Some Other Humorous Tales

Not everything that was horrible about Coho was due to manager/maintenance troubles though.  Many things just outright sucked about the apartment in general.  The one window I had at the end of my apartment (which I will reiterate, was like a hallway) had no screen and was quite large.  There were multiple times, and one very scary moment, when I almost fell out.  The thing began below my knees and when opened (which it often had to be) it was quite dangerous to walk around it.  I was on the top floor, but if I did fall out, my fall would have most likely been broken by the railings of the deck one floor below me.

Having only one window led to other problems as well, such as having no air circulation at all.  For example, we had a "heat wave" during the latter part of the summer I lived in that apartment.  Now, "heat wave" by Seattle standards means over 90 degrees.  Yet, I have now lived here long enough where I am used to this weather and that now sucks.  Anyways, the heat wave peaked on a Wednesday where it hit, I believe, around 96 or so degrees.  Me and some friends spent the day at the beach and for some reason thought the best idea was to pack into my apartment afterwards (most likely due to my newly purchased Wii).  Once there, we figure the best idea is to make a frozen pizza for all of us.  What were you thinking you might ask?  Obviously we weren't.  The four of us are now packed into a small confined space on the hottest day of the year, with the oven on, no air circulation, and playing Wii.  We are sweating profusely.  The fan by the window attempts in vain to get air coming our way, but it is no hope.

Then everything came to a head when our glorious downstairs neighbors continued their habit of barbequing on their deck.  Now, our only window to the outside world turns on us as smoke floods into my apartment, with help from a fan, and makes things unbearable.  The only option is to close the window.  The room instantly becomes a sauna and is still full of smoke.

(Side note: I don't understand the smoke detector in that apartment.  I swear to you, anytime the oven was ever opened that thing would go off instantly (including when we had pizza that day).  I was seriously amazed.  In one swift motion of opening the oven door the smoke alarm would go off across the room.  Yet, when the entire apartment is filled with smoke, not a beep.  It makes no sense.)

The four of us are approaching asphyxiation and we need to get out.  I futilely turn on the bathroom fan in hopes that the smoke will go away and we all flood out into the hallway and close the door.  Now, we have been at the beach all day and we look pretty ridiculous.  We are all crammed into this linoleum hallway, a light flickering above our head, wearing only our swimsuits.  The only thing I could think was that I hoped no one walked into the hall and see us standing there.  Luckily, no one did, and after a few minutes we went back inside only a little worse for wear.

Speaking of annoying neighbors, my lovely neighbor to my right liked to play loud music.  I know this is a stereotypical complaint and normally I wouldn't care, except IT WAS ALWAYS THE SAME SONG!  I don't want to hear the Gorillaz's "Feel Good Inc." everyday for a year like you do!  I never liked that song and it gave me all the more reason to hate it more.  At least it wasn't played as often after the entire floor got a noise complaint because of you.

And how about building security?  On multiple occasions the door had a key broken off into it.  This led to two possibilities.  Either someone would have to climb over the gate and open the door (we had a gated entry as opposed to one of those stupid secure indoor entries) or just leave the door open.  Only once someone had to climb the gate.  All other times (once for over a week) the door was just left completely open.  It's OK though, it's not like the U-District is a crime filled haven where people are constantly getting mugged/attacked/shot right?  Right?  Damn.

Oh and sometimes the water was brown.

Almost Making The Same Mistake Twice

You would think that after all of this I would never set foot near a Coho building again.  Yet, when the time grew near that I was going to move out I almost moved into another Coho building.  In fact, if it wasn't for Coho's sheer incompetence I probably would have.

Me and my girlfriend were searching out a new apartment to move into for the Fall.  We watched Craigslist for awhile, but nothing we really cared for seemed to come up.  We went to a few places, but nothing caught our eye.  We didn't think much of it because we had plenty of time.

We realized we didn't have plenty of time.  All of a sudden we were down to the wire.  Six weeks left on the lease and we had nowhere to live... Uh oh.  Against all of my better judgments, we took a look at another Coho building.

This is when I realized they were all the same.  The layouts were different, but they were just as crappy, if not worse.  The kitchens still sucked, the bathrooms were horrible, and always the second bedroom wasn't really a bedroom.  Seriously, you can't just add an armoire to any room and call it a bedroom.  What was even worse was just how expensive these places were and you were still getting screwed.

But what does the guy showing us around tell me?  Oh, that since I'm already in Coho he can just transfer us to this place since I'm on file, security deposit and all.  I didn't like any of the places, but one of them was bearable.  Well, not really, but for some reason me and my girlfriend decided we would just take it.  Trying to find a new place was becoming super stressful.  Nothing good was coming up, everything was super expensive, and we were out of time.  Safe to say, we were beyond desperate.  A little later we call the guy back to tell him we are going to take the place.  The thing is though, we had to leave a message, because he wasn't there.

He didn't call back.  Well, we figure we'll keep looking around anyways, just incase.  Long story short, we find an amazing place for a great deal and the guy from Coho never returned our call.  Thank God.

