was not expressed to us before the lease was signed (or indeed, until I met the tenants on the date of the move in) that they had not seen the property prior to the move inWe have dozens of applicants each year who relocate to the Cincinnati area from out of town and even out of the countryHowever, typically these clients make arrangements to come in to the area to tour properties in person to make their decisionWe had no reason to believe this did not happen in this case as wellWhen [redacted] came to the office and met with me prior to the move in, he expressed that he wished to see the property but did not indicate that he had not seen it previously.I have no idea why the tenants would have incurred both FedEx fees, bank fees for a cashier's check, and ATM withdrawl fees to get a money orderEither a money order or cashier's check would have been sufficient to pay the funds dueIn order to protect our clients, the owners, we require that payment for move ins that are less than days away are paid by certified fundsThis is typically not expressed in the lease agreement [redacted] did request to see the property when he came in to pay the deposit (again, it was not stated that he had not seen it- I understood that this was to be a follow u showing, which is not unusual)I referred him to talk to Kathy about getting back inResponse 3: To begin, I had to contact the company to arrange a time for the moday or the day we were to begin leasing the houseI asked to see the place at 8:AM, I never received a response and then asked again and was told I could meet John there at PMJohn began to show us around the house and we became extremely disappointed at the condition of the propertyIf the company was there prior to us moving in and they really felt that it was in such a bad condition why couldn’t they just call and tell us that? We expected that moready and taking occupancy that day meant that the company had done their due diligence to get the property in good condition in order for us to move inWe had our things coming on a moving truck and were expecting to take ownership of the property as stated in the leaseObviously, given the recorded history above, after all the events leading up to this and the way we were treated by this company we decided that we no longer wanted to work with this company as it was very clear we were getting taken advantage of.I told the tenants that I saw the house for the first time on the morning of the move in, as we started managing the property on that dateI was at the house earlier in the morning to conduct the move in inspection and indicated to them at the time that I was not satisfied with the condition of the property, and was making an effort to have someone clean the property and address some of the issues, such as patching the anchor holes in the walls Response 4:Everything should have been done prior to our move in dateWe had a showing in the middle of May, the house was already empty and no one was living thereWe requested the walls be patched and paint touched up prior to move inThere is no way the company can say there was not enough time to do thisAs I have stated in previous correspondence, our application process asks the applicants to specify requests like thisThe tenants made some requests which to my knowledge we negotiated with the owner and handled before the move inPatching the holes in the living room was not one of these requestsYes, we did reach out to a lawyer because we were so disappointed in this situation that the house being in the condition that it was, was the final straw for usListed above are all of the other events that took place, prior to moday in which we felt extremely frustrated with the company on a multitude of levels.As a renter, your rights are limited and the landlord always has the upper handBeing new to the country and the area, the only thing we knew that we could do was to figure out the best way to end the lease which in this instance did involve consulting legal adviceOn the moday, once we went to the office that was our very first interaction or exchange with [redacted] We had no communication with her prior to this day and probably never would have had we not go in person to discuss our concerns Response #5: Given our situation and unfamiliarity with Ohio Laws, we didn’t want to pursue legal action but rather just get advice on what our options wereWe felt that we had limited options, the situation and communication with the business had turned fairly hostile and we were just trying to see how we could best get out of this agreementWe felt bullied into signing the termination agreement as we knew further communication with our lawyer would only cost us more financiallySince we were not interested in pursuing a lawsuit, we then were left with the only option which was to sign the termination agreement to get out of our leaseI told the tenants that they had the option of having us do the work to bring the property into complianceThe tenants had already consulted an attorney when they made the demand to terminate the