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CB Real Estate Review of Crown Realty & Management
Crown Realty & Management

Crown Realty & Management review: Deceptive business practices 6

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On October 4, 2006, I sent Crown Management a letter stating that I would be terminating my lease early effective Dec 15, 2006. On November 20, 2006, my roommate (whose name was on the lease) abandoned the house leaving me with rent that I could not afford to pay myself. I called Crown on November 21, 2006 to inform them that I would have to leave Dec 5, 2006 because my roommate left earlier than expected and that I could not afford to pay that month.

In January of 2007, I received a registered letter from Crown with the move out inspection form enclosed with the pending damages. In early February, I received a ledger with accumulative damages estimating at $63,000. I called and ask why the estimate so high. I spoke with Denise Dimbath, the assistant to the broker. She informed me that if the property did not leased for the four-year term of the lease I would have to pay that amount. I drove by the property on February 9, 2007 to see if they were aggressively seeking to lease the property. I did not see any “for rent” signs posted. I drove by on Wednesday February 28 to check to see if they had placed signs out again but this time noticed two cars in the driveway. I spoke to one of my old neighbors and he told me that the new tenants had moved in that day. I called Denise again on 3/1/07 to check to see if she had mitigated the damages and she told me that she would re-do the ledger since the house had been leased and re-send it to me with the new cost and I could make pay arrangements after that.

One week later Thursday, March 8, 2007. I receive an alert form Equifax that a line of credit had been opened on my account with a $10,000 balance and that my credit score had dropped 85 points. Crown opened a revolving line of credit in my name with an account number, an open date of 9/1/05, a last activity of date 12/1/06, a high credit balance of $1,400, the terms of 12 months, a balance of $10,000 and a past due amount of $10,000. With comments, “Lease-Early termination/Merchandise returned before the end of the term”. I call Denise to ask why they would put anything on my credit without informing me. She told me that that was an assumed amount. Later that day she called me and told me that the broker of the owner said that the owners would accept nothing less than $5000. I did everything I could to make sure they knew I was willing to pay my financial obligation. They had all my contact information. Yet never warned me that even if I arranged to pay they would still ruin my credit.

I called the Federal Trade Commission filed a complaint and they told me that this was a violation of the fair credit reporting act section 623. They knowingly report false information to the credit bureau I reported Crown Management Corp’s for their deceptive practices to the BBB. I did so on 3/8/07

I went searching for others who have had a bad experience with this company and found another women having a similar experience with Crown Management and Realty company. I know there are others experiencing similar problems… Can you help by contacting this company regarding their deceptive practices? I am a single mom and they have ruined my credit and my chances of buying the house I had planned to buy in August of 2007 even after I agreed to make arrangements to pay!

Update by Danita Miller
Apr 26, 2007 12:00 am EDT

Crown, started this deception with an amount of $63,053 for assumed fixed damages. They placed another assumed amount of $10,000 on my credit report. They made a verbal agreement of $5000. They sent me a note stating $6900 and now they are telling the BBB that I owe them $7120. Crown cannot get their story straight and they have violated my rights in the process. Crown opened “a line of credit” on my credit report. My account with Crown was never reported to the credit bureau prior to March 8, 2007.

They put this on my credit record to destroy my good credit and my good name and to prevent me from purchasing a home of my own until I pay them something! I was willing to pay my debt with them this is why I kept in touch with them. I gave them all my contact information to avoid leaving them on an even worse note because of the breach of the lease, and because of how deceptive they are they knowingly placed an inaccurate information on my credit record. The information states I have a balance of $10,000 and a past due debt of $10,000. This is a direct violation of the FTC’s Fair Credit Reporting Act. They have also violated several other sections of the (FDCPA) Fair Debt Collection Practice Act and the (FCBA) Fair Credit Billing Act. I have done my research and found seven violations in all.

I want all entries from Crown Management removed from my credit report, as their inaccurate entries are illegal, they have also violated my rights as a consumer and they have violated the FTC’s, Fair Credit Reporting Act.

