US rental giant charged tenants ‘cleaning fees’ after she was sued over $100M+ in ‘hidden fees’ for moving house.
When Mallory Rutkoske moved out of her Salt Lake City apartment, she didn’t expect to have bills to clear.
No one in her lease said she was responsible for the accusation, so she was surprised and angry when the real estate management company forwarded her invoice.
Rotkoske told Fox 13 Utah. “These are predatory fees.”
To make her case, she took Greystar, the largest multifamily rental property manager, to small claims court to contest the accusation. and win.
Now, Grestal has a bigger court case on his hands.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the state of Colorado jointly sued the company, alleging that from 2019 and 2022, Greystar shipped products from Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, Nebraska, Nebraska and numerous other states collected over $100 million in improper fees. California.
The FTC and the state of Colorado want victims to pay damages and ask courts to enjoin bad behavior surrounding hidden rent and extra fees.
In response, Grestal issued a statement saying they are following long-standing industry practice and no tenants are paying fees they did not sign in their leases.
The FTC does not accept this argument. It argued Greystar wrongly hid additional costs from tenants because they were not advertised in the rental listings. Tenants won’t realize the extra costs until they sit down and read the fine print in the lease – and not everyone does.
The lawsuit cites a would-be Utah tenant who applied online for a gray unit and only learned of the additional monthly fee of $112 after clicking multiple links. The FTC said there are many such cases and numerous cases in which Greystar tenants ended up being charged hundreds of dollars in rent, including at least seven in Utah.
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Tara Rollins, executive director of the Utah Housing Alliance, is following the FTC and Colorado lawsuit. She is pushing her state Legislature to require all rentals to be included in the rental price up front.