lease, hours after seeing the house for the first timeAdditionally, we felt pressured to sign the termination agreement because we were told that we would have to pay more money for every day that we continued to occupy the homeTherefore, we were bullied in to signing the agreement as we had no other options if we didn’t want to lose any more moneyFinally, with regards to the property being tied up for “weeks” and the owners being unable to rent it, we took our things out that Sunday June 12th and that was part of the reason for us signing the termination agreement, so they could quickly rent the propertyIt is not our responsibility that the property was not rented until SeptemberAlso, the online posting for the rental property ( [redacted] ) was reposted and/or never removed as we have screenshots of the post being active on June 14thTo imply that we are responsible for the property going unrented for months is absurd.They also had kept all of our rent and deposit for June so they had incurred no finical loss whatsoever during this timeAs previously stated, the tenants had multiple people interested in the house (and more than one offer on it) when they accepted the offer from the tenantsThis put the house on hold for a few weeks while we waited for the move in date with the tenantsThe house was off the market from the day we accepted their application (approximately May 25th) until the Monday after their move in (June 13)This is three weeks during the busiest part of the rental season where we could have found other tenantsAdditionally, after the lease was terminated, the property did not rent until September, so the owners suffered actual loss of rent for June, July, and AugustThe tenants signed the lease agreement which created a legal obligation between them and the ownerThe owner was willing to make accommodations to correct the problems with the house in accordance with Landlord/ Tenant Law but the tenants escalated the situation by involving an attorney (or at least stating they had)If the tenants wanted to get legal advice on how to handle the situation they should have consulted with the attorney they brought in to the situationI made a proposal to the tenants to allow them to terminate and they accepted itTo be honest, we are just trying to help others who may be relocating to the area to not have this happen to themWhen a nationally recognized business takes advantage of two people who are just moving to a new place, one person who’s native language isn’t even English, is incredibly disappointing

The tenants escalated the situation by informing us on the day they moved in that they had spoken to an attorney about terminating the leaseThey did not tell us they they did not intend to file a lawsuit over the situation; since one of the owners of the property is an attorney, she told us that since the tenants were in consultation with an attorney, standard rules of attorney conduct would require that any correspondence between us and them should be through their attorney.The "tied up for weeks" comment in the reply referred to the fact that once the tenants were chosen by the owner to pursue a lease with, it precluded us from taking any other rental offers on the propertyBetween the time we received their rental application and accepted their offer of terms to move in (approximately May 15th, according to emails) and the time they moved out (June 12th), we lost the opportunity to find alternate tenantsWe had other parties who were interested in the property at the time their application was accepted and we had to turn those downOnce the property went back on the market in mid-June, those tenants were lost and the property stayed vacant until September.Again, we made overtures to the tenants offering to resolve the issues with the property in the hours between the time they first saw the house and the time they notified us they had spoken to an attorney and were demanding to terminate the leaseThe termination agreement we negotiated with them was somewhat standard for our company- the tenants were allowed to terminate the lease by paying a termination fee.We negotiated the lease with the tenants in good faith, believing they had toured the house before applying as we were not notified of anything to the contraryIf they had seen the house prior to the move in and requested additional work be done to it, we very likely would have come to an agreementOr, if they had allowed us to make corrections to the property after seeing it and notifying us of the deficiencies, we could have proceeded that wayThe tenants took a hard line that they wanted the lease terminated within hours of their move in so we proceeded accordingly

Hello,Here is the physical address of the business: Columbia Pkwy #125, Cincinnati, OH 45226 Thank you,*** ***

Here is the response to the Revdex.com complaint from [redacted]I received a request for a showing through Zillow from [redacted] regarding the [redacted] property that I forwarded on to my leasing agent - soon afterwards, though, Ms [redacted]' agent, [redacted] with...

