M10| Friday, March 13, 2020 THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
MANSION
IN THE TRENCHES| AMY GAMERMAN
Q
Have you ever had a bad experience
with a rental property?
These Realtors Were Rent Asunder
MELANIE GOLDBERGER
Director, residential sales
The Agency, Pacific Palisades, Calif.
I was a brand-new agent. I got this
lead for a lease. The woman was
recently divorced. She was living
downstairs in a duplex building and
she could hear the owner’s dog
running on the hardwood floors up-
stairs. She was miserable. She said,
“I need something quiet.”
I spent a few days with her and
found her a place in Bel-Air she
liked. We got the paperwork done
and she was going to move in. She
was my first client. I had even
bought her a little gift basket from
Trader Joe’s. It is 6:00 in the morn-
ing, and suddenly I get a million
texts, and picture, picture, picture.
The backyard was completely
ripped up. It wasn’t like that when
we looked at the place. The home
was filthy, garbage everywhere.
The fridge had been ripped out, the
washer-dryer was gone. We have
no idea why—it was written in the
lease that they would be there.
Obviously, there was a big mis-
communication. The landlord was
living in China, and there was aproperty manager who either lived
there or used it as his home base.
Maybe the property manager didn’t
talk to the owner—maybe they were
planning on redoing it. I don’t know.
The client was like, “What the
[expletive]! I have movers coming!
This is unacceptable!”
I text the other agent who was
like, “It’s no big deal, she can still
move in.” I was like, “No, she can’t!”
The client canceled the movers.
She was a lawyer. She made it her
mission to sue everyone possible.
She tried to sue us. She sued the
other broker. The broker said, “You CRISTINA SPANO (2)Our lawyer got in touch with
their lawyer and said, “This is your
problem; you’re the listing broker,
you should have checked it out.”
We didn’t pay a dime. I did offer to
find [the client] another place, but
she said, “I don’t think so.”
Everyonesays,“Youalwaysre-
member your first lease. Now that
you’ve done that, anything will
seem easy.”
If people are leasing, it’s often
not for a great cause: Someone is
getting a divorce, or they had a
flood in their house. The [expletive]
always hits the fan.TIM ALLEN
Real-estate agent
Coldwell Banker, Carmel, Calif.This is an iconic, incredible property
on the 18th hole at Pebble Beach.
It is Billionaires’ Row—it’s ocean-
front and the views are incredible. I
own it. We have a family portfolio
of very high-end, unique rentals. I’m
a real-estate junkie.
This specific property is a 1937
home on 1.6 acres. It had a lot of
neat visitors: Jack Nicklaus, Eisen-
hower. Bing Crosby used to hang out
there. We totally restored it. I rent it
by the month for anywhere from
$50,000 to $300,000, depending.
These were clients of mine. They
were looking for something special
[to buy] in Pebble Beach. I thought,
“Thisisgreat.Icanrentittothem
while they are here looking.” I
showed them the house and they
loved it. So they got a nice deal,
but it was good for me, too.
We checked them in. They bought
their groceries, filled the fridge. Ev-
erything was great. Then the next
morning I get a message from the
client, saying. “You probably heardwhat happened.”
I call him back and he says,
“There was a rat in the kitchen
trash bin.”
We’ve had this house a year and
a half, and we’ve never seen a rat.
Lamborghini rents the house; AT&T
rented it for the U.S. Open. I rush
out there, and the wife is just freak-
ing out. It turns out she has this
phobia of rats; she is just shaking. I
call my team in and we opened up
the bin. There was no rat, but we
found a little hole in the back. An old
trash compactor had been there un-
der the sink. When we remodeled
everything in the house, we had
pulled it out and replaced it, but the
builders forgot to plug the hole.
I was like, “Hey, don’t worry, we’ll
take care of it.”
But she was done. They packed
up their car and left their food in
the fridge and they were gone. I
didn’t collect anything.
They did catch the rat the next
day. I saw a picture of him. They
put a little clear piece of plastic
over the hole, like a window for
him. We kept traps everywhere.
But we never saw another one.and I need to kick in $1,000 each
to make this go away. I’ve been
around a long time and I’m gonna
make your real-estate life terrible.”
I was shaking.
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