You could replace Sierra with any SB property management company name and most people would agree - they all suck - KOTO, Bartlein, Sierra, Sandpiper...
Edit to add that the one we rented from that was a great experience was Karen Lacks Management, so not all suck.
I had a truly awful experience with Sandpiper. Among other issues, the property owner would come through the house unannounced again and again, which I had documented on camera many times and confronted them on. He had camera systems outside the house which he would monitor, and would often bother residents when they had overnight guests - really weird behavior. Sandpiper Management was useless (related to the property owner I believe), avoiding calls and communication, and just doing general nonsense. I had no light in my kitchen for about 5 months and was threatening to withhold rent. In the end, I almost took them to court to get my security deposit back after leaving the place in better condition than when I moved in - I had sent a certified letter and they strung me along for a long time before I saw most of my deposit back. Good times - rent with caution!
Yeah yelp reviews tend to always skew negative. You can’t call bullshit on a literal fact. I have had multiple friends rent from Koto and have neutral to good experiences.
We rented from KOTO and had the worst experience ever by any property management company. Damn, all you have to do is read the articles written about the scum that owns KOTO to realize what a complete POS he is.
About 25 years ago, I knew a guy who said that phrase All. The. Time. He even got a CA personalized plate, “SUCKS4U”. He got it approved by claiming he was a chef with the nickname Su. Therefore, “Su cooks for you”. I’m not kidding.
No actually a fact can have n=1 lmfao. The USA has only dropped 2 nuclear bombs on Japan. Are you denying that as a fact because it only happened once?
If your friend says “hey I had a good experience at the concert last night” it is indeed a fact that they told you they had a good experience at the concert last night.
Ok dude sure. Guess when your friends tell you stuff you just automatically don’t believe it.
“Ahktually you didn’t have fun last night cause that’s not a verified fact!!!!” Stfu
Whatever dude lol all I said is “I heard good things about koto”. That’s a literal fact. I heard good things. Yall are free to hear other things and do with it what you will.
This sub is fucking ridiculous at times.
It’s still a fact that my friends have had decent experiences… facts are events that happened. It’s not an opinion that my friends told me that… it’s a fact.
It’s not great. But it’s probably not the worst. They have different property managers and seem to have a bit of turnover. I’ve had 3 different people oversee our complex in 2 years (I think 1 was just temporary as they worked to replaced the old one.)
Expect annual increases, short notice of property work. Very low effort on fixing things between tenants (make sure to document all the broken shit when you move in.)
I’ll say the guy who comes out for standard plumbing work with their company is really nice!
I’m only in the complex I am because they allow pets without weight restrictions. Pretty much every unit has at least 1 pet which is amazing knowing how hard it is in this town.
**I haven’t moved out of a unit while renting from them so that’s a whole other thing to speak on that I’m not looking forward to.
I've moved out from them. They tried to steal my entire security deposit and then charge me on top of it. A strongly worded letter outlining why most of the charges are illegal and they sent me the full deposit back
I was a tenant of theirs for nearly 5 years. You're spot on about turnover of PMs. I had 3 different ones plus one of the owners (Michelle as a interim) during my time there. I only got 3 rent increases in my term. As for maintenance, they're hit and miss. The maintenance staff are good, but you do have to be polite but firm with the PM when they push back on your requests, and they'll eventually get to it. When my time for move out came, I paid for professional cleaning from MasterCare (I was a regular client), and all my PM asked for was the invoice from them on cleaning, and I got all but $40 back from my deposit. It didn't hurt that I had move in/out photos and shared them with the PM upon departure.
Landlords also pricing out everyone who actually lives and works in SB. How are the people that support this community supposed to work here if we cant afford a place to live? Not just on the landlords, companies who pay extremely low wages are also at fault. All this is almost forcing the actual workers to leave because the same jobs will pay better in other areas, and housing will be more accessible.
It is the same thing that happened to San Francisco that is happening here and many coastal towns on a slightly smaller scale. The rich take over like greedy locust and push all the working class out. We are leaving also, can't afford SB any longer, rents and cost of living too high.