6 comments
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Farrukh Butt
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May 16, 2007 12:00 am EDT

As a single parent (father of two girls) I was granted permission by court to move out of state from New Jersey to Georgia. However, it was required that I place children in a school system that meets courts higher ranking ratings. Representative from Crown and the Crown website both confirmed that the property of interest advertised by Crown falls in that category rating of the school. Base on that we mobilize from New Jersey by trucking and took possession of the property only to learn next day that this was false advertising and misrepresentation. The school of interest was not in the zone of the property advertised by Crown. When this was shared with Crown they apologized, and appeared to be co-operative when I advise them that I would have to vacate or I risk my status with court order. I gave them appropriate notice telling them that I will be vacating as soon as I have alternate residence identified and admission confirmed in the school of interest processed. I continued with payment of all rental dues on time. However, Crown did not show-up at the check out for turn over of keys. And though I paid all rental dues, Crown hit me with a large bill of $7,000 made up of all kind of highly inflated excuses. This include administrative charges, cleaning services charges (though house was professionally cleaned and left in better then found condition), legal and collection fee (though no attempts were made for legal or collection attempts at that point) and consequential damages (though I was victimized by them and should be the one demanding consequential damages).

I hired a law firm to represent me with them and on January 25th, 2006 by my law firm send a letter in respond to their letter of December 29th, 2005. The letter made clear my position on important points related to fraudulent false advertisement by Crown. Regardless of Crown’s questionable ethics, our letter offered a $2,000 settlement. However, upon receipt of the letter Crown took a silent position for total of 9 months. Never responded in writing or verbally to the law firm or to me. Though the matter was in dispute with a settlement offer pending, Crown recklessly enlisted me to “Equifax” posting me as bad credit. This wrongful action by Crown has been very damaging to me and hurt him in many ways:

a. Dropping my credit rating significantly and making it difficult for him to get any external services, do any business, or obtain personal loans.
b. Hindering me from obtaining outside offers of employment since most employers check credit ratings these days and negative ratings posted by Crown (via Equifax) are hurting Mr. Butt professionally.

Their silent treatment for nine months and than a follow-up again with unwilling and non co-operative attitude with a threat to take me to court is harassment. Now they also have collection agencies chasing me.

At this point I am left with no choice but to do the following:
* File complaint with Federal Trade Commission as a violation of the fair credit reporting act section 623
* Filing against Crown Management with Governor’s Office of Consumer Affairs; O.C.G.A. Section 10-1-390 et seq

I can use some advise. I also need help in restoring my credit with credit reporting agencies.

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Ana W.
Powder Springs, US
Aug 02, 2014 11:36 am EDT
Verified customer This comment was posted by a verified customer. Learn more

This company is beyond crooked! The same thing has happened to me. My mother and I rented a home for 3 months and was late one month. My mother went to court to pay the rent and crown did not want the check and told us we had to leave the home in a week. My mother and I had to pay a judgment for over 2k. After moving out of this place crown sends us a invoice or they call it a "ledger" for over 13k. WHAT!? Beyond crooked. They had bogus charges all over this thing. Not to mention they posted it on our credit bureaus. So staying in a home for 3 months and having to pay this crooked company 15k for these bogus charges and for a judgment is ridiculous. It gets even more crooked. We never paid for those fraudulent bogus charges and 7 years later they send me a letter in the mail saying if I don't pay I will have to pay lawyer fees! That is breaking the law to put a fear tactic in a consumer to try to collect debt! Its on the debt collection act. I find out the home we rented from 7 years ago was foreclosed 6 months after we moved out. I'm trying to understand why is crown attempting collect fraudulent debt on a property they haven't managed in over 6 years!? Because they are crooked evil people. They also charged off my account and gave it to a collection agency but they were still attempting to collect debt themselves. They put a lien on my mothers car as well. They are beyond evil and greedy. Denise Dimbath is one of them! She is the lady I have been speaking to the whole time and behind everything! That last comment from Robert Locke is so fake! He is crooked as the letter S. I have reported them to FTC. This company will be shut down and will be trapped by their own evil ways. It will be under investigation soon. God will see to it. Don't EVER do business with this company.

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Robert Locke
Roswell, US
May 04, 2009 2:07 pm EDT

“I relyed on Crown to identify the school system”
Real Estate agents do their best to identify “which school system does this house belong to”? We rely on public information as best we can find but we don’t contact each school to ask. Schools change their foot print at least once a year and drive us all crazy with their changes. We do not promise which school goes with which house as “we don’t know”. That is why real estate agents add notes to their listings telling the public “not to rely on this information as being accurate”. Each buyer/renter needs to take this responsibility on themselves and do their own research. They should never rely on what neighbors tell them, bus drivers, cross walk attendants or real estate agents. None of us are reliable sources for that information. If this issue was that important you’d think they would have done their own research. We obviously goofed, or so he says, and for that I am very sorry. We get blamed no matter how made the mistake.

“Crown did not show up at the check-out” …. We generally do not make an appointment for the move out inspection. We do several move out inspections a day and never know how long each will take. We generally don’t know when we will get to each one. If it is critical that we make a specific appointment we will. Obviously this was not critical to this person.

