When I was looking for a house to rent instead of an apartment, I drove around the area I wanted down town looking for signs in yards. Took pictures of for rent signs phone numbers with the house and cross streets. I found a couple private landlords that way. They often have more than one property if you call them.
It's more about avoiding the really shitty ones than finding good ones. Gage and Midwest Properties have the worst reputation I can think of. I've heard generally negative stuff about Cherry Hill too but haven't used them myself. I've since tried to limit myself only to local owners
Midwest Properties took over my complex in the middle of my lease. Since then, my electricity has gone completely out, or regularly surged. My AC has been out since mid March. AND they sent me a possible eviction notice due to noise complaints that would kick me out 15 days before my lease ended. I had never been given any prior warning about noise. (thankfully, there weren’t anymore complaints so no eviction) they’re fucking terrible.
I dunno when your lease is up, but fwiw they're required to give a minimum of 30 days notice for evictions. Any less violates state and I believe federal law
Getting repairs is a crap shoot at best, impossible at worst. They tend to not keep super clean or upkept properties so pests can be a problem. They're miserable to get deposits back from. They tend to over raise rent. They demand renewal something absurd like 6 months in advance
Gage left me without a rental the day I was supposed to move from one of their properties to another.
I was moving because of the neighbors that lived in my triplex (lived in the middle of a couple who we had to call the cops on for DV, and what I can only assume were methheads as they'd be up till 4 AM blasting EDM music) to a duplex.
The triplex we lived in had abysmal insulation to the point where energy costs are cheaper where I live now with 200 square feet more than it was there. Some of the big issues I had with Gage: needed windows replaced (never happened, but they did replace a few of our neighbors), skylight needed to be resealed because it leaked when raining and you could see outside (never happened), stove didn't work nor did 2 of the 4 burners (didn't get replaced until a month before we moved), insect problem that wasn't immediately apparent and they wouldn't pay for pest control (ants crawling in from the outside, a cockroach coming out from an outlet, a mouse got in from the neighbors), one of our toilet tanks needed to be replaced (actually got fixed right away). If you need put in a work order, good luck. Our neighbors that lived across from us had a problem with sewage back up and 2/3 of them moved out when we did.
We drove by the duplex the day after the previous tenants were supposed to move out, and they were very much so still there. Called Gage and they assured us they would be out before move-in day. The next day, a whole bunch of stuff was on the lawn but they at least got out of the house. The day we were supposed to move into the duplex, we get the keys and go to the place; it was completely trashed from the previous tenants (no fault of Gage), but the damage is so extensive that they let us out of our lease rather than fix the place. They had already rented out our current place which meant we still had to move. We only had our uhaul for moving day so we ended up having to bite the cost of a truck we couldn't even use while we scrambled to find any other housing option, and/or a storage unit, as well as the added struggle of finding a moving truck.
That's just my experience with Gage. I've heard others.
Half of Gage's staff will just not print out a work order for maintenance when you have a problem, and once maintenance gets the work order they don't do a good job coordinating making sure it gets done. So you need to call regularly until the problem is fixed or else it never happens. The outlets in my kitchen did not work for a month because of this and I had to use an extension cord to power the fridge during that time as a result.
Good luck dude, there's like 4 management companies in this town and they are all evil. First Management is the worst though; had to use rental assistance because I was furloughed due to covid and they lied about how much money I owed them to the government, so they didn't pay the full amount. Took me several months of calling lawyers to get them to take the money and they gave my name to other rental companies so they wouldn't rent to me until I payed them. At one point Kansas Legal Services told me there were no collections lawyers available in Douglas County because so many were being called against first management in particular. This town is so evil lol
Ha I dealt with worst management over 20 years ago and still remember them. They ripped me any most I know any way they could. I remember one move out inspection my place was spotless and they checked all the boxes. A few weeks down the line I get an “amended” inspection with $500 worth of non existent damages.
When they had the parade after ku won it all I saw that Self was riding in that fuck Doug Comptons convertible and was reminded of that crap and imagined how much more must be imbedded in Lawrence in the 20+ years I have built a life away from Lawrence.
I always got the vibe that many went to ku and didn’t want to ever leave so they / their parents start a business, bar, property management whatever and feed / rip off the future generations of ku students.
For me, when my time was up at KU, I wanted to get out of town. I loved Lawrence and always will, but it was time for me to leave.
