Encore Realty J.K. Property Management ripoff is too light of a word to use, these guys are scammers Sandy Utah

My family and I moved across country to start a new job and needed a place immediately. We thought this place was a gem with immediate availability. Even though the carpet was stained and the patch jobs in the walls were shoddy at best we were assured it had all been noted and we would not be fined for damages. After the first few months we received a court summons that we owed them over $1500 in fees and unpaid balance. Then were toldthat we had to pay $50 per adult in the household for water trash and sewer and were able to produce a letter that neither of us signed yet had our signatures stating that we agreed to these terms instead of what was on the lease ($50 flat rate.) We reluctantly paid. We moved out after our year lease giving them a forwarding address and a 30 day notice to vacate. We made sure the apartment was in better condition than when we moved in.

Over a year and a half of no contact from this company we received court papers saying we owed $6500 some odd dollars to the company for damage and repairs. We attempted to fight it even went to a lawyer to see what our options were and we were told to just settle out of court because it would be cheaper. We contacted the maintenance supervisor that worked for the company when we moved in and he said he would testify that a number of the pictures they had were like that when we moved in. We were told that the company would fight his testimony and not allow him to testify for us. We contacted the on site property manager that was there when we moved in and a totally different one that was there when we moved out. The company stated they have no records of those people working as on site property managers and it would be thrown out as hearsay. We found later that the property managers did not have a realtors license which for some odd reason is needed for the duties they are expected to perform. We disputed almost all of the charges and was able to get them to take a couple charges off lowering the amount owed to $5912. The company argued they had the carpet cleaned 5 times which we were charged for then replaced, then the company charged us $25 for lightbulbs after we made certain that all of the lights worked when we left.

During our time at their property the company had contacted meon my cell phone multiple ttimes. When we received this new summons they said that they had attempted to make contact, but we never received any demand letters or phone calls. The pictures they offered as evidence could have been any apartment, or taken at any time. There was no time or date stamp no video evidence unedited or otherwise showing this was the apartment we left in that condition. We were also advised by the neighbors that lived there (and still do) that nothing was done to the apartment and a new family moved in briefly before they were evicted. After speaking with an attorney who told us it would be cheaper to settle out of court since our jobs depend on our credit (and we could lose them if we got any bad marks on our credit) we decided to take bad advice from a bad attorney. After talking with other previous residents we have heard the same complaint, that they have all gotten court summons stating that they owe an extravagant amount of money as well. When the company gets a bad name or too many lawsuits against them they "go out of business" and change their names to one of three  (the two listed are the most common, the third one I can't remember or find record of.) If I were to go after recompense I would target the owner directly so this cannot be done and the money is lost to the winds. Thank you for reading this and hopefully this warning helps you realize how horrible these people are.