TheVillages Hometown PropertyManagement Company A -RIPOFF From Hometown Property Management Company The Villages Florida The Villages Florida

  Villages Hometown Property Management Company: We bought an investment property in January, 2017, and decided to have it managed by The Villages Hometown Property Management (HPM). After meeting with their representative, we moved forward to acquire all of the home accessories required on their list (4 pages of items) in order have the property "accepted" into the HPM rental program. The required accessory inventory list was very extensive………to the point of being ridiculous. After acquiring all of the required items on the list and placing or installing them in the home, we were told that everything was in order for HPM to "accept" the property, and we went on a cruise for a week. While we were on the cruise, they contacted us repeatedly and we had to deal with them on the phone, text messages and emails…...needless to say all of that put a major damper on our vacation!

Once again, after going through all of this back and forth and answering multiple questions posed by HPM, we thought that we were finally going to be able to start renting our home and generating income. WRONG!! Hometown still needed to take pictures of the property for its web site (which ended up being terrible photos), and then we found out about all of their website issues.......ugh!! Finally, after all of the red tape and delays, around March 1st, we thought our home would start renting and generating income. Wrong again!! HPM had to do one more 'final inventory' check, and this time they decided that our dish cloths were not acceptable (after not raising this issue previously), and they took it upon themselves to throw them away without our consent. When we found this out, we told them that we were unhappy about them taking this unilateral action, and also told them we wanted to be compensated for our personal property; unbelievably, the snarky response we received was "what do you think used dish rags are worth?" Ultimately, we were essentially forced (if we wanted the home to be approved by HPM for the program) to purchase brand new dish cloths, and we were never reimbursed for anything, or even given an apology!

The next issue we encountered, shortly after we returned from our cruise, was a phone call from The Villages Sales Office on a Sunday afternoon, who told us a neighbor had reported that there was water running out from under our garage door. So we immediately went to the house, where we found that the hot water heater was gushing water out the top. We called HPM and we were told that someone from their office had been there earlier in the day and they had "prepped" the house for our first tenants (who were due to check-in the next day), and the HPM person had turned on the hot water heater in preparation for the guests. When we called HPM, we asked if someone could come over and help us deal with this major leak issue, and their response was to suggest that we "call a plumber." Seriously, we said, 'what are we paying you for?' When our home started renting, items were taken by tenants in the 5 months HPM was managing our home…items taken…dish rags, cutting board, king-sized pillow, bath towels and wash clothes…..we again complained and were told "that's normal wear and tear"........good grief that's just ridiculous!!

If you have a home managed by HPM be prepared to have things taken......and you will be expected to replace those items that are taken! HPM contacted us regarding a yard plant that was dying. We then contacted the Landscaping company which taking care of our yard. They immediately said they would check the setting on the irrigation system, but they needed access to the garage. We contacted HPM because there were tenants in the home at the time, and requested they take care of the meeting with the landscaping company (which the landscaping rep. wanted to handle on July 4th), and HPM told us that we'd have to handle it ourselves (again)........seriously?? Why are we handling all of these issues while HPM is collecting a 20% management fee for doing nothing!!?? HPM is a great property management company if you like 1) dealing with disgusting, pompous attitudes, 2) having your requests repeatedly ignored, 3) if you want to take care of all of the maintenance issues on your own home, 4) having to deal with having your personal items stolen and being told by HPM that's just 'normal wear and tear' all while they take 20% of your rental proceeds for doing NOTHING, then HPM is the firm that you should hire to manage your property!!! Just Disgusted