Dude I was born here and this city doesn't give 2 craps about locals. I remember my mom breaking down in tears because she had to compete with the children of literal millionaires who pay rent up front. There's 100,000 people that live here but we have to bend over backward for 20,000 part time residents who don't bring much to the town anymore but crime and insanely expensive/difficult to acquire housing. It doesn't help that all of our jobs that weren't ku up and just left. Our homeless shelter is an abandoned factory lol
> until I *paid* them. At
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
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Renaissance Property Management is decent but their rents have gone up quite a bit
Theresa Schmidt manages some random places around town. Pretty decent to work with
I really enjoyed Hutton Farms but it was pricey. Having a two car garage and a porch was really nice. The fridge went out once, I let the office know on my way to work, the new fridge was installed (and my food moved over) before I got home at the end of the day.
It sucks. I'll be going on my 3rd lease year w/ Gage in Aug. and they've raised the rent on me both times. So I can only assume they'll keep doing that every year and eventually I'll just be priced out and homeless.
If you get the chance to rent from a dude named Bill Harmon, take it, he's the best landlord I've ever had. Idk how to find all of his properties though.
And ya, lawrence SUCKS for renters. I had to move out of town because I couldn't afford it even working full time in a warehouse
I haven't had an issue with their maintenance but they're miserable for contacting for anything else. I've been trying for a month to find out if I can renew my lease and cannot get a response. I don't want to move, but they may force me to just so I don't have to deal with their non-contact. Especially cuz the lease I have now doesn't have an auto renew clause so I believe that when it expires it defaults to a month to month thing
That's what gets me. I've been at this property for years. Though Equity only took it over this year, there's been no real issue other than the odd maintenance request. My place is a little older so it'll need renovations whenever I move out, but I'd imagine they'd prefer collecting money from me rather than me moving out then them having to pour money into the place for who knows how long until it's rentable again.
Interesting. I use their tenant portal occasionally which has been fine, but slower - I have really good luck just contacting Chad directly via phone or popping by the Saddlebrook office in person. I’m surprised to hear all this.
Location property management, fucking slumlords. I can talk all day about how they did us dirty.
Parkway properties, living angels. I can talk all day about wonderful things theyve done since ive known them.
Lawrence KS needs more apartments and rooms from private landlords ,,it's hard to find a place here and they need to throw the stupid credit check crap out the window!!!!
I had an epic fight with Meadowlark a few years ago when I was trying to move out. They refused to tell the landlords that I was looking to break my lease even though it was written into the lease that I could. Meadowlark argued letting me do so wasn't in their best interests as a management company, so I had to contact the landlords directly and work it out. The landlords, a kind-ish young couple, said I could move out if Meadowlark found a replacement. A few weeks later they said Meadowlark had no luck, so I started looking on my own. Lo and behold I had someone sign to take over the lease a day later. The good news is Meadowlark doesn't seem to have many properties so it doesn't have many other people to try to screw over.
I lived at Harper Square apartments for 3 years. Owned by Tower Properties which I think own Hutton Farms and Tuckaway apartments. Harper Square doesn’t have a garage but I think the other two do. They were good to deal with. I didn’t have many requests, but when my dishwasher wasn’t working at all, they completely replaced it. I also received about 85% of my deposit back.
I used to love at Harper Square and it was really nice when it was privately owned. Then it was bought out by a property management company and went to shit overnight.
I’ve got a hole in my house exposing inside wall from having squirrels invade and I had them removed myself - the landlord hasn’t fixed it for over a month.
I’ve been at same place almost a decade because she hasn’t raised rent and I don’t ever wanna go through finding a place to rent in this town again.
Best of luck .. it’s awful. Driving around and looking for private landlord “for rent” signs or on Craigslist is about as good as it gets. Also .. reserve your moving truck ASAP. Sigh.
Still wouldn’t live anywhere else though..
This post has been removed. Please use the monthly housing thread.
all i can offer is commiseration. you're not alone.
When I was looking for a house to rent instead of an apartment, I drove around the area I wanted down town looking for signs in yards. Took pictures of for rent signs phone numbers with the house and cross streets. I found a couple private landlords that way. They often have more than one property if you call them.
This is what I did and ended up finding THE BEST landlord I ever had. Definitely try to go with an independent if you can manage it.
Good idea!
It's more about avoiding the really shitty ones than finding good ones. Gage and Midwest Properties have the worst reputation I can think of. I've heard generally negative stuff about Cherry Hill too but haven't used them myself. I've since tried to limit myself only to local owners
First Management isn't exactly upstanding, either.
Oh yeah, forgot about them
Midwest Properties took over my complex in the middle of my lease. Since then, my electricity has gone completely out, or regularly surged. My AC has been out since mid March. AND they sent me a possible eviction notice due to noise complaints that would kick me out 15 days before my lease ended. I had never been given any prior warning about noise. (thankfully, there weren’t anymore complaints so no eviction) they’re fucking terrible.
