I signed a 12-month lease with Irish Residential, which I paid in its entirety but of which I only stayed for 8 months due to a breathing issue I developed while living there. Yes, as a broke, recent post-grad, I chose to pay rent for a second, different place rather than live in this house for another 120 days. I'd give zero stars if I could.
The condition of the house upon move-in was appalling. When I saw the house for the first time before signing a lease, it was bad, but I was assured that it was the previous tenant's doing and that it would be thoroughly cleaned before I arrived again. Keep in mind, we saw multiple houses from Irish Residential and this was the best one (there was literally a dead bat in another one). I was a fool to believe that. No one had sat foot in this house, especially not to clean or improve the property, between my initial visit and my move-in.
Someone else's dirty furniture was still there, bugs were everywhere, water damaged the basement ceiling which they covered with tiles but did not repair, stickiness or dust covered every surface, outside vines on windows were growing inside, multiple smoke alarms were beeping because their batteries were out, lightbulbs were only in the kitchen and bathrooms which could be why I didn't see or register the extent of the issues on my initial visit, especially in the basement where there was storage stacked including dirty underwear and feminine products, and I still could go on.
Come to find out, cleaners did show up but it was too dark for them to work safely, so they left. I took photos for documentation, which mostly consisted of the last tenant's unhygienic furniture which was my main concern at the time of move-in. I called to complain immediately upon walking through the house, and they came to get the furniture out and "clean", which they did quickly and NOT efficiently. Yet, despite all of this being reported in the first hours, when our lease was up, over half of my security deposit was being kept for cleaning fees and fridge brackets, which were also missing upon move-in, when this place was cleaner than when I'd arrived due to our occupancy.
The nightmare didn't stop on move-in day. There was at least 10° difference between the basement and second floor from the first floor, there were only window ACs which my bedroom window wouldn't support and management led me on about buying one for several hot months, the downstairs bathroom was unusable to the point that maintenance told us to keep the water off in there because it would definitely flood, and there were three sets of washers and dryers and only one set worked, which was all we needed, but the other washers would flood and management wouldn't move them out, because it wasn't "necessary". Doors wouldn't stay shut, loose wires were found, etc. There were leaking radiators, clogged drains from the previous tenants, and an ancient trash shoot in the house near the kitchen that still had trash in it from who knows how long ago. The radiator even flooded the place in the winter, including in my bedroom, ruining my furniture, for which maintenance wouldn't come out to fix until after I went to work the next day. I stayed up all night, drying towels to reuse them to reduce the flooding.
I lived in one of the basement bedrooms, which was added on as a bedroom at some point in time, didn't have adequate ventilation, located right next to the boiler room (aka hot and loud), and was in close proximity to the water damage, all of which are a recipe for mold, causing my breathing issue. My allergies were exorbitantly worse in this house than when I subsequently lived with a cat and I'm very allergic to cats. These issues were on top of this house being filthy. The uncleanliness of the place was a constant battle.
Near my move-out, I sent my photo documentation to the new property manager, explaining my situation, to which he pretended to be concerned. However, when day 44 of 45 hit from the official move-out date (the longest they can hold onto a deposit), he sent the charges and then pictures of areas we didn't clean when we moved out, even though those issues existed when we moved in as we inherited someone else's mess.
Honestly, I am less concerned about the money as I am about the principle, considering the condition in which we lived because they were unable or unwilling to fix issues with that house. I should have called code enforcement or the buildings department when I was there; I urge anyone who lives in one of Irish Residential's locations to do so... Or better yet, just don't ever sign a lease with them. I learned my lesson.
Oh, and the kicker, new management said we were good tenants and wanted us to sign another lease for 50% INCREASED rent from what we paid for the first lease with NO improvements or renovations. At least they have a sense of humor. I now live in a multiple bedroom and bathroom luxury apartment in the same area for that exact same price. read more