Residents have 5 days under the law and the lease to “dispute the move out damages charged on the inspection”. No dispute was ever received …. Ever ….

“I hired a law firm” … we pay close attention to letters from lawyers so we can avoid a law suit. Since this person does not identify himself I can’t respond to his claims of “no response for 9 months” but it sounds like his attorney (and he) went scilent for 9 months also. Aparently it was not that important to anyone.

“recklessly listed me in Equifax” … as a member of Equifax we are required to report anyone who has not paid what they owe. This was not reckless but “on purpose” as we have records and stand ready to defend legetamate charges against this person. We do not make false claims as we are under the fair credit reporting act and could suffer severe punishment if we did this “fraudulently” as this person suggests.

“Dropping their credit score” … this is a natural consequence of not paying attention to credit claims. If we are wrong we are happy to change it. We have a “comment button” on our home page for complaints. As the broker I will be the only one reading it. Please feel free to use it and I will respond. It’s there so I can respond to things like this. Please give me a chance to address your complaint. Rather than taking the time to file complaints with organizations that will not listen to you (and do not care) why not complain to me? I will listen … I care …. and I have the authority to do something about it.

The problem with filing complaints on the internet is “you don’t have to prove anything”. You get to say anything you want and not produce a single piece of evidence. Georgia has a great system of offering people who have a complaint to have their day in court and be heard by a judge. It only costs $56 to file a complaint in majestrates court and get you opportunity to “make your case against someone who has harmed you”. Judges will listen … if you have evidence. They will try to look at the evidence, make people whole and punish those who do “fraudent and reckless things”. The problem is most people go to the internet because “they don’t have evidence”, they just want to “make claims”. We do the best we can to address these things in a professional way. Some times we can and some times we can’t.

Robert Locke

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Anna Ardizone
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May 17, 2007 9:04 am EDT

This is so true. It seems like Crown Management is a worse company that you ever can find. I am dealing with them too, and their company is terrible. They just should close down their business.

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Farrukh Butt
,
May 15, 2007 9:36 am EDT

I have similar experience with Crown Realty & Management.

As a single parent (father of two girls) I was granted permission by court to move out of state from New Jersey to Georgia. However, it was required that I place children in a school system that meets courts higher ranking ratings. Representative from Crown and the Crown website both confirmed that the property of interest advertised by Crown falls in that category rating of the school. Base on that we mobilize from New Jersey by trucking and took possession of the property only to learn next day that this was false advertising and misrepresentation. The school of interest was not in the zone of the property advertised by Crown. When this was shared with Crown they apologized, and appeared to be co-operative when I advise them that I would have to vacate or I risk my status with court order. I gave them appropriate notice telling them that I will be vacating as soon as I have alternate residence identified and admission confirmed in the school of interest processed. I continued with payment of all rental dues on time. However, Crown did not show-up at the check out for turn over of keys. And though I paid all rental dues, Crown hit me with a large bill of $7,000 made up of all kind of highly inflated excuses. This include administrative charges, cleaning services charges (though house was professionally cleaned and left in better then found condition), legal and collection fee (though no attempts were made for legal or collection attempts at that point) and consequential damages (though I was victimized by them and should be the one demanding consequential damages).

I hired a law firm to represent me with them and on January 25th, 2006 by my law firm send a letter in respond to their letter of December 29th, 2005. The letter made clear my position on important points related to fraudulent false advertisement by Crown. Regardless of Crown’s questionable ethics, our letter offered a $2,000 settlement. However, upon receipt of the letter Crown took a silent position for total of 9 months. Never responded in writing or verbally to the law firm or to me. Though the matter was in dispute with a settlement offer pending. Crown recklessly enlisted me to “Equifax” posting me as bad credit. This wrongful action by Crown has been very damaging to me and hurt him in many ways:

a. Dropping my credit rating significantly and making it difficult for him to get any external services, do any business, or obtain personal loans.
b. Hindering me from obtaining outside offers of employment since most employers check credit ratings these days and negative ratings posted by Crown (via Equifax) are hurting Mr. Butt professionally.

Their silent treatment for nine months and than a follow-up again with unwilling and non co-operative attitude with a threat to take me to court harassment.

At this point I am left with no choice but to do following:

* File complaint with Federal Trade Commission as a violation of the fair credit reporting act section 623
* Filing against Crown Management with Governor’s Office of Consumer Affairs; O.C.G.A. Section 10-1-390 et seq

I can use some advise from this group. I also need help in restoring my credit with credit reporting agencies.

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Ronnie Bowman
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Mar 28, 2007 9:09 am EDT

You need an attorney...