[redacted], contacted me on her behalf.For context, it is not unusual for us to receive a request for a showing from a tenant and then learn that tenant is represented by another agent - our multiple listing service allows agents to promote listings from other agents and brokerages on their web site - this is referred to in our business as Broker Reciprocity. Tenants are often anxious to see rental properties and will cast many nets - typically, the agent who responds first will get the lead. We deal in volume, in rentals, particularly, so when we learn that an agent who we had a lead from is represented by another agent, we back off immediately - this is both good business and in compliance with Ohio Agency Law.Mr. [redacted] showed the property on September 26th and requested I contact him to discuss an offer - I called him that day and we discussed Ms. [redacted]' timeline and her request that the paint in the unit be corrected. I sent him an application and cover sheet (our required documents to lease) that same day, September 26th.The cover sheet sets out our application process and is signed by all of our applicants - it was signed by Ms [redacted]. I am happy to provide this supplemental evidence if requested, I have a copy of the cover sheet Ms [redacted] signed.In the meantime, I learned that Ms [redacted] was texting my leasing agent directly about the property. The texts that I received from [redacted] (my leasing agent) start with her offering to show her the property. When she learns that Ms [redacted] is represented by an agent, she says that it would inappropriate for her to show the property since Ms [redacted] is represented by an agent. She recommends that Ms [redacted]' agent make a showing request through [redacted], our showing service. I have copies of these text messages if they are useful.Ms [redacted] did not understand why we couldn't just show the property ourselves - we can not because it would go against Ohio Agency Law for us to interfere in an agent-client relationship in this way. At this point, to my knowledge (and I don't know differently, now), Ms [redacted] had already seen the townhome the day before.[redacted] could tell that Ms [redacted] was getting frustrated, so she asked me for help - I immediately called her agent, [redacted], and let him know that Ms [redacted] was contacting us directly and that we didn't want to interfere in his relationship with his client. He said he would give her a call, and, to my knowledge, the text messages stopped.Soon after I phoned [redacted], a second showing was scheduled for the property in question - this was on the evening of September 27. The feedback indicated that they wanted to make an offer to lease. I emailed another copy of the application and the cover sheet to [redacted] on September 28.I received Ms [redacted] application on September 28th - I discussed the offer with my client. The offer requested that the unit be repainted, the bedroom door be repaired, the carpets and the entire unit be cleaned prior to move in. The agent and I had also discussed the appliances, which were on order and not yet in place, and would they be available for the tenant's October 4th move in? I discussed these issues with my owner, showed him pictures of the problematic paint, and discussed the appliances.I responded to Mr. [redacted] on September 29th, and told him the terms of the offer that we accepted. We accepted them all. In fact, my owner repainted the townhome in anticipation of Ms [redacted]' move in, and we even asked if she would like to request a specific shade of red for the accent wall that was being repainted. Mr [redacted] said the terms of the offer were accepted, and I ran the application. I presented the results to my owner on that same day, September 29th. We discussed them by phone. My client, an experienced investor and landlord, was uncomfortable with the results, and requested that I ask for additional security both in the form of security deposit and monthly rent to mitigate what he viewed to be a risky application. It is important to note that, as Licensed Real Estate Agents, we do not establish the rental criteria that our clients use, nor do we make the final decision on whether applications are rejected or declined. We present the information we receive from our reporting service (Rental Research) to the owner and they make the decision based on the information we have provided. Owner make their own decisions on what criteria is acceptable to them including credit they find acceptable, criminal backgrounds, landlord and employment references, etc.  As Agents we do ensure that our clients are abiding by Fair Housing law and Ohio Landlord Tenant Law.Per my owner's instruction, I requested 1.5 month's rent as security deposit and an additional $100/month in rent - I presented this to Mr. [redacted]. I suggested that Ms [redacted] get in touch with my property manager, [redacted], with any questions (Mr.