This question has actually come up more and more as the ease of searching for an apartment’s online has become the primary method of matching landlords with tenants.
As a tenant, you should get the exact apartment that is shown on the rental property’s website.
But we know that doesn’t always happen, hence the reason I am talking to you about this today.
Almost to a person, we have been “Catfished” at some point in our lives. Whether it is the fake pictures on the dating site, the car that isn’t quite as good as the owner made it seem in the online posting, or more often, the hotel that you stay in that is NOT what was shown on the site.
I am going to take you, as a renter, through what you need to do to be sure that you are getting what you think you are paying for.
Know What You Are Renting
The age of the internet and social media makes it incredibly easy to share and post a picture of almost anything to anyone. This includes pictures of things people are putting up for sale. And whether that sale is permanent, or for a specific time period, like the period on your lease, or a hotel for the weekend, people can be misled very easily.
One of the most common techniques that hotels use to rent their property out is by a “Bait And Switch”. They will advertise their hotel online as “Newly Renovated” with everything looking brand spanking new and just as sparkly clean as you could get!
So, you book the room, feeling good about your decision making and don’t think about it again until you pull into the hotel and check-in. The manager gives you a couple of room keys, and the moment you walk in the door, total shock.
The room smells like smoke and animals. It is smaller than advertised, dark, there is no fan in the bathroom, the remote has a cord on it tied into the wall, and the décor is from 1987.
You have just been had.
How do hotels do this?
The most common practice is for them to renovate ONE SINGLE ROOM, take pictures of that room, and then post it as the main picture for the rest of their hotel. They can then say that their “renovations are not complete” and be free of any liability of false advertising. Because…….technically……the renovations are not complete.
Meanwhile, you just overpaid for a dump that you are now stuck with for the weekend. And the majority of people are not going to complain. The ones that do, the options are going to be limited. The hotel MAY have a nicer room they are willing to put you in because you called their bluff, but if they don’t have another room, it is going to be tough getting out of the hotel room and finding suitable accommodations at the last second.
The exact same thing can happen in the apartment renting world.
A landlord will have SOME of his rooms renovated, so they will take pictures of those rooms and post them for ALL of their listings. The prospective tenants pay the application fees, go through the whole process, and when they go to move in, they see that the building isn’t as nice as it showed in the picture, the layout of the apartment isn’t the same, and it isn’t NEARLY as nice and new as they wanted you to believe on the rental site.
So, what do you do as a tenant to avoid being taken?
Go For A Walkthrough
The first and best step you should take is by going through a physical walkthrough of the apartment at the complex, with the manager.
Make sure that you ask the manager on the phone that the apartment they are going to walk you through is the exact apartment you viewed online and applied for, and the exact apartment you will potentially move in to.
This ensures that the apartment complex stays on the up and up, and doesn’t hold back their best apartments for the next easy sell if they think you are just going to move into whatever apartment they put you in.
Doing a walkthrough also allows you to see what you are going to be leasing with your own eyes. That way, if there is anything that causes you concern, you can either address it with the manager or just choose not to rent with them.
Obviously, if they ARE trying to pull a “bait and switch”, it isn’t an apartment complex you are going to want to rent from anyways. If the landlord or manager are pulling those type of shenanigans, you can be assured that that’s not the only thing they are doing that’s shady. Find somewhere else to rent from.
What To Do If You Sense A Bait And Switch
If you DO get into a situation where the apartment complex is not what you signed up for, and you have already paid the application fees for the background and credit check here is what you need to do.
Tell the manager that the apartment you did the walkthrough in was not the apartment that was shown on the website. Whatever reason they have for it doesn’t matter at this point; it isn’t the same one. Then, politely ask for your application fee back, which they will more than likely have to cut you a check for.
It is your choice whether or not to accept if they choose to show and move you to an apartment that is more like the one on the website. They are going to do anything to avoid negative reviews online and will probably bend over to make you happy at this point. However, just be cautious about accepting this, because if they are skirting the line and not being completely honest with that, then you can be assured there are other things going on as well.
In the end, make sure that you do a physical walkthrough, with the manager, to make sure that you are getting the apartment whose pictures and features attracted you to it online in the first place. If it isn’t exactly as advertised, then politely ask for your money back and take your business elsewhere.