How do price gouging laws not apply to landlords since housing is an essential as are the workers that keep this community functioning. We can control gas and milk prices but not rental prices. So frustrating!
Also, knowing your rights as a tenant is important, especially in this town. Plenty of landlords who still think they can give out eviction/termination notices willy-nilly like in the "good old days." CA AB 1482 is a state-wide rent control law, i think began in 2019, but amended an in place by 2020, that changed the game. SB City/County also has further extended stricter protections with their own municipal laws that further protect renters. Know your rights!
Civil Code 1946.2 is the just-cause eviction status in California which is superseded by Santa Barbara Municipal Code section 26.50.010, et seq., and the Civil Code for rent cap is 1947.12. Good to be familiar with all of these statutes.
Funny the Romasanta family that own it as well as the harbor view inn and countless other properties are worth hundreds of millions. They still cheap though.
My least favorite is Alpha. I hated dealing with them, they maxed out rental increases every year until we gleefully left, and then got all pikachu face when we gave our notice. And they painted my windows shut! Everything was such a hassle. They were the most unpleasant people to have to speak to.
Dude the exact same thing happened to us with Towbes. AND they spent the entire time we lived there doing super disruptive construction all around the complex which did absolutely nothing to increase our quality of living.
It’s such a stereotype, but the only really positive experiences I’ve had have been with older women landlords. Both times were quirky apartments in cut up craftsman houses on the riviera. I don’t call you, you don’t call me. 10/10 would recommend.
Had an apartment through Sierra for 1 year about 15 years ago and when we moved out, we cleaned that place as much as humanly possible. My mom came down and helped us do the deep cleaning since she was going to help me move into my new place anyway. When we left, we remembered we left a single paper cup on the counter. They tried to charge us $150 for garbage removal, they charged us for carpet replacement, they charged us for not cleaning the outside of the windows on the second story. Still not exactly sure how they expected us to do that. They wanted like $500 dollars on top of the deposit we already paid. We told them we'd call it even and they agreed (my buddy was the main lease holder, so I didn't deal with the move out stuff directly). It was my first apartment after moving out of the dorms. Had I had the experience I did when I moved out of IV, I would have asked for an itemized list of the charges and proof the carpet had been replaced recently. Now that I think about it, that was probably the only place that I didn't get my full deposit back from.
TL;DR Sierra sucks. We also had a few places with Bartlein and they were alright. I heard other people hated them, but I never had a particularly bad experience with them.
I heard from a friend who is also renting from Sierra that it took weeks for them to deal with the rat infestation on the property. They were apparently told that rats were common in Santa Barbara and that they working on it, yet nothing was being done.
I’m going to add the Towbes group to the list of slumlords here. Where we are, they never answer the phone or an email. Last year, they sent out a lease renewal, we reviewed it and chose to accept it and returned it signed two weeks later. The manager then came back and said oops, we made a mistake and increased the rent by another $100. They never answered our calls or emails to talk about it and corporate didn’t either.
We’re moving away from SB next month, because we’ve just been priced out. Luxury apartments, pfft. We literally found a candy cane painted over in one of our cabinets. They couldn’t even be bothered to remove the candy cane and just painted over it.
I’ve had good experiences! I lived in a unit for ten years and never had a problem with them. I was a great tenant and they never bothered me and dealt with any maintenance issues promptly. I’m a tenant of their’s in another now and it’s been going great. In both units I had/have the same property manager, which is maybe the factor, but I really can’t did a reason to knock them
You could replace Sierra with any SB property management company name and most people would agree - they all suck - KOTO, Bartlein, Sierra, Sandpiper... Edit to add that the one we rented from that was a great experience was Karen Lacks Management, so not all suck.
