The end is near

Somewhere in December, my wife got notice that she was going to get an overseas posting. We decided we were going to move out of ParkMerced. We turned in our notice and our last day was to be Jan 23, 2008. My wife's work was going to start in early January and so she left before I did and I stayed on to take care of clearing up the apartment and tying up all the odds and ends.

Before my wife left, she paid rent and it was prorated to our last day on Jan 23, 2008.

When I arrived home from work on Jan 15, 2008. There was a note (3 pages) duct taped to our front door. Recently, the complex had been repainting and stuff so, frequently, the residents would find notes taped to their front doors to either inform them to move stuff out of the way or just to inform them that there would be painting being done on their doors/windows. I almost didn't pay any attention to the note, thinking it was one of those notices. 

However, when I saw that there were several pages, I decided to take a closer look. To my astonishment, it was a "3 day to pay or quit" notice. For those of you who have never seen/received one of these things (by the way, this is my first time ever), this is the first step toward eviction. It means you have failed to pay rent. You are now late on your rent and you have 3 days to pay. Otherwise, you leave (in their terms, "quit").

This is what occurred next.

The next day, I decided to take care of our "3 days to pay or quit" notice. In addition to the notice posted on our door, we also got a similar notice in the regular mail.

I enter the leasing office and there was one "resident relations" person helping a resident. I waited for him to get done with the person he was with and then toss (I really did toss it at him, I'm an irate customer) the notice at him. He picks it up, tells me he is going to look it up. 

He says: "It looks like you owes us $400 something (I don't remember the exact figure he quoted), how would you like to pay this?"

I say: "I don't owe you a f**king thing. We have never owed you any-f**king-thing. You all are a complete model for incompetency."

He says: " Thank you for the compliment."

He was being a smart a$$ and I was not in the mood for more of their incompetency and arrogance. I was not furious. We were leaving in a few days. But, this place had given us nothing but problems. I couldn't even vacate in peace. I am not saying my actions/speech are appropriate and do not advise anyone to repeat them. But, in continuation...

I say, very loudly and angrily: "Don't be a smart a$$. This is our notice of our intent to leave (and I toss that at him too) because you guys are just one big f**k up. This is the amount the notice says we owe and this is what we paid. If you all are so incompetent and can't get that right, that's your f**king business, not mine. Due to your incompetency, you do not have any right to embarrass us by posting a "3 days to pay or quit" notice on our door. Fix it!! (even though I'm not really sure what there is to fix)

He says: " If you don't calm down, I will have to ask you to leave."

(another sign of their extremely well trained staff. Instead of trying to calm me down, he threatens me)

I raise my voice even more: " You can ask me to do whatever the f**k you want, but I'm not leaving till you fix this!"

At this point, there are 2 people standing at the door leading to their internal offices looking in on us. I presume they are staff wondering what's going on.

He repeats: "If you don't calm down, I'm going to have to either ask you to leave of call security."

This security is the same security that has allowed 4 cars in the parking garage I use to be broken into in the last 2 weeks. I'm terrified.

I say: " Call whoever the f**k you want to call, ask me to leave, do whatever the f**k you want to do, but, fix this problem first."

At this point, one of the ladies standing in the doorway steps forward and stretches out her hand. I refuse to shake hands with her. She does not introduce herself but asks very softly and politely: "Sir, I see you have a problem, would you care to explain what is going on to me?"

I repeat the story to her and add: "How would you feel if this was done to you?"

She immediately apologizes and gathers the notices that are on the table. While we were talking, the guy who was first attending to me actually called security, so, now there are 2 security guys behind me and more people peering in from their internal offices.

This lady waves the security guys away, waves the ever so capable person that was helping me out of the room and says she is going into the back to research this notice. She also tells me she is the Resident Relations Manager. She invited me into her office but I declined.

When she steps away, another gentleman who was peering in, steps into the room and apologizes to me. I tell him: "There are no amount of apologies that can help me remove all the bad taste I have had from staying here. We are an ideal renter. We pay rent on time. We don't call for anything and replace stuff ourselves as much as possible. We don't have loud parties. And all ParkMerced has done is f**k us over time and time again. We lose stuff that ParkMerced moves out of OUR storage and we have to deal with their high and mighty lawyers. No amount of apologies will suffice."

He apologizes again and states that he is the new manager of the entire complex and that he is not familiar with my "file".

I tell him to go look it up.

He says he will. He "promises to look into my file" and that I "will be hearing from " him.

To that, I reply: "Yeah right."

He says: "I promise"

I say again: "Yeah right."

(side bar) It's been 3 months since I have vacated ParkMerced. I have not heard from him. I have not seen any mail/e-mail from him. I have not changed my phone number nor e-mail address we have on file. And we have a forwarding address on file too.

The other lady returns and apologizes again. She tells me she will take care of the notice and take it out of our file (like it really matters to me) and that it was an oversight on their part.

I really did not gain anything out of this experience.