Dowling Properties

My son hasn’t even moved in yet and I’m already pissed off. They require each tenant to fill out an application but only allow one check each month for the rent or they charge you $ 20 per extra check and if you want to pay by cash they charge you a $ 30 fee

management there are totally heartless! They were going to kick me out on the street after a home purchase nearly fell through– even though they did not have a new tenant signed up yet.
I will hate signing up as a tenant with them. Zero compassion. They definitely deserve the title of slum lord.

I urge you to think twice, neigh three times about renting from this property management. The owner and management are patronizing, demeaning, and insincere, especially towards women. When I got into my apartment, they hadn’t even cleaned the bathroom and there was literally coffee all over the floor and blinds. The washer and dry rarely worked, there was never hot water, and the bathroom was moldy. They don’t take repairs seriously, either taking months to fix the issue or just completely ignoring it, and not to mention the repair man is a nincompoop. This was THE WORST rental experience I have ever had. I cleaned my apartment at the end of the lease within an inch of its life with a verbal confirmation that I would get my entire deposit back. LIES. SUCH LIES. Do yourself a favor and steer clear of Dowling Properties; it’s not worth your time, money, or sanity.

While Downling Properties are pushy when they want something, they ignore repeated maintenance requests, and blatantly ignore tenant rights. They also have it in their lease that they will not take care of pests in their buildings, which leads me to believe they are just slum lords.

Poor Dowling! Thought I should put in my two-​cents since I don’t believe it deserves quite the bad rap it’s receiving. Currently renting with Dowling, and on my third year with them.
Having lived in the Bay Area (Berkeley, Oakland, SF) before moving to Davis, I’ve gone through my share of landlords and feel that Dowling is actually quite responsive. I remember how Jon Vento, the manager, went above and beyond to help us get settled in. They’ve always been highly responsive to our maintenance requests and do their best within the constraints — property owners who are stingy at times, maintenance folks who are working multiple jobs, and a relatively small staff managing a lot of properties.
My feedback for Dowling is:
— Please follow-​up with the maintenance folks you ask to come, and try to get back to them regarding large repair orders (e.g., replacement of dryer or dishwasher) in a timely manner. I know it probably requires owner approval, but I think it took more than a week or two in my case.
— Please make sure that the property is thoroughly and professionally cleaned before new tenants move in. Check all the cabinets for junk, and do a smell check. This probably has to do with allowing a bit more time between tenants to do these checks. Our place reeked of cat urine despite carpet cleaning due to previous tenants. They were very good about changing out the carpet ASAP, and Jon even volunteered to come help us move our stuff from room to room out of his own time. Highly appreciated!!!
— Lastly, this is a piece of feedback for all rentals in Davis. We are not all students renting according to an academic calendar and having time to see properties in the middle of the day on a weekday. If you are a working professional who cannot come during the work day, finding an place to rent in Davis is near-​impossible. Please allow for evening viewings and leases that do not follow the calendar year. It is completely ridiculous!

It’s the property management system that makes Dowling Properties a tough business to work with. I just ended a lease with a property that was managed by Dowling. It’s essentially going through a middleman between a property owner who wants to rent out their house but just want the money, so they give Dowling a cut for managing it. And Dowling is able to cut costs by hiring its own crew of maintenance people and short changing the tenants. In this kind of system, the tenants will always get the short end of the stick. They also think they can get away with things because we’re all, for the most part, college students.
Don’t get me wrong, Jon, our main contact, was nice. But his promises were empty. And his maintenance men and contractors are some of the nicest. Our place was handed to us with a spider and cockroach infestation. The spiders were taken care of after a few calls, the cockroaches were an ongoing problem throughout the year. I don’t think they took my emails saying that cockroaches were crawling in the sinks and bed very seriously.
Our house was fairly rundown. There were definitely things that needed to be replaced that never were. Like broken window blinds, holes in the walls, old cracking vinyl floors, bathroom and kitchen fixtures. We lived with all this for a year, and returned it in practically the same condition with normal wear and tear. When we signed our lease, they took double the rent (which is the maximum legal amount) for our deposit. They returned it all minus about $ 400 for «cleaning» and «repairs». Per the lease we signed, there’s no way they can be wrong. Awesome, Dowling.
It also really sucked to live under our lease (they vary from house to house) because we had to pay for the city services which can amount up to $ 300 bi-​monthly on top of our rent and other services. We also had to pay for our carpets to be cleaned at the end of our term regardless of the condition that we kept the carpet. See what I mean by the tenants getting the short end of the stick? Poor conditions and more expensive for us than anyone else.
Don’t expect Dowling to look out for you. I should’ve known this when I met the condescending Mr. Dowling when initially turning in the deposit check. He said to me «Give the me the check, my name’s on the door.» Regardless, I don’t feel comfortable giving $ 3100 dollars to a man I’ve never met and will never see again throughout the course of my lease.
I’ve moved every year I’ve been in Davis and can say with confidence that there are many, many more options in Davis that give you a better deal and a better place to live without having to keep a dedicated hand vacuum for cockroaches. Avalon, part of the Sorrento and Brisa owners, in south Davis had the nicest, most prompt administration and maintenance people I knew, and never have I seen a cockroach there.
I will never pay good money to live on 922 J Street ever again. Thanks for the great year Mr. Dowling.

Poor service. You have to bug them and bug them to reply back if you got or did not get the rental. At the end, I found better luck on craigslist with a private party.
Famous for: Bad service and headache trying to find a place to live.