Alban Place Townhouses    |    Sandra Watkins    |    Frederick    ,    Maryland     Landlord Complaint 20-0897

Thirty days after signing our lease with Alban Place in March 2010, we learned that the home was infested with bed bugs. We contacted the leasing office to notify them of the issue. They offered to have the place exterminated at their expense, however we were responsible for preparing our home for extermination. The list of preparations included packing our house in space bags, taking all of our washables to a laundromat to dry everything for 20 minutes, etc. This process was costly and took a lot of time as my husband and I did not have the time to take off work. We spent nearly $3000.00 on this ordeal. Our house was finally able to be "unpacked" again in June 2010. In September 2010, I found another live bed bug crawling on my clothing. I have again advised the leasing office of the issue and they are willing to pay for the extermination, but I still have to pay again to prepare my home. I do not want to continue living out of boxes and cannot afford to continue to absorb the costs. Upon talking to one of my neighbors, I learned that her family had the same experience upon moving in here. When I commented to the management that they needed to exterminate all of their homes, they replied that not everyone prepares their homes according to the instructions and they can't get rid of the issue. I asked the extermination company to send me a copy of their reports from the first extermination and I know for sure that in one of the instances, the exterminator falsified what was done. I had only been gone from the house for 5-7 minutes prior to returning to retrieve my wallet, in which time the exterminator had arrived at the house entered and was getting ready to leave again. On the report, she claims to have sprayed several surfaces in the house and outside the house. The rental office does not provide any oversight of the exterminations or any verification that the services have been performed. At this point, all I want is to terminate my lease without penalty. I will take care of cleaning my things prior to relocating and then they can exterminate this entire place to ensure the next tenants won't have the same issue. I just need assistance.