We appreciate being able to communicate our concerns with you. This is the list of grievances that we have against Southern Management Corporation and the Vienna Park Apartments.
Before we moved into this apartment complex in August 2009, VPA told us that this apartment had its own water heater. When the water heater failed to work that is when we found out that they deceived us.
We asked the office if these apartments were infested with bugs and they told us no.
After we signed a one-year lease rental agreement, we found out that this apartment had a large infestation of roaches, bedbugs, and spiders. Because our family has asthma, we cannot be around the highly toxic chemicals, fumes, and insecticides that V.P.A. uses everyday; we took matters in our own hands and treated our own home with natural everyday products to keep most of these out of our home. Because of our diligence, we are glad to say that we do not have a problem. The office staff and the many different pest companies that V.P.A. has hired come into our home and cannot find any evidence of any infestations.
VPA had the ability to repair the kitchen floor before we moved into this apartment. We discussed the repair of the kitchen floor with the assistant manager, when we looked at the apartment. They were aware that we needed that kitchen floor to be repaired prior to us moving into this apartment. After we moved into our home, the kitchen floor was in dire need of repair. I felt that anyone of us including my parents would easily fall through the floor. We called the office to get it repaired and they brought a highly toxic glue container in our home. My wife looked at the contents and told them that they were not going to use it in our home, because of the warnings or cautions that were placed all over the container. My wife was pregnant at the time and we had a small child in our home as well. They piece milled the floor with thin plywood and a couple of layers of flimsy squared vinyl tile and then screwed it down and left. That was the full extent of their ability to repair. By the way, while the repairmen were there they were using curse words left and right in front of my family. That was totally inappropriate. Just because something does not go right for them, does not mean that they can allow curse words to fly out of their mouths in front of my family.
According to the Virginia Residential Landlord and Tenant Act and the Tenant Landlord Handbook, page 26, “The landlord can enter the unit without the tenant’s permission ONLY if there is an emergency such as a hazardous or life threatening situation, or if there is a court order”. We did not receive any notices of an emergency of any kind and they violated us again.
In June 2014, we asked to have our apartment removed from the insecticide treatment list and the assistant manager agreed to have our home removed from that list. He assured us that we would be removed from that list. On June 29, 2014, we had to make an emergency medical trip towards my wife’s mom because she was very ill with cancer and on her deathbed. On July 1, 2014, she passed away. Because of the July 4th holiday, we were delayed in making transportation back to Virginia and burial arrangements for her mother. We managed to get back to Virginia to bury my wife’s mom at the same time that she arrived. After we buried my mother-in-law, we drove back to our apartment with my parents. Upon opening the door to our home, we all noticed a very strong toxic insecticide odor coming from inside.
We could not stay at our own home because V.P.A. and the assistant manager violated our request to have our home removed from the bedbug, roach, and rat treatment list. Because the assistant manager violated our family, we were forced to stay in a hotel for 2 days and 2 nights while my father and I removed all of the toxic insecticide bait that was placed within our home. We were never reimbursed for the hotel expenses during that period. The assistant manager then told my wife over the speakerphone in which all of us heard him state that it must be nice to be able to take a long vacation.
What we had just been through was no vacation. We were grieving a loss of a family member and the heartless assistant manager had the audacity to attack us verbally. We buried a family member. VPA has displayed high disrespect for our family from day one. We asked the assistant manager how he knew that we were gone and he told us that he has his ways. We found out that he has been profiling us. He has people watching and recording our every move. In our opinion, the assistant manager has disrespected us on many occasions because of our skin color. When we approached the property manager about her staff’s blatant disrespect and lies towards our family, she covered up for her staff. Her staff has lied and deceived us every chance that they can get.
We took notes of all the stains, tears, piece milling of the carpets, improper prepping of the walls and doors prior to painting, the paint drips on the carpet and the fixtures in the bathroom. V.P.A. requires us to wash down the walls frequently. If we did wash down the walls as they state, there would be no paint left because the paint on the walls is the cheap chalky type to start with.