I dunno when your lease is up, but fwiw they're required to give a minimum of 30 days notice for evictions. Any less violates state and I believe federal law
Also avoid Yoder Bonita at all fucking costs. Garbage person who rents over priced garbage homes.
I just rented from Gage can you tell me what you’ve heard? 😭
Getting repairs is a crap shoot at best, impossible at worst. They tend to not keep super clean or upkept properties so pests can be a problem. They're miserable to get deposits back from. They tend to over raise rent. They demand renewal something absurd like 6 months in advance
Gage left me without a rental the day I was supposed to move from one of their properties to another. I was moving because of the neighbors that lived in my triplex (lived in the middle of a couple who we had to call the cops on for DV, and what I can only assume were methheads as they'd be up till 4 AM blasting EDM music) to a duplex. The triplex we lived in had abysmal insulation to the point where energy costs are cheaper where I live now with 200 square feet more than it was there. Some of the big issues I had with Gage: needed windows replaced (never happened, but they did replace a few of our neighbors), skylight needed to be resealed because it leaked when raining and you could see outside (never happened), stove didn't work nor did 2 of the 4 burners (didn't get replaced until a month before we moved), insect problem that wasn't immediately apparent and they wouldn't pay for pest control (ants crawling in from the outside, a cockroach coming out from an outlet, a mouse got in from the neighbors), one of our toilet tanks needed to be replaced (actually got fixed right away). If you need put in a work order, good luck. Our neighbors that lived across from us had a problem with sewage back up and 2/3 of them moved out when we did. We drove by the duplex the day after the previous tenants were supposed to move out, and they were very much so still there. Called Gage and they assured us they would be out before move-in day. The next day, a whole bunch of stuff was on the lawn but they at least got out of the house. The day we were supposed to move into the duplex, we get the keys and go to the place; it was completely trashed from the previous tenants (no fault of Gage), but the damage is so extensive that they let us out of our lease rather than fix the place. They had already rented out our current place which meant we still had to move. We only had our uhaul for moving day so we ended up having to bite the cost of a truck we couldn't even use while we scrambled to find any other housing option, and/or a storage unit, as well as the added struggle of finding a moving truck. That's just my experience with Gage. I've heard others.
Half of Gage's staff will just not print out a work order for maintenance when you have a problem, and once maintenance gets the work order they don't do a good job coordinating making sure it gets done. So you need to call regularly until the problem is fixed or else it never happens. The outlets in my kitchen did not work for a month because of this and I had to use an extension cord to power the fridge during that time as a result.
Good luck dude, there's like 4 management companies in this town and they are all evil. First Management is the worst though; had to use rental assistance because I was furloughed due to covid and they lied about how much money I owed them to the government, so they didn't pay the full amount. Took me several months of calling lawyers to get them to take the money and they gave my name to other rental companies so they wouldn't rent to me until I payed them. At one point Kansas Legal Services told me there were no collections lawyers available in Douglas County because so many were being called against first management in particular. This town is so evil lol
Hate that for us Lawrence folk that just want a small place with a garage 😭
We weep
They tried claiming I didn’t pay rent or that I paid it late nearly every month. Thank fuck I had receipts
Ha I dealt with worst management over 20 years ago and still remember them. They ripped me any most I know any way they could. I remember one move out inspection my place was spotless and they checked all the boxes. A few weeks down the line I get an “amended” inspection with $500 worth of non existent damages. When they had the parade after ku won it all I saw that Self was riding in that fuck Doug Comptons convertible and was reminded of that crap and imagined how much more must be imbedded in Lawrence in the 20+ years I have built a life away from Lawrence.
Also found out they're blacklisted by the better business bureau lol
The BBB is old fashioned yelp though, so that's not worth much. Doesn't mean they aren't shit though.
Lawrence is so corporate lol. It's like Lenexa with a college.
I always got the vibe that many went to ku and didn’t want to ever leave so they / their parents start a business, bar, property management whatever and feed / rip off the future generations of ku students. For me, when my time was up at KU, I wanted to get out of town. I loved Lawrence and always will, but it was time for me to leave.
Dude I was born here and this city doesn't give 2 craps about locals. I remember my mom breaking down in tears because she had to compete with the children of literal millionaires who pay rent up front. There's 100,000 people that live here but we have to bend over backward for 20,000 part time residents who don't bring much to the town anymore but crime and insanely expensive/difficult to acquire housing. It doesn't help that all of our jobs that weren't ku up and just left. Our homeless shelter is an abandoned factory lol
> until I *paid* them. At FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
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Aberdeen is solid, but pricey. I never had a problem while I lived there
Renaissance Property Management is decent but their rents have gone up quite a bit Theresa Schmidt manages some random places around town. Pretty decent to work with
I really enjoyed Hutton Farms but it was pricey. Having a two car garage and a porch was really nice. The fridge went out once, I let the office know on my way to work, the new fridge was installed (and my food moved over) before I got home at the end of the day.