[redacted] is more easily reached by phone than I am - I receive all of our leasing calls, and I knew that Ms [redacted] was on a tight timeline and I didn't want to cost her more time). [redacted] and I are co-listing agents on [redacted], and, as such, we both represent the owner of the property.Ms [redacted] said she could provide supplemental evidence that would strengthen her application. We did not receive that until October 2nd.On September 30th, we received another application on [redacted].It is important to note that our job, [redacted] and mine, is to represent our owner's best interest. We have an application in play and we are not agreeing on terms - the tenant is not agreeing to pay the larger security deposit and extra rent, and we are not agreeing to accept her application if she does not. We are at an impasse. As agents for the owner, we have to advocate for the best outcome for our client - as such, I informed [redacted] that we had received another application and that, since we had not agreed on terms, we were in multiple application. We asked if Ms [redacted] would like to improve her offer - I suggested that the owner would be amenable to a longer lease term or larger rental amount.Again, to this point, multiple offers happen in real estate, they are legal and do not violate our code of ethics when handled appropriately - I did not violate any rules of conduct in the way I handled this situation.On September 30th, [redacted] responded to me by email (which I have, and am happy to provide): "Go ahead and rent it I found her another property."So, we proceeded with the second application.On October 2nd, Ms [redacted] emailed me, cc'ing her agent, the documentation she said she would send on September 30, and hoped would secure her application. She wished to keep her offer the same.I discussed this with my client and received instructions to tell Mr. [redacted] that Ms [redacted]' offer was not competitive as-is (our second offer was stronger), and we asked if she would improve her terms. We had not agreed to terms with the second application, so this was an acceptable thing for us to do.I haven't heard anything further from Mr. [redacted] on Ms [redacted]' behalf, nor from her, until receiving notice that a complaint had been filed with the Revdex.com.Since I did not hear from her agent, we have moved forward with the second application. The property is lease pending and will, unless something falls apart between now and tomorrow morning, have a fully signed lease.To respond to some specific allegations in this complaint:- Ms [redacted] says that her agent was unable to reach me until he spoke with friends of his at Keller Williams Advisors - I spoke directly to Mr. [redacted], there were no intermediaries;- I did not make the decision to request the higher security deposit and rent- this decision was made by my client, based on what he felt was a risky application. I merely followed the lawful instructions of my client by making this request;- I do not profit from an increased security deposit - my commission is one month's rent. The amount of the security deposit does not affect my commission in any way;- I do not profit from a longer lease term - my commission is one month's rent regardless of lease term;- If we had come to an agreement on a higher rental amount, my commission would have gone up by perhaps $50 or so, as I would share the commission (50% to me, 50% to the cooperating agent) - this is hardly incentive to push for a larger rental amount;- I would welcome an audit of the 90+ properties I have leased since January 2016, the Revdex.com and Ms [redacted] are welcome to review whether or not I have a pattern of increasing rents to pad my commissions. I would argue that, statistically, the number of times the rental amount has exceeded the lease price would not be atypical for other agents in my field. I would further suggest that the percentage of my income due to negotiating higher rental amounts (higher than lease price) would be statistically insignificant.If you have further questions regarding this matter, I welcome them.

[redacted] Cincinnati, OH 45227

To [redacted]:Here [redacted] response to this complaint.[redacted] is a single family home that was purchased by one of our property...

management clients as a rental property. Here are some specific responses to the complaints the tenants have raised.1.  As the tenants stated, they did not tour the property prior to turning in an application, a fact that we were not aware of before they signed the lease. The standard procedure is that the tenant views the property in person with an agent prior to turning in a rental application. One of the items listed on the cover sheet for all of our properties is that the tenant lists any requests in writing that are to be made, such as repair requests to be made of the owner. (As a result of this particular situation with this client, we have instituted a strict policy that we will no longer accept rental applications unless the potential tenant has viewed the property in person.) The cover sheet listed the only request as "Can you please touch up the paint on the first floor bedroom?" If they had seen the property prior to moving in, we could have had a more specific list of requests to work with. The tenants signed a one lease lease on the property that was due to start June 10th.2. The only request I received about seeing the house prior to the move in was Tuesday, June 7th. One of the tenants stopped by to drop off the check for the rent, and asked if it would be possible to see the house prior to the move in. I told