Barbera - Monrovia, California

Eduardo T.

Just got my deposit back. Was told there would be a $300 cleaning fee, but wasn’t told that we would be charged for new toilet seats even though it was in same condition as when we moved in. We were also charged $300 dollars to repaint the entire unit even though the paint was in the same condition it had been in when we moved in 1 year ago. We asked the property manager if it was OK to install wall shelves and he said yes, he would help us patch up the holes when we move out. He didn’t tell us it would be an extra 50 dollars. Property manager also changed the move out date on our 30 day notice, so it was one day after the move out date listed on our lease. When we caught the mistake and told him, he said he said he already turned in the notice and it was too late to fix it, so we were charged for an extra day in prorated rent.

Sam M.

We lived in an apartment owned by Barbera Management for exactly three years between 2006 and 2009.

About one month after vacating the property I received a letter from Barbera Management with a check for approximately $900. They had deducted almost $700 from my initial security deposit, for fees and carpet replacement. I was appalled, given the fact that we had lived in the apartment for three years and that the carpet was one year old when we moved in.

I called Barbera Management and the person answering the phone told me to send a letter. I wrote a letter and did not cash the initial check for $900, as the letter with the check indicated that by cashing the check I would waive all rights to dispute.

After a few weeks I received a very terse letter stating that the miscellaneous charges were in my lease agreement, and that the carpet cost was pro-rated. No additional information was provided. I wrote a final letter to Barbera Management noting that their response did not address any of the items in my initial letter. I returned the initial check for approximately $900 and informed Barbera Management that unless I received my full security deposit I would take them to small claims court. The day came and went and I got no response from Barbera, so I filed with small claims court

Filing for small claims was relatively easy and only cost $60. The most difficult part was following the procedures for serving the court documents. The documents were served and finally my day in court arrived. When I got to court I was surprised to see that no one from Barbera Management arrived. The judge ruled in my favor and stated that the ruling would be mailed to all parties in two or three days. The judge also told me not to get my hopes up for payment, as the defendant automatically had 30 days to appeal.

I received a copy of the court ruling about two days later. The following day I received a hand-written envelope from Barbera Management. Inside the envelope was a check for the full amount of the security deposit. I felt vindicated.

The worst part of this whole situation is that it shows Barbera Management was just trying to put one over on me. In my case, I fought back and won. If I had been wrong, and if Barbera felt the charges were legitimate, it would not have been too difficult to show up in small claims court or at a minimum appeal the decision. The immediate payment simply shows me that they are a shady company that knew they were doing the wrong thing in trying to take almost $700 of my money.

So if they try to pull this on you, fight back.

PS - The apartment was fine to live in, and they were generally an OK management company, aside from the security deposit debacle.

Riley G.

Posted this on yelp as well, but needs to be shared.

These people are monsters: I am naming Patrick O'Reilly, Jesus Serano, and Vanessa Hernandez because Barbara management makes it incredibly difficult to get in touch with their mysterious "management," and these are the people who do their dirty work but never return phone calls. They prey on their tenants and illegally take their money with the assumption that they don't know their rights.

When we decided to move out after our lease was up, the management informed us that we either had to pay a $2700 fee, or let them show the apartment whenever they wanted to without any notice for the next 30 days. We went back and read our lease, and of course there was nothing about the fee, and it actually stated that 24 hours notice must be given for the management to enter our apartment. We told them this, and they were VERY unhappy that we'd called their bluff. They tried very hard to think up ways that we had violated the lease so as to apparently blackmail us into complying. Of course this didn't work, as we had not violated the lease in any way.

A month later, when it was time to move out, we asked for a walk through with the manager and he scheduled it for the day we were supposed to move out. We found out later that they did not inform us of our right to a pre-move-out walk through, as is legally required of them. Anyways, our walkthrough went great: the manager told us that the place looked fantastic and he explicitly stated that the nail holes in the walls and any repainting needed was normal wear and tear and would not be taken out of our security deposit (this was also told to us before we moved in, as many holes were left in the wall from the previous tenant). We all signed a walkthrough document stating that everything was in good condition and he told us that the only fee we would get deducted was a small cleaning fee (estimated $80). He also told us that he would send us a copy of the walk through document, but of course never did.

20 days later, we get the check and $600 is deducted from it. They illegally deducted money for a city inspection, several things that they claimed were broken (that weren't) that were never mentioned in our walkthrough, and for patching nail holes and repainting the entire apartment. We tried calling several times to no avail, and ended up sending a formal dispute letter. They responded to this with a check for $60 to cover the blatantly illegal inspection fee, and ignored the rest of the letter. We sent another dispute letter and called many more times. Vanessa called back once and when I asked her to please send a copy of walkthrough document we signed, she pretended she had no idea what I was talking about and then told me she'd have to call me back. We have not heard back from anyone at Barbera since. I wish I had the time to take these horrible people to court so that someone will stop them from screwing over more people.

Morroq T.

These people are complete scam artists. They refuse to meet you in person, they'll gladly let you drop off the application fees and then give you a runaround and add more things to submit that were never mentioned before, and every time I asked to meet in person the question was blatantly ignored and dodged around. Don't trust them at all.

Mohammed A.

They will take all your security deposit it happened to me and they will put stuff on you you didn't do to take more money and when you talk to them they are unprofessional at all and they will simply tell you we will not return it back go do whatever you want to do

Mathew J.

Best place to stay ever. They had people out to fix my place the day after I called, and they were really nice about

Genevieve M.

The maintenance man is fantastic.

David G.

Never been to the place.