Background:
Two months ago, I was blindsided when my landlady of over ten years decided to sell the condo we've been leasing for ten years and wanted us out in less than two months, an inconvenience for which she was willing to compensate us. Instead of eight months to find a place, we had forty-five days. Worse still, because of the recent fires in Altadena, the rental market was in even worse shape than usual. Some landlords illegally inflated prices to gouge desperate people who had lost homes in the fires, and even without gouging, much of the supply in the rental market was gone due to the sudden jump in demand just two months earlier. Needless to say, we were looking for a home with very little time and even fewer prospects.
Once the shock wore off, I got down to business. I jumped onto Zillow and started looking. I applied to many houses and condos I found, and I was able to get tours of a few. After a week, I had three properties lined up, one in Duarte, one in San Dimas, and one in Azusa. The real estate agent handling the Duarte property, like everyone else these days, required separate applications and credit checks from all prospective adult tenants, and since my two college student sons would be moving with us, they had to apply as well. My eldest son had issues with TransUnion because he had no credit file, and the real estate agent was completely unhelpful and inflexible. We were lucky to be able to use the same application package from RentSpree to apply to the San Dimas property. In that instance, the property owner, who had been seriously burned by her last tenant who abused the pandemic-era eviction moratorium to skip years of rent payments, was skittish and kept asking for more and more assurances. Every time I provided her with what she wanted, she asked for more. Three months of paystubs became four, one year of tax returns became two, 3 months of bank statements became six. When she wanted a copy of my CalPERS and CalSTRS retirement accounts, I called it off.
My experience with Lotus Property Services:
Enter Alondra from Lotus Property Services. Alondra followed up with me as soon as I reached out, and arranged to show me the Azusa property. I brought my daughter with me to view the condo, and we both liked it well enough, so I moved forward with trying to make the deal happen. At this point, mind you, I was starting to worry that I would not find a new home in time.
Lotus Property Services, which I'll just call Lotus from now on, has its own proprietary application and property system, so I wasn't able to just send them my RentSpree application. At first, I was annoyed at having to pay another application fee and to fill out a bunch more paperwork, but as it happens, it was worth the trouble. I'll discuss that later. I submitted all the required fees, uploaded the necessary documentation, and filled out all the forms and prepared to wait. I didn't have to wait long. Alondra reached out and offered us the home. After a little confusion about how to read my credit union's bank statements (to be fair, it's very hard to follow), Lotus was satisfied that I was able to handle the lease payment without relying on my wife's credit or income, so we signed the lease agreement.
Alondra was there through every step of the process. She made herself available at all hours, seven days a week via text message, and she was quick to reply. From first contact to the handover of the property, Alondra made us feel like valued clients, and she went out of her way to make the process as painless and pleasant as possible. She even had the old fridge hauled away (we have our own we wanted to keep) and had the carpets reshampooed before we moved in.
Lotus has an incredible lease agreement. The thing is a real beast, just over a hundred pages long (no joke). While this may seem daunting, it is actually a good thing. I'd rather know exactly what's expected of me than to get ready to move out one day only to find I might lose my security deposit because I used the granite countertops as a cutting board or let my buddy bring his dog into the house. The agreement sets out clear expectations, and that protects both the homeowner and the tenant.
We just finished our first month in the property, and what's really nice is being able to pay rent through Lotus's online rental management system. No more writing checks and tracking down my landlady. I just set up autopay and walk away! Even better, the online system also holds the lease agreement, detailed photos of the unit, and more. It's really quite convenient.
Overall, I am very satisfied with Lotus and with Alondra, the rep who worked with us to secure our new home. I highly recommend them if you want a no-nonsense experience finding a home or leasing out your own property. read more