him he should call his leasing agent to have her set an appointment to show it. I did not hear anything about this request again (despite the fact that I had several emails with the tenants between the 7th and the 10th) until after the move in. If the tenants had difficulty getting the agent to show them the house, they could have contacted me about this. Again, at this time I did not yet know the tenants had never been inside the house. The tenants had an agent who was working on their behalf who conducted the video tour on the house- we had nothing to do with any suggested video or photo misrepresentation of the house. The photos we used for marketing were not edited to show the house in a better condition than it was, and we had absolutely nothing to do with any video tour the tenants may have seen.3. I arrived at the property the morning of the move in (June 10th) to do the move-in walkthrough. This was my first time being in the house, which is not unusual for properties when we start managing them. The lease specifies that the walkthrough is to be conducted within 48 hours of the move in date. (This is to prevent situations where the walkthrough is conducted several days before the move in date and the condition of the property deteriorates prior to the tenant moving in.) I usually conduct these inspections alone, because it can take 2+ hours to do a walkthrough on a house because of the amount of detail, and if I am answering questions at the same time it can take longer. The goal of the walkthrough is to accurately depict the condition of the property on the date of the move-in, so I made notes on the inspection such as holes in the wall due to anchors that were placed by the previous owners, and scrapes on the floor. I went over the results of the walkthrough with the tenants when I met with them a few hours later. I told them at the time I was not satisfied with the cleanliness of the house and would call a cleaner to come out and do some cleaning at the house. I also told them, due to their concerns about the walls, that I could have someone come out and patch them. I had no safety concerns about the lock on the house. I pointed out to the tenant, in fact, that the lock on the garage was not working and that I would address it. If there were any issues with the locks, I would have had them corrected by the handyman. In fact, the handyman went to the property on the evening of June 10th to start the patching and cleaning work.4.  Over the next few hours I made some calls to coordinate having a cleaner come out and having someone come out to patch and paint the holes in the walls. I received a series of calls from the tenants that escalated from "When is the cleaner going to get here" to "We have spoken to a lawyer, we are going to terminate the lease" in 3.5 hours. The tenants did not give us an opportunity to address the concerns that were brought to our attention just a few hours before.5. One of the owners of the property is an attorney. Once the tenants mentioned that they had consulted an attorney on the matter, we moved to a position that we should deal directly with their attorney, since the tenants were taking a posture that suggested a lawsuit. We specifically told the tenants that if they were working with an attorney, we should be negotiating directly with the attorney. The tenants told us that they would waive any requirement that we speak to their attorney and negotiate with them directly. We negotiated a settlement on the lease where the owner agreed to release the tenants from the lease in exchange for the tenants forfeiting the security deposit, the rent prorate for June, and the pet fee they paid, a total of $2331.50. (This is something of a standard procedure when a tenant requests an early termination of the lease- we negotiate a termination agreement and allow everyone to move on.) The tenants agreed to this and signed it. QAs I stated, I was not satisfied with the condition of the property when I did the inspection and made arrangements to start correcting things on the day of the move in. The tenants had several options once they saw the property and were dissatisfied with the condition. They could have waited until we made corrections. They could have requested a discount on the rent for the inconvenience. They could have used Ohio Landlord Tenant Law to make sure that we complied. Instead they immediately told us they wanted to terminate the lease. Our clients- the owners- suffered harm in this transaction- at the time the tenants applied for the property, there were other offers on the house that they could have accepted. By tying up the property for these weeks, the owners lost out on the potential to rent it to these other tenants, and did not re-rent the property until September. The owners also could have taken a tough position with the tenants, forcing them to abide by the lease agreement, but decided that would have not be in anyone's best interest. As property managers, we are advocates for our clients, the owners of the property. Our job is to protect their interests. We acted in accordance with Ohio Landlord Tenant Law, agency procedures, and our own policies.

Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint.  For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.