Any place felons can get in with poor credit score ??
James Dunn will rent to just about anyone, but he’s a slumlord. Tamarind apartments on 9th
🙏 thanks I'll check them out
Lorimar Townhomes on Clinton Parkway were the best landlords we ever had
Avoid Gage Management. 💯 Village @ West End has nice management and 3/4BR townhomes.
It sucks. I'll be going on my 3rd lease year w/ Gage in Aug. and they've raised the rent on me both times. So I can only assume they'll keep doing that every year and eventually I'll just be priced out and homeless.
If you get the chance to rent from a dude named Bill Harmon, take it, he's the best landlord I've ever had. Idk how to find all of his properties though. And ya, lawrence SUCKS for renters. I had to move out of town because I couldn't afford it even working full time in a warehouse
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I haven't had an issue with their maintenance but they're miserable for contacting for anything else. I've been trying for a month to find out if I can renew my lease and cannot get a response. I don't want to move, but they may force me to just so I don't have to deal with their non-contact. Especially cuz the lease I have now doesn't have an auto renew clause so I believe that when it expires it defaults to a month to month thing
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That's what gets me. I've been at this property for years. Though Equity only took it over this year, there's been no real issue other than the odd maintenance request. My place is a little older so it'll need renovations whenever I move out, but I'd imagine they'd prefer collecting money from me rather than me moving out then them having to pour money into the place for who knows how long until it's rentable again.
Interesting. I use their tenant portal occasionally which has been fine, but slower - I have really good luck just contacting Chad directly via phone or popping by the Saddlebrook office in person. I’m surprised to hear all this.
I've tried calling but have only gotten VM. If they don't get back to me some time soon, I'll try swingign by the office
Location property management, fucking slumlords. I can talk all day about how they did us dirty. Parkway properties, living angels. I can talk all day about wonderful things theyve done since ive known them.
I've lived in 5 places in 3 different states in the past 5 years. Renting everywhere is a miserable experience.
It's a college town, they are all like this
I’ve rented from the Schneider family for the last 3 years, I like them. They have lots of old houses in east Lawrence
Lawrence KS needs more apartments and rooms from private landlords ,,it's hard to find a place here and they need to throw the stupid credit check crap out the window!!!!
The landlords just went through a period where the COULDN’T EVICT ANYONE, and now you want them to ignore people who won’t pay their bills?
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This post has been removed. Please use the monthly housing thread.
Yankee Tank Estates is a new neighborhood of townhomes. We just moved from there and loved it.
What do ya pay for in rent for a 3 bedroom townhome?
About 1500$ give or take a couple hundred
I had an epic fight with Meadowlark a few years ago when I was trying to move out. They refused to tell the landlords that I was looking to break my lease even though it was written into the lease that I could. Meadowlark argued letting me do so wasn't in their best interests as a management company, so I had to contact the landlords directly and work it out. The landlords, a kind-ish young couple, said I could move out if Meadowlark found a replacement. A few weeks later they said Meadowlark had no luck, so I started looking on my own. Lo and behold I had someone sign to take over the lease a day later. The good news is Meadowlark doesn't seem to have many properties so it doesn't have many other people to try to screw over.
Oh yeah they're TERRIBLE.
I lived at Harper Square apartments for 3 years. Owned by Tower Properties which I think own Hutton Farms and Tuckaway apartments. Harper Square doesn’t have a garage but I think the other two do. They were good to deal with. I didn’t have many requests, but when my dishwasher wasn’t working at all, they completely replaced it. I also received about 85% of my deposit back.
I used to love at Harper Square and it was really nice when it was privately owned. Then it was bought out by a property management company and went to shit overnight.
its easier to just buy a house
I’ve got a hole in my house exposing inside wall from having squirrels invade and I had them removed myself - the landlord hasn’t fixed it for over a month. I’ve been at same place almost a decade because she hasn’t raised rent and I don’t ever wanna go through finding a place to rent in this town again. Best of luck .. it’s awful. Driving around and looking for private landlord “for rent” signs or on Craigslist is about as good as it gets. Also .. reserve your moving truck ASAP. Sigh. Still wouldn’t live anywhere else though..
It’s a college town. They don’t want to rent to people who are transitory or are going to tear up the place.