Most of the times when we need a repair in our home and we call them in, our children are subjected to the repairmen’s foul mouths. That is unacceptable and highly unprofessional. When we mention this blatant disrespect to the property manager she tells us to stop making things up. Her staff lies to her about their blatant rudeness towards our family. That is unprofessional and unethical. In our opinion, the property manager protects and defends her staff. We the tenant have no voice to state our concerns when her repairmen disrespect us in our home. She is never present when they are rude to us. She believes them over us. They tell her a sob story and then she attacks us with you can’t treat my staff that way. In essence, she allows all of her staff to disrespect and to verbally abuse the tenants. We believe that the disrespect we receive from all of them is because we are white. Just recently, we found out that they have been recording us, using their cell phones, and walkies to record us without our knowledge and permission.
One of repairmen hit our car at night while we were still inside our car. When we asked him why he hit our car, he just gave us a nasty smirk, told us that his name was XXX, and then walked away. When my wife called the property manager about the incident, she called him into her office and spoke to him. XXX said that he did not hit our car. That is when my wife told the property manager that was the name he gave to her. My wife then realized that it was XXX that hit our car. She then corrected her statement towards XXX and said it was XXX. Since that incident, the property manager has defended her staff and has allowed her staff to abuse us verbally. This is one of the many reasons why we do not like to call them into our home.
According to the Tenant Landlord Handbook, “Landlords Must (VRLTA §55-248.13) If air conditioning is provided by the landlord, the unit must maintain a temperature of not more than 80 degrees Fahrenheit in all habitable rooms from May 15 to October 1.” Please refer to the letter of concerns that we mailed to the property manager about the Air Conditioner and the extra expense that was forced upon us by SMC/VPA. The property manager has refused to acknowledge that part of the letter. We gave the property manager proof that our electric bill had an increase of usage during that period. Our family has suffered undue stress, physical suffering, pain, and exhaustion due to their lack of properly addressing the A/C situation. We have requested a reimbursement for the extra costs because of the A/C failing and the property manager said that it was not important. A female person from SMC said that they refuse to reimburse us for anything. A repairman told my wife that the A/C system almost caught on fire due to it overheating and he had to cool it down with water to be able to read the actual temperature.
The property manager and her staff have strong tendencies of twisting our words against us. In one of our very recent conversations with the property manager, she twisted my wife’s words to suit her needs.
We have had them come into our home to replace the lock on our main door at least four times since we have lived here. Three times, they installed a lock that was previously cycled within the community. Because we had an attempted B&E in progress, which my wife stopped, we immediately requested to have a new lock with a new key because we need to feel safe within our home. We filed a police report for this incident. The property manager told us that she would install a new lock only when she gets the police report. The assistant manager and the repairmen all told us that the locks and keys are cycled within the community to keep costs down. The Vienna Police Department told us while we were filing the report with them, that cycling the locks and keys within the community was not a good idea or safe for the next tenant. When my wife approached the assistant manager about this situation, he told my wife that they cycle the locks and keys to keep the cost of new locks at a minimum. The assistant manager confirmed that the property manager knew about that practice.
The property manager told us that they do not cycle the locks or keys. Then who was attempting the B&E? The staff? When the repairman attempted to change the lock and key, he had a previously used lock and key with him. He confirmed that the office told him to use one of their previously cycled lock systems on our door. We asked him to take that used lock system back and install a new lock and key. He eventually installed a new lock and key. The screws for the turn style shank lock (deadbolt) was not installed correctly and it locked us in the apartment. When I attempted to open the door, the jam side of the lock came out of the jam with the deadbolt lock. V.P.A. installed ½” screws for that side of the lock. My wife removed the ½” screws that were installed in the door jam side of that lock with 2 1/2” wood screws with large biting threads.