[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, we would like to know your view on the matter.]  p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545} Response #1: This is incorrect that they were not aware that we didn’t view the property prior to moving in. First of all, they knew that we were out of state (and out of the country) and relocating at the beginning of June which is why they pushed back the lease start date for us. They also knew that from our rental application addresses and documents we submitted during the application process that we were both relocating to the area. Additionally, please see below for a text message that was sent to [redacted] on May 31st 2016. She had been our primary point of contact, the person who showed us the house via Skype as she knew we were out of state. [redacted] had originally asked [redacted] in person at [redacted] on this date and he was told that John couldn’t do it. [redacted] texted Kathy (which had been primary mode of communication up until that point) and she never responded.   Screenshot of that text message is attached.  p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545; min-height: 14.0px} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545}  Response #2  This is also incorrect. As stated above, he had come by to request to see the place and to drop off checks for rent. At that time, they told us we needed a cashier’s check for deposit and rent and it was never stated in any of the paperwork.  We then spent the following day trying to get the cashiers check as quickly as possibly and you can imagine that we were pretty frustrated at this point as well. We spent: $34.58 for Fedex Overnight delivery or Cashier's check. + $7.00 Bank Fee for Cashier's Check$24.00 in ATM withdraw fees for [redacted] trying to get cash out for a money order With regards to the reference to the several emails that we had back and forth all of the email communication was done on our part and not on [redacted] part. They were simply responding to our emails and not ever setting anything up or reaching out.  June 3rd I sent an email to John and Kathy: File Attached June 8th I sent an email to John and Kathy: File Attached  At this point we were extremely frustrated by the lack of communication on behalf of [redacted]. This lack of communication lead us to already be frustrated with the company on several occasions prior to move-in day. Attempts to contact the company and get these concerns heard were ignored and thus we just moved forward in the process as we needed a place to live upon the beginning of our jobs here.  With regards to the video tour we may have seen— This FaceTime showing was conducted via Video by Kathy on Monday May 9th. Kathy is a Relator/Leasing Agent working for [redacted] and therefore shows that [redacted] did in fact know about the video showing.   p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545; min-height: 14.0px} Response 3:  To begin, I had to contact the company to arrange a time for the move-in day or the day we were to begin leasing the house. I asked to see the place at 8:00 AM, I never received a response and then asked again and was told I could meet John there at 1 PM.  John began to show us around the house and we became extremely disappointed at the condition of the property. If the company was there prior to us moving in and they really felt that it was in such a bad condition why couldn’t they just call and tell us that? We expected that move-in ready and taking occupancy that day meant that the company had done their due diligence to get the property in good condition in order for us to move in. We had our things coming on a moving truck and were expecting to take ownership of the property as stated in the lease.  Obviously, given the recorded history above, after all the events leading up to this and the way we were treated by this company we decided that we no longer wanted to work with this company as it was very clear we were getting taken advantage of.  p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545; min-height: 14.0px} Response 4: Everything should have been done prior to our move in date. We had a showing in the middle of May, the house was already empty and no one was living there. We requested the walls be patched and paint touched up prior to move in. There is no way the company can say there was not enough time to do this.  Yes, we did reach out to a lawyer because we were so disappointed in this situation that the house being in the condition that it was, was the final straw for us. Listed above are all of the other events that took place, prior to move-in day in which we felt extremely frustrated with the company on a multitude of levels. As a renter, your rights are limited and the landlord always has the upper hand. Being new to the country and the area, the only thing we knew that we could do was to figure out the best way to end the lease which in this instance did involve consulting legal advice.  On the move-in day, once we went to the office that was our very first interaction or exchange with [redacted]. We had no communication with her prior to this day and probably never would have had we not go in person to discuss our concerns.  p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; color: #454545; min-height: 14.0px} Response #5: Given our situation and unfamiliarity with Ohio Laws, we didn’t want to pursue legal action but rather just get advice on what our options were. We felt that we had limited options, the situation and communication with the business had turned fairly hostile and we were just trying to see how we could best get out of this agreement.  We felt bullied into signing the termination agreement as we knew further communication with our lawyer would only cost us more financially. Since we were not interested in pursuing a lawsuit, we then were left with the only option which was to sign the termination agreement to get out of our lease.  Additionally, we felt pressured to sign the termination agreement because we were told that we would have to pay more money for every day that we continued to occupy the home. Therefore, we were bullied in to signing the agreement as we had no other options if we didn’t want to lose any more money.  Finally, with regards to the property being tied up for “weeks” and the owners being unable to rent it, we took our things out that Sunday  June 12th and that was part of the reason for us signing the termination agreement, so they could quickly rent the property. It is not our responsibility that the property was not rented until September. Also, the online posting for the rental property ([redacted]) was reposted and/or never removed as we have screenshots of the post being active on June 14th. To imply that we are responsible for the property going unrented for months is absurd. They also had kept all of our rent and deposit for June so they had incurred no finical loss whatsoever during this time.  To be honest, we are just trying to help others who may be relocating to the area to not have this happen to them. When a nationally recognized business takes advantage of two people who are just moving to a new place, one person who’s native language isn’t even English, is incredibly disappointing.  