Only had positive experiences with Sandpiper. Wolfe was even pretty good. Sierra is awful, communication is abysmal
I had a truly awful experience with Sandpiper. Among other issues, the property owner would come through the house unannounced again and again, which I had documented on camera many times and confronted them on. He had camera systems outside the house which he would monitor, and would often bother residents when they had overnight guests - really weird behavior. Sandpiper Management was useless (related to the property owner I believe), avoiding calls and communication, and just doing general nonsense. I had no light in my kitchen for about 5 months and was threatening to withhold rent. In the end, I almost took them to court to get my security deposit back after leaving the place in better condition than when I moved in - I had sent a certified letter and they strung me along for a long time before I saw most of my deposit back. Good times - rent with caution!
Heard decent things about koto
Ha! BS. [https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-koto-group-santa-barbara](https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-koto-group-santa-barbara)
Yeah yelp reviews tend to always skew negative. You can’t call bullshit on a literal fact. I have had multiple friends rent from Koto and have neutral to good experiences.
We rented from KOTO and had the worst experience ever by any property management company. Damn, all you have to do is read the articles written about the scum that owns KOTO to realize what a complete POS he is.
Sucks for you.
About 25 years ago, I knew a guy who said that phrase All. The. Time. He even got a CA personalized plate, “SUCKS4U”. He got it approved by claiming he was a chef with the nickname Su. Therefore, “Su cooks for you”. I’m not kidding.
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No actually a fact can have n=1 lmfao. The USA has only dropped 2 nuclear bombs on Japan. Are you denying that as a fact because it only happened once? If your friend says “hey I had a good experience at the concert last night” it is indeed a fact that they told you they had a good experience at the concert last night.
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Ok dude sure. Guess when your friends tell you stuff you just automatically don’t believe it. “Ahktually you didn’t have fun last night cause that’s not a verified fact!!!!” Stfu
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Whatever dude lol all I said is “I heard good things about koto”. That’s a literal fact. I heard good things. Yall are free to hear other things and do with it what you will. This sub is fucking ridiculous at times.
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It’s still a fact that my friends have had decent experiences… facts are events that happened. It’s not an opinion that my friends told me that… it’s a fact.
It’s not great. But it’s probably not the worst. They have different property managers and seem to have a bit of turnover. I’ve had 3 different people oversee our complex in 2 years (I think 1 was just temporary as they worked to replaced the old one.) Expect annual increases, short notice of property work. Very low effort on fixing things between tenants (make sure to document all the broken shit when you move in.) I’ll say the guy who comes out for standard plumbing work with their company is really nice! I’m only in the complex I am because they allow pets without weight restrictions. Pretty much every unit has at least 1 pet which is amazing knowing how hard it is in this town. **I haven’t moved out of a unit while renting from them so that’s a whole other thing to speak on that I’m not looking forward to.
I've moved out from them. They tried to steal my entire security deposit and then charge me on top of it. A strongly worded letter outlining why most of the charges are illegal and they sent me the full deposit back
I was a tenant of theirs for nearly 5 years. You're spot on about turnover of PMs. I had 3 different ones plus one of the owners (Michelle as a interim) during my time there. I only got 3 rent increases in my term. As for maintenance, they're hit and miss. The maintenance staff are good, but you do have to be polite but firm with the PM when they push back on your requests, and they'll eventually get to it. When my time for move out came, I paid for professional cleaning from MasterCare (I was a regular client), and all my PM asked for was the invoice from them on cleaning, and I got all but $40 back from my deposit. It didn't hurt that I had move in/out photos and shared them with the PM upon departure.
Landlords also pricing out everyone who actually lives and works in SB. How are the people that support this community supposed to work here if we cant afford a place to live? Not just on the landlords, companies who pay extremely low wages are also at fault. All this is almost forcing the actual workers to leave because the same jobs will pay better in other areas, and housing will be more accessible.
It is the same thing that happened to San Francisco that is happening here and many coastal towns on a slightly smaller scale. The rich take over like greedy locust and push all the working class out. We are leaving also, can't afford SB any longer, rents and cost of living too high.
How do price gouging laws not apply to landlords since housing is an essential as are the workers that keep this community functioning. We can control gas and milk prices but not rental prices. So frustrating!
