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PaYahoo101's avatar
PaYahoo101
Explorer
Dec 31, 2014

Tarpon Springs 55+ community nightmare

wish we had stuck with our RV for wintering in Fla. Instead we rented a place at Sun Valley Estates in Tarpon Springs. Double wide sounded to be a great upgrade from our TT. Has turned into a nightmare. We were assured by the park that the guy we were renting from was an upstanding owner. Turns out when we get here he bought five units that should have been demolished and did little to upgrade them. Dirty, mold, mildew, minimal furnishings, etc. Of course he is not going to give our money back. We plan to fight for it but not feeling confident we will actually get it back. Gives us a bad taste when dealing with people who only care about money. Hoping we can get the county to condemn the properties as uninhabitable. Good luck getting them to investigate any time soon.
PS: you might not want to rent from John Reed, he also has properties in tampa from what i have been told.
RV Lifestyle
  • C-Bears's avatar
    C-Bears
    Explorer
    Jan 15, 2015
    My wife has a friend that wanted to rent a place this summer in SW Florida. She looked at all the photos on line and it looked nice. Before she committed she had another friend actually go look at the unit to make sure it was okay.

    You do have to be careful down here, some folks will take advantage of you.
  • arnko37's avatar
    arnko37
    Explorer
    Jan 14, 2015
    We live in Florida but head north for the summer. We have a HUMIDISTAT. That is a small unit that goes next to the thermostat. It measures the humidity and when it gets too high(you preset it)it will turn on the AC.It cost less than $100 and saves money because the AC does not run when its not needed to dry out the air.
  • lizzie's avatar
    lizzie
    Explorer
    Jan 01, 2015
    I am so sorry that this happened to you. I own a condo in South Florida that was rented for two years to a professional couple from South America. They were wonderful tenants, but when they left I learned that they did not use the A/C as they considered it to be too expensive. As a result, I had a major mildew and mold problem that required professional cleaning. Fortunately my property manager discovered the problem before we rented it again. In Florida the A/C doesn't just combat the heat, it is necessary to fight the humidity. lizzie
  • azrving's avatar
    azrving
    Explorer
    Dec 31, 2014
    Being from the north, the thing that we have to do is winterize to prevent freeze damage. I was told that a lot of the time in Florida you need to run the ac all the time to prevent mold/moisture damage. So just because it's warm doesn't mean forget it.

    So....during Florida's off season, which is the summer, this guy is probably not willing to pay for the a/c to run with no one there.
  • NanciL's avatar
    NanciL
    Explorer II
    Dec 31, 2014
    We are toying with someday when we are too old to pull our travel trailer of renting a place in the Keys for the winter, but there is no way I would rent something with out first seeing it.

    Jack L
  • John_Joey's avatar
    John_Joey
    Explorer
    Dec 31, 2014
    Sorry to say you seem to see a lot of that in Florida. Between the high humidity, warmth, bugs, and constant supply of tourists nasty moldy places to rent abound.

    I know of a few that will drive to the area and then start to look for a place to rent staying in hotels till they find something.
  • K_Charles's avatar
    K_Charles
    Explorer
    Dec 31, 2014
    Money makes the world around.
    Didn't you look at it before you rented it?

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