Regards,
[redacted]

Please see my responses below.The concerns that we sent in the last correspondence were not addressed except for Item #5.  For your reference all of our concerns are below: Response #1: This is incorrect that they were not aware that we didn’t view the property prior to moving in. First of all, they knew that we were out of state (and out of the country) and relocating at the beginning of June which is why they pushed back the lease start date for us. They also knew that from our rental application addresses and documents we submitted during the application process that we were both relocating to the area. Additionally, please see below for a text message that was sent to [redacted] on May 31st 2016. She had been our primary point of contact, the person who showed us the house via Skype as she knew we were out of state. [redacted] had originally asked [redacted] in person at [redacted] on this date and he was told that John couldn’t do it. [redacted] texted Kathy (which had been primary mode of communication up until that point) and she never responded. See screenshot attached in previous email. As agents, [redacted] and [redacted] represent the owner of the property and work on their behalf. Kathy Bronkhorst, another agent at KW, represented the tenants. The fact that the tenants had not seen the property in person was never expressed to us by either the tenants or their agent.Response #2 This is also incorrect. As stated above, he had come by to request to see the place and to drop off checks for rent. At that time, they told us we needed a cashier’s check for deposit and rent and it was never stated in any of the paperwork. We then spent the following day trying to get the cashiers check as quickly as possibly and you can imagine that we were pretty frustrated at this point as well.We spent: $34.58 for Fedex Overnight delivery or Cashier's check. + $7.00 Bank Fee for Cashier's Check$24.00 in ATM withdraw fees for [redacted] trying to get cash out for a money orderWith regards to the reference to the several emails that we had back and forth all of the email communication was done on our part and not on [redacted] part. They were simply responding to our emails and not ever setting anything up or reaching out. June 3rd I sent an email to John and Kathy: Attached in previous email June 8th I sent an email to John and Kathy: Attached in previous email At this point we were extremely frustrated by the lack of communication on behalf of [redacted]. This lack of communication lead us to already be frustrated with the company on several occasions prior to move-in day. Attempts to contact the company and get these concerns heard were ignored and thus we just moved forward in the process as we needed a place to live upon the beginning of our jobs here. With regards to the video tour we may have seen— This FaceTime showing was conducted via Video by Kathy on Monday May 9th. Kathy is a Relator/Leasing Agent working for [redacted] and therefore shows that [redacted] did in fact know about the video showing.Each agent at [redacted] operates (as most Realtors do) as an independent contractor..As I stated before, it was not expressed to us before the lease was signed (or indeed, until I met the tenants on the date of the move in) that they had not seen the property prior to the move in. We have dozens of applicants each year who relocate to the Cincinnati area from out of town and even out of the country. However, typically these clients make arrangements to come in to the area to tour properties in person to make their decision. We had no reason to believe this did not happen in this case as well. When [redacted] came to the office and met with me prior to the move in, he expressed that he wished to see the property but did not indicate that he had not seen it previously.I have no idea why the tenants would have incurred both FedEx fees, bank fees for a cashier's check, and ATM withdrawl fees to get a money order. Either a money order or cashier's check would have been sufficient to pay the funds due. In order to protect our clients, the owners, we require that payment for move ins that are less than 10 days away are paid by certified funds. This is typically not expressed in the lease agreement. [redacted] did request to see the property when he came in to pay the deposit (again, it was not stated that he had not seen it- I understood that this was to be a follow u showing, which is not unusual). I referred him to talk to Kathy about getting back in. Response 3: To begin, I had to contact the company to arrange a time for the move-in day or the day we were to begin leasing the house. I asked to see the place at 8:00 AM, I never received a response and then asked again and was told I could meet John there at 1 PM. John began to show us around the house and we became extremely disappointed at the condition of the property. If the company was there prior to us moving in and they really felt that it was in such a bad condition why couldn’t they just call and tell us that? We expected that move-in ready and taking occupancy that day meant that the company had done their due diligence to get the property in good condition in order for us to move in. We had our things coming on a moving truck and were expecting to take ownership of the property as stated in the lease. Obviously, given the recorded history above, after all the events leading up to this and the way we were treated by this company we decided that we no longer wanted to work with this company as it was very clear we were getting taken advantage of.I told the tenants that I saw the house for the first time on the morning of the move in, as we started managing the property on that date. I was at the house earlier in the morning to conduct the move in inspection and indicated to them at the time that I was not satisfied with the condition of the property, and was making an effort to have someone clean the property and address some of the issues, such as patching the anchor holes in the walls.  