3/25/09
It has been reported that Local Property Management Firm, Sperry Van Ness/Miller Commercial Real Estate, has been over charging the tenants of Court Plaza Shopping Center that pay common area electricity fees. Any tenant who has paid common area maintenance (cam) fees from 12/07 to the present is a possible victim of this "situation". Apparently, the tenants have paid bills from a meter connected to two rental units, not the bills from the meter that is clearly marked "house meter".
Preliminary figures show that the tenants have been paying electric cam fees based on over $7,000.00 of fraudulent bills.
The Tenants of the Court Plaza
If any of the Court Plaza tenants wish to contact Sperry Van Ness please contact Ann Morris/Property Manager, 206 E. Main St. Salisbury, MD 21801 office# 410-543-2440 ext. 120, or at ann.morris@svn.com
DelMarVa's Premier Source for News, Opinion, Analysis, and Human Interest Contact Publisher Joe Albero at alberobutzo@wmconnect.com or 410-430-5349
29 comments:
It's nice to see a company step up to the plate and do the right thing!
Joe,
what the tenants at court plaza neglected to tell you (because there's always 2 sides to a story) is that once we were made aware of the problem, we contacted Delmarva Power to have those meters separately billed and are currently working on calculating the total amount for the meter that was improperly charged to the tenants since 12/07. We are currently waiting a final bill from Delmarva Power so that everyone gets the fair credit that is due to them.
Questions/concerns can also be directed towards myself - Cathy Justice, Property Manager cathy.justice@svn.com.
Thanks for the heads up Cathy.
sounds like they got caught speeding. How come an entire center is on a common meeter? How do you fiqure a fair share when the businesses all use different power levels. Sounds like a low rent center to me.
well i heard the meter in question belongs to the owners office..sounds like a cover up to me
re: cathy Justice's Comment
Thanks for the sperry van ness company line. i wonder why when tenants call to get the same information you just provided, they get cussed at and are told you dont have the time to go through the 2" pile of crap on your desk. by the way the two meters were confirmed by mast electric to already separately serve common area lighting and two rental units. Delmarva power knows nothing about separating meters and bills.
Court Plaza Tenants
Common area electric meters are for the night lights in the parking lot and on the three buildings. the meter in question is for the two units, which are for the owner and the office of Hugh Livingston of I.D.E.A.S. they share the same meter and hugh has not had an electric bill since december of 2007. cover up...cover up...cover up...
Wasn't Cathy's Pet Salon located there for years before she moved to Mt. Hermon Road next to the Credit Union? I'll bet they owe her a small fortune. I wonder of Sperry Van Ness contacted her in good faith to let her know they owe her all that money?
ever since sperry van ness has taken over the plaza over nine tenants have moved out and gone to other locations. their cam charges have run everyone out of the plaza. just a few more tenants to go and it will surely be empty. you think the owner would step up to the plate and try to do something for the tenants.
I hate Sperry Vaness with a passion. I have always had problems with them when it comes to billing and other issues. The problem is they manage most of the properties is the area. Places you used to be able to lease at an affordable price are now so high most small bussinesses can't afford it. They have the owners jack up the prices in promises that they will find someone to pay higher fees. The rent is high but then the cam and taxes just add to it. I was at the court plaza for 2 years. That cam is a joke. That place is a piece of crap and they don't do squat to deserve that common area maint. fee. I am not a disgruntled business person, I am very succesfull and make allot of money. I don't use my name becasue unfortunatley I still have to deal with these idiots.
If Hugh Livingston was honest, he would know he should not have had free electricity for 15 months. What is wrong with him?
Seems like that entire Plaza is messed up. When I worked in there and we had the phone installed they crossed up something. When we plugged our phone in we actually were using someone elses line. It took us a while to figure it out. Being alone in a shop and pick up your phone and there is someone talking on it. It was weird!. If I remember correctly the water bills were always messed up as well.
is Hugh Livingston going to have to pay up? We floated him for way to long! I knew he was trouble ever since he moved in! I wounder when he will stop playing office.
If I know Hugh,he's deducted electricity costs from his taxes as a business expense. Guess he's guilty of tax fraud.
Well well...something finally comes out about them. I know first hand that they will, have and would double bill anyone and everyone if they could get away with it. That is the reason why, when I bought my new building...I made sure they would have nothing to do with it. We actually fired them as our property managment and went with our own. We are making out much better!!! I would not deal with them if my business counted on it!!!
what happen do AB Abbott does he still own the plaza? He used to years ago.
LA Abbot is dead. The center has passed through at least 2 owners since him ownership years ago. Blaming Sperry Van Ness for pass through tax, insurance and common area maintannce fees is idiotic. The pass through fees are just that, and are a direct pass through of property taxes, property insurance and common area maintenance. There are the direct costs to the owner for these items not some made up nonsense.
Beyond this the T+I&CAM fees are 2.51 per sq ft annually for the center with is right in the middle of local shopping center pass throughs, some are as high as $3-$4 sq ft. It mostly depends on the tax basis of the property. Newer facilities or those recently re-assessed will be more expensive with older ones like Twilley Center less expensive.