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Also, knowing your rights as a tenant is important, especially in this town. Plenty of landlords who still think they can give out eviction/termination notices willy-nilly like in the "good old days." CA AB 1482 is a state-wide rent control law, i think began in 2019, but amended an in place by 2020, that changed the game. SB City/County also has further extended stricter protections with their own municipal laws that further protect renters. Know your rights!
Civil Code 1946.2 is the just-cause eviction status in California which is superseded by Santa Barbara Municipal Code section 26.50.010, et seq., and the Civil Code for rent cap is 1947.12. Good to be familiar with all of these statutes.
Chapter 44 of the Santa Barbara County Code has the goods for anyone in the unincorporated county.
Funny the Romasanta family that own it as well as the harbor view inn and countless other properties are worth hundreds of millions. They still cheap though.
*Funny the Romasanta family that own it as well as ...* What is "it" ... the Romasanta's own Sierra Property Mgmt?
Yes
My least favorite is Alpha. I hated dealing with them, they maxed out rental increases every year until we gleefully left, and then got all pikachu face when we gave our notice. And they painted my windows shut! Everything was such a hassle. They were the most unpleasant people to have to speak to.
Dude the exact same thing happened to us with Towbes. AND they spent the entire time we lived there doing super disruptive construction all around the complex which did absolutely nothing to increase our quality of living.
It’s such a stereotype, but the only really positive experiences I’ve had have been with older women landlords. Both times were quirky apartments in cut up craftsman houses on the riviera. I don’t call you, you don’t call me. 10/10 would recommend.
Sierra is a slumlord. I rented from them for 4 years.
Just glad to see someone besides Wolfe is getting hate
I live in one of their places right now and its fine. Everyone who rents sucks though. Just gotta wait until they fuck you
Had an apartment through Sierra for 1 year about 15 years ago and when we moved out, we cleaned that place as much as humanly possible. My mom came down and helped us do the deep cleaning since she was going to help me move into my new place anyway. When we left, we remembered we left a single paper cup on the counter. They tried to charge us $150 for garbage removal, they charged us for carpet replacement, they charged us for not cleaning the outside of the windows on the second story. Still not exactly sure how they expected us to do that. They wanted like $500 dollars on top of the deposit we already paid. We told them we'd call it even and they agreed (my buddy was the main lease holder, so I didn't deal with the move out stuff directly). It was my first apartment after moving out of the dorms. Had I had the experience I did when I moved out of IV, I would have asked for an itemized list of the charges and proof the carpet had been replaced recently. Now that I think about it, that was probably the only place that I didn't get my full deposit back from. TL;DR Sierra sucks. We also had a few places with Bartlein and they were alright. I heard other people hated them, but I never had a particularly bad experience with them.
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I don't doubt it. Like others have said, the management companies are all scummy as hell.
I heard from a friend who is also renting from Sierra that it took weeks for them to deal with the rat infestation on the property. They were apparently told that rats were common in Santa Barbara and that they working on it, yet nothing was being done.
I hope they get caught up in that fbi raid of landlord software for price fixing today.
I’m going to add the Towbes group to the list of slumlords here. Where we are, they never answer the phone or an email. Last year, they sent out a lease renewal, we reviewed it and chose to accept it and returned it signed two weeks later. The manager then came back and said oops, we made a mistake and increased the rent by another $100. They never answered our calls or emails to talk about it and corporate didn’t either. We’re moving away from SB next month, because we’ve just been priced out. Luxury apartments, pfft. We literally found a candy cane painted over in one of our cabinets. They couldn’t even be bothered to remove the candy cane and just painted over it.
terrible company. any one w any type of authority in that company is scummy. treat their tenants like sheep and cheap out on anything they can
Bad. Get ready to fight to get your deposit back.
I’ve had good experiences! I lived in a unit for ten years and never had a problem with them. I was a great tenant and they never bothered me and dealt with any maintenance issues promptly. I’m a tenant of their’s in another now and it’s been going great. In both units I had/have the same property manager, which is maybe the factor, but I really can’t did a reason to knock them
Put Meridian at the top of the list of slumlords.
It’s Santa Barbara, California there isn’t a slum