Response 4:Everything should have been done prior to our move in date. We had a showing in the middle of May, the house was already empty and no one was living there. We requested the walls be patched and paint touched up prior to move in. There is no way the company can say there was not enough time to do this. As I have stated in previous correspondence, our application process asks the applicants to specify requests like this. The tenants made some requests which to my knowledge we negotiated with the owner and handled before the move in. Patching the holes in the living room was not one of these requests. Yes, we did reach out to a lawyer because we were so disappointed in this situation that the house being in the condition that it was, was the final straw for us. Listed above are all of the other events that took place, prior to move-in day in which we felt extremely frustrated with the company on a multitude of levels.As a renter, your rights are limited and the landlord always has the upper hand. Being new to the country and the area, the only thing we knew that we could do was to figure out the best way to end the lease which in this instance did involve consulting legal advice. On the move-in day, once we went to the office that was our very first interaction or exchange with [redacted]. We had no communication with her prior to this day and probably never would have had we not go in person to discuss our concerns.  Response #5: Given our situation and unfamiliarity with Ohio Laws, we didn’t want to pursue legal action but rather just get advice on what our options were. We felt that we had limited options, the situation and communication with the business had turned fairly hostile and we were just trying to see how we could best get out of this agreement. We felt bullied into signing the termination agreement as we knew further communication with our lawyer would only cost us more financially. Since we were not interested in pursuing a lawsuit, we then were left with the only option which was to sign the termination agreement to get out of our lease. I told the tenants that they had the option of having us do the work to bring the property into compliance. The tenants had already consulted an attorney when they made the demand to terminate the lease, 3 hours after seeing the house for the first time. Additionally, we felt pressured to sign the termination agreement because we were told that we would have to pay more money for every day that we continued to occupy the home. Therefore, we were bullied in to signing the agreement as we had no other options if we didn’t want to lose any more money. Finally, with regards to the property being tied up for “weeks” and the owners being unable to rent it, we took our things out that Sunday  June 12th and that was part of the reason for us signing the termination agreement, so they could quickly rent the property. It is not our responsibility that the property was not rented until September. Also, the online posting for the rental property ([redacted]) was reposted and/or never removed as we have screenshots of the post being active on June 14th. To imply that we are responsible for the property going unrented for months is absurd.They also had kept all of our rent and deposit for June so they had incurred no finical loss whatsoever during this time. As previously stated, the tenants had multiple people interested in the house (and more than one offer on it) when they accepted the offer from the tenants. This put the house on hold for a few weeks while we waited for the move in date with the tenants. The house was off the market from the day we accepted their application (approximately May 25th) until the Monday after their move in (June 13). This is three weeks during the busiest part of the rental season where we could have found other tenants. Additionally, after the lease was terminated, the property did not rent until September, so the owners suffered actual loss of rent for June, July, and August. The tenants signed the lease agreement which created a legal obligation between them and the owner. The owner was willing to make accommodations to correct the problems with the house in accordance with Landlord/ Tenant Law but the tenants escalated the situation by involving an attorney (or at least stating they had). If the tenants wanted to get legal advice on how to handle the situation they should have consulted with the attorney they brought in to the situation. I made a proposal to the tenants to allow them to terminate and they accepted it. To be honest, we are just trying to help others who may be relocating to the area to not have this happen to them. When a nationally recognized business takes advantage of two people who are just moving to a new place, one person who’s native language isn’t even English, is incredibly disappointing.