The owner of Court Plaza, who lives out of town, paid way too much money for a shopping center in need of a hugh make over. She and Van Mess are doing everything to get more money out of their tenants. An electrical inspector and fire marshall would run out of paper writing violations in most of the units, occupied or not.
Responding to the comments by Richard, Cathy Justice and anonymous 6:36 pm; The overbilling was brought to the attention of Sperry Van Ness by the TENANTS, Richard!!! Cathy Justice fails to mention this in her comments as well, no surprise there!! The TENANTS initiated their own investigation after getting billed for lights that are timed to come on and go off a certain time every day!!! This bill would vary some months by hundreds of dollars while the other lighting (on separate meters), would stay fairly consistent every month!!! And for anonymous 6:36pm, we understand that we should pay common area fees, as we all enjoy the benefits of same, and consider these fees as a cost of doing business IF AND ONLY IF THESE FEES ARE HONEST AND ACCURATE, which is definitely not the case here!!!!
Finally, some news about Court Plaza that doesn't include anything about "accidental discharges" ; guns, sewage, or otherwise!!!! Still sounds like some decent business people are getting SCREWED!!!
how come all of the people with negative things to say about sperry vanness all post as Anonymous? the only person who has responded with a name is cathy from sperry. do the negative ninnies have something to hide?
Becky, the tenants of Court Plaza are not anonymous. Come by sometime, we would love to sell you something!!
A lot of people seem to have a significant misconception of how property management operates. A management company typically charges a landlord 5% to 6% fee to handle all the details of property ownership including rent collection, attending to maintenance issues, and general property oversight etc. Occasionally a PM firm will also do the leasing for a property, but not always.
The task of property management is not to act as a profit center, but simply to collect rent, attend to tenant and municipal code compliance issues, and make sure the center they manage is maintained as efficiently as possible. If they do a poor job of this the tenants will leave and they will lose (i.e. be fired) by their landlord clients. Miller Property management - Sperry Van Ness is by far the largest PM firm in the region and most landlord clients are quite well satisfied or they would not be in business.
Having said this PM is often a thankless task as there is always late or non-pay tenants that have to be chased or brought to court, something that needs fixing, code compliance issues, conflict between tenants, exterior maintenance upkeep, roof and parking lot issues etc. etc. and this is for almost any center more than 10 years old. As a way to make a living it's a huge PITA, and PM firms often have significant turnover because even well meaning people simply get burned out handling the incessant tide of problems, 24/7 complaints, chasing dead-beat tenants, and owners that howl and moan when significant capital expenditures are required or try to get by with patch work fixes when major renovation is necessary, but no funds are available to undertake them.
If you think PM is a breeze hang out your shingle and do it yourself. I'm sure you could do much better than those evil Sperry Van Ness people.
10:28, if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. There's always someone who will take your place.
WAAAAA
To anonymous 10:28 pm I'll bet Brent Miller is crying all the way to the bank!!!
You belly-aching doggies just keep yapping and yapping like silly little farting lapdogs sitting on your owner's laps terrorized by a hardworking police dog. If the service Sperry Van Ness provides is so awful there must be TONS of opportunity in local and regional PM for you to practically MINT money! Why it's there on the ground ready to picked up by you super heros! Go for it!
I ve know alot of the PM's at Sperry Van Ness. They didn't quit because of burnout, they quit because they got tired of working for the Millers. I understand as people say deadbeat tenats, Some people just are not cut out to be in business. That dosen't make them deadbeat's. But when they go out of business and then Sperry Van Ness goes after their savings and home to try and collect all future rent, that is crazy. And the person who commented on the cam being fair, I don't think any of us argue paying CAM is not our responsibility, but do something for the money. Fix the plaza up. I am tired of promises to do things that don't get done.
To 10:59. re
"But when they go out of business and then Sperry Van Ness goes after their savings and home to try and collect all future rent, that is crazy."
Sperry Van Ness as a PM is contracted by the property owner to act as their representative in collecting bad debts. In a nut shell this usually involves taking people to court and getting judgements for defaulted rent. All this is clearly spelled out in the lease re what's going to happen if rent is in default.
As the agent of the owner what exactly would you have Sperry Van Ness do? Do you imagine they have the authority or owner's permission to go "Oh shucks that was a bit of bad luck. Just give us the keys and go on your way"?
Let me reiterate - they are not the property owner, they are merely contracted agents for the owner. If you think the American system of law and contracts is immoral or unfair re debt collection procedures that's not a issue that Sperry Van Ness has a lot of power over. If I default on a debt I have personally guaranteed is the debt collection agent or contractor really the bad guy in that scenario?
I wish I saw this when it was posted and not in 2014. We had this problem in 2008 when we rented a unit from them on South Division Street. We were paying for 100% of the house meter charges as well as part of another unit due to bad wiring. Their excuse was that they bought the property like that and it wasn't their fault. Ummm no.... your property, your problem. We fought back and forth to get reimbursed. Took several months. So glad we got away from them.
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