The Reston Police Department taught everyone in our previous community to change the length of screws for their front doors to add security. My wife mentioned this to the Vienna Police Department and they agreed that was a very smart move on our end.
We made an emergency call to have the new lock repaired and the repairman asked if we could wait until the next morning to have it repaired again, because he said it was not a real emergency. I insisted that it was a potential threat to the safety of my family and me. He said that the new lock broke on the inside and he had to replace it again. He said that it had nothing to do with the door jam side of the lock and that it was secured.
Now for the leak. The apartment has had consistent leaks coming from the apartment upstairs bathroom. There are periods of dryness and then periods of extreme water. Whenever we call the office or the property manager, the leak stops and they cannot find anything and they have left it at that. In 2014, they came into our apartment and cut out a large section in the wall and ceiling. The repairman did not find any leaks, so he replaced the drywall and the painter compounded the drywall. We requested from them not to paint due to high level of VOCs. My family and I have difficulty breathing when toxic levels of chemicals are placed around and in our home. We are on nebulizers to assist our breathing.
The property manager told my wife that yes, indeed, we will replace all of the wet drywall and yet she tells her repairmen to only replace the ceiling. She had five grown men to come into our home to make sure that my wife would not get any pictures of the toxic black mold. Only one worked while the others were told to watch my wife. They intimidated my wife and scared my children. I told my wife to call the Vienna Police Department to get protection because I felt that my family’s safety was in danger from the excessive presence of men being in my home.
We found out that an SMC employee told the property manager to send 5 grown men to my home to keep my wife from taking pictures of the toxic black mold. VPA would not have intimidated us if I had been at home to protect my family from their abusive repairmen. I do not threaten anyone, nor am I intimidated by anyone, and I do not allow people to push us around. My wife and I are protective over our family and when anyone threatens our family, I step in. A lot of the verbal garbage happens when I am not physically present. However, for my family’s protection, I have been on the phone listening to their interactions with my family. I do not like how they communicate with my family. I consider their verbal actions highly unprofessional, unethical, and abusive.
The VPA employees are always coming into our apartment speaking in another language, so that we do not know what they are saying. These same employees speak English very well. Why do they have to use a different lanuage in front of us?
SMC has told us that we will be locked out of our home during the repair time and our family does not have a place to live. We will still have to pay our rent, even when we are not there. SMC told us that they do not care as long as we are out of our home. We have small children and SMC/VPA refuse to accommodate our family during the repair period. SMC does not care when we are forced to live out of our car. That is no place for anyone to live especially young children.
We did not cause this leak that came from the upstairs apartment, but we feel that they are punishing us for their improper management of the property. Because we contacted the county, they are now retalitory against our family.
In a world where people do their dead level best to take away the other persons voice even when they are in their own home, thank you for giving us a place to voice our concerns.
#2Author of original report
Tue, April 18, 2017
April 17, 2017
Dear M,
I thought that you should know that SMC and VPA are going against what their attorney wrote in his letter to you about the air quality sample. SMC and VPA refuse to keep their word to us and to you. SMC and VPA do a lot of bait and switch.
FS told us that if we wanted an air quality sample taken that it would be on us. In other words, we would have to pay for their gross negligence.
All of these apartments are in dire need of repair and SMC and VPA repairmen just paste, paint things together, and hope that no one acknowledges what they are doing. When we came into our apartment, we asked Wilbur to repair the kitchen floor before we moved into the apartment. He had an entire month to replace that floor, but he refused. Instead, they just piece milled it together after we moved into the apartment.
This situation was caused by their neglect of proper maintenance. We did not cause this situation. I believe that we should not have been displaced; the added stress, physical pain and suffering, the added financial hardship should be off set by SMC and VPA because they had accommodated many other non-white tenants when they had these same problems. We had to spend $1,100.00 during the time in which we were displaced. That was for the hotel, gasoline, the added food that we had to purchase because SMC and VPA refused to allow us access to our food that we had just purchased.
