Review History for Patience_1

Don't live here...Crime is high...I was burlgarized

I lived at Briarwick for close to 2 years. Before I tell my story, I do want to state the positives: the apartment was reasonably priced, included heat, was spacious and was very quiet in the apartment. The quietest place I ever lived, actually. The option to have washer/dryer in the unit. Lauren was the ONLY professional, kind and helpful person working in the office. And Dave the maintenance guy was very nice and helpful also. That's all the good things I can say about it, here's my story... On December 5, 2008, my apartment was broken into and burglarized, at approx. 2:00pm in the afternoon. I was at work, and my fiance worked 3rd shift and was always home during the day, but on this day, he left for one hour to have lunch and in that time we were burglarized. I rushed home from work immediately to find our apartment cleared out, door broken and police everywhere...an absolutely devastating and violating feeling. Everything of any value was taken...large flat screen tv, video game consoles, 2 computers, 2 monitors, jewelry, other electronics, etc. Luckily I had renters insurance. The total loss came to about $15,000. I lived in an upper unit, and our door faced the parking lot. The police took fingerprints, knocked on neighbors doors, did what they could...but to this day, nothing has been recovered and burglars have not been caught. What I don't understand is how can this happen in broad daylight, in the middle of the day, and NO ONE saw anything?...how do you not see a person or persons, carrying a huge 50" flat screen TV down the sidewalk, through the snow or across the field!?? Weeks after the burglary, I found out from the mailman, staff and other residents, that just a few weeks prior to the burglary of my apartment, the office was burglarized as well, and had computer monitors stolen! I had a sit-down meeting with George and he had the nerve to tell me that something like this have never happened here before...and I looked right in his face and said "oh yea, well your office got burglarized before my apartment did!"...he had such a stupid look on his face, he didn't know what to say when I busted him out. All he could reply with was "oh, we got some small alarms on the doors now". I requested that our lease be broken so that we could move out ASAP, because obviously we no longer felt safe. George said he wouldn't do it, that it wasn't his fault and he won't let us break the lease (which would have been July 2009). I asked what he WOULD do for us, and he said if someone else rents the apartment, then we can leave early. Other than that, all he did was change the lock on the apartment door. He wouldn't even fix the broken wooden door frame, from when the burglars broke through the door. I lived in that burglarized, empty, unsafe apartment until April 2009 when he finally found some people that wanted to rent it, and we could move out. I don't think the new tenants were ever told what happened in that apartment, and I wonder if they ever asked why the wood around the door is broken and busted up. I doubt George or his staff will ever tell them the truth... Speaking of the truth...George never sent out a notice to his tenants about our burglary, so that maybe other tenants could take precautions or start up a neighbor-watch or whatever. Weeks after our burglary, a girl got her car broken into and she went door to door giving out fliers and talking to other tenants. She wanted George to do something about the thefts, like put up cameras. My fiance had a chance to share our story with that girl when she came to our door, as confirmation that yes, theft and burglary IS happening at Briarwick. A few days after the girl gave out her flyers, George passed out letters of his own, basically trying to make it look like that girl was a liar or exaggerating...George was trying to make it seem like that type of stuff doesn't happen at Briarwick...and in his letter, not ONCE did he mention what HE was going to do to PROTECT the tenants or make it safer. He didn't offer solutions in his letter, he just focused on making that girl look bad. After all that I have been through and what the girl went through, I learned that George does NOT care about tenants safety, all he cares about it collecting rent money. I would never return there, nor would I ever recommend that place to family or friends. I don't wish a burglary on anyone, its a horrible, violating experience. I also learned to be very careful and watchful of anyone that enters your apartment for any reason. My fiance and I are very quiet and private people, keep curtains closed, we didn't invite people to the apartment, we never had parties, in the 2 years we only had 2 guests, my sister and cousin. The only other people who would have seen what was inside our apartment was: Briarwick maintenance people--the painter and the plumber, and the guys that delivered our washer/dryer into the unit. I cannot blame anyone because I don't know for sure...but if we lived in an upper unit with curtains closed, the only way anyone would know what we own is if they had been in the apartment...and the people I just listed are the only people that were ever in my apartment. It's highly unlikely that a burglar(s) take a chance of knocking a door down and not knowing who or what is inside. Which means, the person(s) who burglarized our apartment, must have been watching us to know that my fiance stepped out, since he was normally home during the day (cause he worked 3rd shift). For weeks after the burglary, I talked to a lot of people--staff, tenants, people in the community, and I was told of many other thefts and crime at Briarwick. In addition to my burglary, that girls car being burglarized and the Briarwick office being burglarized, I was told of an assault, a burglary 5-6 months prior to mine and mutliple cars being broken into. If you don't believe me or my story, feel free to contact the Greenfield Police Department, they have the police report and you can ask about the incident, or contact me at patience_ak1 at yahoo dot com, and I can give you more information. It angers me that George does not let his tenants know when these things happen, so that everyone could secure their doors, or keep an eye out for other neighbors, or anything so that tenants have a chance to take precautions...and the fact that he doesn't let tenants know, proves to me he doesn't care and is concerned about losing tenants(money). I hope to never go through that experience again, but I learned so much, and I hope that I can at least save one person from going through what I did.