Complaint Review: Corvias Military Living - Fort George G Meade Maryland

I'm not even sure where to start, but here goes.

My husband was sent to Fort Meade, MD for his first duty station. I was 12 weeks pregnant with our first child and we only had a week to relocate so we went for Military Housing, thinking we would save money. We had only been married for a few months, only lived together for 4 months, never had experience renting. We didn't check the house thoroughly and the employee who showed us around failed to mark any damages they didn't cover. We thought they did.

There were stains COVERING the carpets. At one point, when I went to scrub one up, it was a week-long process and as the stain rose, it turned rust-colored and reeked of iron. There were horrible carpet stains in every room. We were missing a screen for a window. The AC/Heat only worked sometimes. When I complained about the carpets, two women came, looked around, and told us that they could offer a free cleaning but that was it. Whatever.

Here's where the trouble started.

I started smelling a weird, rotten garlic smell. Upon Googling, I found that could be a gas leak. I called my husband, who was working nightshift, and we called the fire department. They found a leak, a continual one. We called maintenance who came and REFUSED to repair it, because "it's not like it's harmful, just one leak."

Just one leak, right.

Suddenly, this kept happening.

And every time, maintenance would do a patchwork job and it would come right back, or they wouldn't do anything. They kept insisting a GAS LEAK wasn't harmful. I was PREGNANT, 5 months at this point! I was getting dizzy and lightheaded and one of our cats got severely sick from it, even. But they still didn't care. So finally, we went to JAG and started going forward to try and relocate to another house.

We were cleared to do so but it was considered entering a new lease, and it would put us behind one month so if we ever want to move out of military housing we have to pay two month's worth of $1787 BAH. Which we're currently doing. But I digress.

We finally got cleared to move to a different housing subdivision on base. We were told we'd view 3 different places and all had yards (we have a dog). So we went to look, and not only was the lady the MOST RUDE person I've ever met, she snapped at me when I told her that we were informed we would see multiple houses. Said they had ONE house available, and if we didn't want that one we were out of luck, and no, it didn't have a fence. We inquired about putting up a fence on our own, and she said if we wanted a fence put in we would have to pay $3000 out of pocket because only their workers can do that- but in their lease it says we CAN install our own fence, we just have to use their specific fencing. But anyhow, we get to view the house and lo and behold it has a self-installed fence.

So, we take the only house offered, knowing the person who just moved out. So we knew some of the damages, and made sure all were taken down, moved in, and it was decent. I mean, we have no grass in the backyard and despite being told it will be replaced and calling weekly, constantly being told they'll be out to replace it, they never come. The water pipes sometimes make strange, banging noises and then our toilet starts to overflow, but they won't come out and look at that. And we suddenly have stains rising! We spoke to the previous tenants, who paid to have the carpets replaced because they were told they had to. The carpets weren't replaced. Imagine that.

But here's the kicker.

Behind my hoouse, there's a patch of grass that the men who do the lawns didn't touch for month. It grew over two feet tall. When they finally mowed it, we suddenly had fleas. EVERYWHERE. Our animals are on prescribed-by-the-vet flea medication and we're very diligent about bathing. Yet this infestation is HUGE. I now have a 6-month-old baby boy, a cat, and a dog. And a horrible flea infestation. They're EVERYWHERE. Literally everywhere. We called Corvias about this, and they said fleas aren't covered in pest control, they woud send someone out but we had to pay.

Wow. Okay. Fleas aren't specified in the lease to NOT count under pest control, but whatever, right?

So the exterminator comes out, lays down flea traps and NEVER COMES BACK. We had to call TWICE for them to come back. And they claimed there were no fleas at all?! But we could pay $90, twice a week, for 6 weeks, to treat anyway. Because we can totally afford that. So we've now pulled a loan to begin the move out process. Because we're nearing $500 in flea control. Everything from organic to chemical based, bombs and foggers, diatomaceous earth and borax, flea dips and flea sprays and flea shampoos and flea collars, lemon sprays and rosemary baths and vinegar in the water, brewer's yeast and EVERYTHING and nothing works, but they refuse to help us do anything about it. My animals are suffering no matter what we do, our couch and bed are infested, but they say because we have animals they're not liable anyway. The fleas came from a mix of the deer and groundhogs that hang around my backyard and the GIANT two-foot-tall grass they didn't mow for months!

And finally, as we are breaking the lease to move, we asked about a payment plan to help deal with paying $1787 two times so we'll have the money to feed our family. They agreed to one, my husband went to speak witn them about it, and we were told, "Oh, the only payment plan is where you pay within the month of your 30-day notice." Oh. Well. That's not quite a payment plan, is it?

We can't live here anymore, hence breaking the lease. They're soon to be charging BAH (the $1787) just for rent, and our bills (water, electric and gas) will be separate. And honestly, nearly $1800 a month for a 937sq ft, nasty house? No, thank you. So we're leaving, because paying another $500 in bills outside of that would make living here completely unsustainable.

But so far, that's it. We're moving out, we found a nicer place, much cheaper.

Corvia Military Living are money-grubbing and rude. Please, don't move in here.