Just Let It End!

Like everything with Coho, moving out was quite the chore.  The lease for my new place started in August and my lease for Coho wasn't up until the end of September (yes, I wanted to leave that bad), so I could be ready to move out whenever.  In fact, I did move out most of my stuff slowly over the month to the new place, yet wasn't sure when I'd be officially moved out.  After some back and forth with my manager, it eventually led to a "just let me know when you are done."  Ah yes, such certainty is always a good sign.

There is one interesting story during the actual moving process worth telling.  And in fact, this story isn't even Coho's fault, but it's just yet another thing that I couldn't believe happened while living there.  And what does it involve?  Star Trek CCG cards.  Yes, anyone who knows me also knows I am a nerd and have a few thousand of these things.  Now, moving up and down stairs is always a pain.  And maybe you can already tell where this story is going.  Me and my girlfriend are carrying loads of stuff down the stairs while moving out.  She has my cards.  It all seemed to happen in slow motion.  I see her stumble and fall onto her butt.  The entire box of cards flies into the air.  My eyes grow wide in shock.  The cards flood down like a wave over the stairs... down... down... and continue along out under the gate and into the bushes outside.  We just stare.  Looking back on it, it was actually quite beautiful.  At the time though, it took forty five minutes to clean them all up.  Many of them I ended up just getting rid of because they were so covered in junk it wasn't worth the time to clean them.  Just another thing that made my stay at those apartments much more fun.

After we finally finished moving everything out of my apartment, it was cleaning time.  This led to a couple interesting discoveries.  One, no one has cleaned behind the fridge in at least two years (because that was how long ago the date was on the receipt (one of many things) I found behind it).  Two, the kitchen floor wasn't off-white, but in fact, white.  It was annoying actually, because we started scrubbing the floor and then realized that it was noticeably a different color underneath.  All of a sudden about a 1/10th of the floor was visibly white with a very obvious line between the white and off-white.  Thus, we ended up having to scrub the entire floor down to even it out.  This led to more near asphyxiation (see: chemicals + no ventilation) and another hour of work.  What a pain.

Finally we are done and I'm ready to let my manager know I'm ready to do my move-out.  I head downstairs and knock on the door.  No one answers.  Well, it isn't his office hours so I figure I'll just have to come back tomorrow (believe it or not, by this time I am back down to only working one job, so I actually, you know, have time).

I specifically make note of the office hours and come back the next day.  I head on inside and see a note on the door "Went to drop off papers at the main office, be back in 15 minutes."  I knock just incase and no response.  So I stand there in the hall for about twenty minutes waiting... and waiting... which is actually quite boring.  I figure I might as well just go up to my apartment and watch out the window for my manager to come back.  So I head back up, and wait... and wait... and after another twenty or so minutes I figure maybe I just missed my manager.  I go downstairs and knock on the door, no response.  I wait again.  I head back upstairs again.  Finally, about an hour after I got there, my manager gets back.  I go back down and let her (Yes, at some point during my stay my manager had some girl move in and co-manage.  I have no idea of the relationship of these two or when it even happened as we were never really told, what a surprise) know that I'm done moving out and ready for a walk-out.  Oh, but apparently I have to make an appointment for that.  Thanks other manager for the "just let me know".  Way to ignore policy!  An hour wasted doing nothing and all I get is this lousy appointment!  I just want this to be over!

A few days later I get the move-out over with leaving just one thing left: the security deposit.  I'm told it will take two weeks to get.

Three weeks go by and no security deposit.  My managers I had don't manage there anymore, so I email the Coho main office.  I get an auto response that whoever runs this lousy Real Estate company is out of town... for a month.  The email gives me another email address and I email them.  Days go by without a response.  Finally, I get an email telling me that I should have the refund in a few days.  This tells me, "Oh yeah, we forgot to mail that to you."  And after almost a month, I get my security deposit back.  I don't even care to wonder what they took out of it, because it's finally over.

Conclusion

One could argue that I'm the exception or that I expected too much from Coho Real Estate.  Well, I've heard other tales from other people, and while I may have had a worse experience, no one that I've known has ever had a good experience.  That says something.  And as for what to expect?  I didn't assume first class service, but I did expect basic amenities, like you know, lights, a proper toilet, hot water.  Is that too much to ask?

If you've read this whole article, I commend you because it is quite long, but I really felt like this was a tale that had to be told.  Not just for me, but for anyone who ever has or ever will rent from Coho or any of the other real estate companies around the country that I'm sure are its mirror image.  Apartment buildings can be run correctly, I know.  I live in such a place now.  But sadly, as long as there are people looking to save money, there will also be people ready to take advantage of them.

Yet, in the issue of fairness, I will tell all sides of the story.  Thus, to wrap up this article, I will tell you about all the positives of living in my apartment.

The Positives!

It had a nice view.

The End

<<Part 2 - Back to Part 1<<

Jaybird currently resides in Seattle where he reads comics, works in a library, and writes for this site.  He has also been known to blow your mind, rock your world, and eat pizza.