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Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Kingsley Management Under Scrutiny in Lafayette

The article in today's Lafayette News about the Arbordale Acres Mobile Home Park describes allegedly poor property management efforts and onerous requirements on elderly residents of the neighborhood. It appears that mismanagement of the wastewater fees charged to the residents is a crucial issue the out-of-state management company, Kingsley Management, is going to have to answer to. The Camera wrote about this last week too.

In 2003, Kingsley Management told a resident of the Carefree Country Mobile Home Park they managed in Utah that he couldn't use the swimming pool because he had a "communicable disease" - AIDS. The fact that water isn't the method of transmission didn't occur to their lawyers who threatened eviction if he jumped in the water.

Also in 2003, residents of Kingsley-managed El Granada (CA) Manufactured Home Community claimed they "have slapped on extra fees for water and garbage, enforce the rules inconsistently, aren't keeping the park up, and are unresponsive to the residents' concerns....We have out-of-state greedy owners that haven't cooperated. The condition and maintenance of the park have been appalling." The San Mateo County Commissioners voted to institute rent control on the properties in response to the poor management. (See the build up in 2002 here.) The Taylorsville, Utah City Council issued subpoenas to the HOA of a Kingsley-managed property in 2003 over election complaints.

I couldn't find a website for Kingsley directly, but I did find their sales force recruitment site.

What caught my eye was the last sentence in the Lafayette News: "[Lafayette City Councilor Frank] Phillips wants to explore the possibility of municipal regulations for leases." Seems Lafayette won't be the first community to address such needs based on Kingsley's management style.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Unlike the infamous immigration resolution, this is the kind of effort where city councilors can be effective in directly helping Lafayette residents. Good job Frank Phillips.

Anonymous said...

Thanks! Unfortunately we will have to pursue a different strategy as I found out rent control is illegal in Colorado. However the Boulder DA's office is looking into many of the other issues brought up that might not be legal, and I will continue to work closely with the residents to find solutions to the problems.