This is an email from the property manager.
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April 12, 2017 Hello, If you would like, at your own expense, you can hire your own hygienist Sincerely, FS |
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Their attorney wrote the county and told the county that SMC and VPA would pay for an air quality hygienist to conduct an indoor air quality test. You see that the property manager is refusing to comply with what their attorney wrote to the county.
M, I think that I need to restate something for you. SMC and VPA inclusive, has berated my wife on many occasions, and in the letter that they mailed to you. As if all of the vindictiveness, deliberate acts, prejudice statements, Giday hitting our car, and excessive force against my family is not enough let’s add the slamming by their attorney. SMC and VPA have defamed my wife’s character and reputation just to suit their monitary needs.
I asked my wife to communicate what I wanted to tell SMC and VPA. She has had too many attacks from SMC and VPA. They come into our home verbally abuse my wife, scare our children, and then demand that we respect them. In all fairness, we are the ones that deserve respect. After all, we pay their payroll. The Police Officers told us that SMC and VPA have no right to come into our home and tell us how to act or to speak. When we are in the privacy of our own home, we can speak however, we wish.
M, J from SMC told us that whenever we need any more repairs done in our home that they were going to send five or more men to do that small repair. Well, my wife has my full permission to immediately call the Police Department when that happens. Per my request, she will ask the police officers to remove the men that are not going to do anything except taunt, abuse, intimidate, and threaten my family as they did the last time.
M, when we finally were allowed back into our home, we noticed a few things.
1. The tub has multiple chips and scratches from where they either dropped or drug their tools. They are going to force us to pay for their lack of attention.
2. There are some areas that show deliberate vindictiveness within our home.
3. SMC and VPA deliberately dripped and splattered paint all over one of our personal property items. This item sits about five feet away from the small area they painted over. They did not get paint on the floor when they slopped paint onto our property. You would think that a drop cloth would have been used to protect our property.
4. SMC and VPA hung the vanity mirror in the bathroom high enough to where only a 6'+ person can see themselves in the mirror. I can only see the very top of my head. We consider this to be highly vindictive and deliberate.
See the kitchen floor? This is the floor they piece milled.
M, I need to mention to you that our attorney told us to get them to stop when they found mold. They did find mold and that is why they stopped. It literally had nothing to do with my family. They were attempting to smear my wife and her reputation. That is it.
They were trying to cover their assets all the while smear my wife because she knows how to repair just about everything. That was passed down from generations to her and she did some major construction when she first came back to Virginia.
The culture that SMC and VPA’s repairmen come from do not like it when women know more than they do.
SMC and VPA circulated a document which stated that when ICE comes to their door that they are to fight the authorities. In our opinion, SMC and VPA has just instigated a fight that does not need to take place.
M, whenever my wife points out the repair problem with solution, they get all defensive, then they tell her that she does not know anything about how to repair the problem, and then they ALWAYS come back with the same solution that my wife mentioned.
We truly hope and pray that you recognize our situation and in our opinion, the corruption that lies behind the SMC and VPA doors that they hope no one acknowledges.
Sincerely,
#3Author of original report
Mon, April 03, 2017
If you are considering Southern Management Corporation or Vienna Park Apartments as your home, please reconsider and be fair warned that you are going to be subjected to unprofessionalism from corporate and VPA, rudeness, unethical standards, threatening events, incompetent repairmen, unsympathetic behavior, uncaring, heartless, and very unfriendly to your needs and concerns.
If you have any medical problems definitely stay away. They boldly state to your face that they will ignore all medical letters from all doctors.
If you are a self-assured, self-confident, straightforward, truthful, intelligent, and an honorable person, they will treat you with great disrespect, especially if you are a female. This kind of person intimidates them. SMC/VPA hate these qualities in a person.
Overcrowding. SMC/ VPA have many people that are crammed into apartments that are not family members of the tenants. We were told that only family members could be in the apartments within reason.
SMC/VPA issued a letter to all residents to fight ICE. They were warning all of their illegal immigrants to fight ICE at all cost.
SMC/VPA uses a private security for purposes other than providing true security for the residents. They are there to intimidate the tenants.
Preferential treatment and repairs to select buildings [INTERIOR AND EXTERIOR] of the apartment complex. This is very true.
SMC/VPA has selective enforcement of renter’s policy requirements. We are not supposed to park in the emergency space/loading/unloading spaces, yet they allow certain people to park there. When a person complains VPA/SMC writes them up as non-compliant and a troublemaker. Then SMC/VPA retaliates against the person that complained with excessive force.
There is a lot of loud head banging music being played all day and night. If you complain to the office, they write you up as a troublemaker.
We do not use the laundry room because our laundry was stolen, and taken out of the washer in mid-wash and thrown on to the floor.
Our young children do not use the playground because SMC/VPA allows other tenants' children to threaten our children on the playground. When we approached VPA, they told us to stay off the playground when that happens. One of my young children was almost pushed off backwards from the top of the jungle gym by a bully. What is the use in stating that there are amenities, when SMC/VPA takes them away from you?
There are many outlets that are wired wrong. When I place a circuit tester into the outlet and it says that it is wired wrong, then it is wired wrong. VPA assistant manager told us that they are not required to give us more than two outlets per room. That also goes for the telephone jacks. We had only one that was working in the apartment when there were five jacks.
SMC/VPA are highly unprofessional, rude, threatening, unsympathetic, uncaring, and very unfriendly to our needs and concerns. They used excessive force against my wife and small children. They wait until I leave for work to verbally abuse my family.
SMC/VPA told us that the reason they used excessive force was to control my wife. SMC/VPA sent 5 grown men into our home to intimidate my family and only one man worked while the others were scaring my family. By the way, the four men that just sat around did absolutely nothing except watch my wife. The Vienna Police Department ran the four men out of the apartment and told them that it is excessive force being used against us.
SMC/VPA have been trying to manipulate us into believing that the reason why they stopped when they did was due to my wife. That is totally wrong. My wife did nothing to impede their work. They legally had to stop because they found toxic black mold.
Now we are being forced out of our apartment. We have no where to go and SMC/VPA refuse to accomodate our family.
If you want to enjoy a stress-free apartment home, then do not rent with Southern Management Corporation or Vienna Park Apartments.
#4Author of original report
Mon, April 03, 2017
We do not have anywhere to go. Southern Management Corporation/Vienna Park Apts are kicking us out as of April 9, 2017.
Where do we store our personal property? Where do we live after the horrifiying ordeal? How are we to survive?
Southern Management Corporation is causing our family extreme stress. Our small children are so scared that they are having trouble sleeping a night.
Southern Management Corporation does not care that they are kicking out a family with small children.
Southern Management Corporation told one of their corporate employees to use excessive and extreme force.
Southern Management Corporation was told by us that they were to stop when they found mold in the ceiling coming from the upstairs apartment. They stopped, but they are saying that the only reason why they stopped was because we would not allow them to complete the job. That was never the case. They found toxic black mold.
We told them what our insurance company, Fairfax County Code and Compliance, Fairfax County Consumer Affairs, Fairfax County Health Department, and professional restoration company all told us. They told us that when SMC/VPA finds mold that they were to stop, file a claim with their flood insurance, and have a specialist to come out to remediate.
That is the real reason why they stopped. Because, when there is mold, then the repair of a leak has to be remediated by a mold specialist.
Southern Management Corporation and Vienna Park Apartments scared my small children really bad.
We need help. Would someone be willing to help us out. Please. We would be grateful.
We fear that Southern Management Corporation and Vienna Park Apartments are going to black list us, so that we will not be able to secure a place to live.
Help.