Madison Property Management

I WILL NEVER FUCKING RENT FROM THESE CROOKS AGAIN! I rented a small crummy studio in a divided house. The tenant in the unit behind me must have been on some kind of disability because she was pure crazy, and allowed to live there consequence free for her behavior. She had screaming delusions at all hours of the day and night, terrorized me and the other neighbors, even to the point of one morning, throwing a rock through my car window, my kitchen window and my neighbors window. And of course I didn’t see a damn bit of money back to cover the $ 211 paid to replace my car window. After 3 weeks I finally got my security deposit back, only to have been charged 2.5 hours to clean, when I left the place cleaner than when I moved in! I was also charged for having to remove items from curb. Even when they finally got the psycho woman moved out (2 weeks after the rock throwing incident), she left items on the curb and NO ONE from MPM came out to move that stuff. I paid $ 15 extra a month to have a pet, thats $ 180 extra for the year, and even then they still charged me to replace a couple of crappy blinds. Fuck these people! Nearly a year I lived there, being terrorized by the neighbor, never once being offered an answer beyond «call the police if you feel scared» and yet expected to pay rent every month, never offered a discount or compensation for the stress and anxiety from the crazy woman they allowed to live there.

The wife and I moved from Maine/​Massachusetts to Wisconsin so she could attend the university. She found Madison Property Management doing an online search.
I don’t know if they could have made things any easier for us. Because of our distance situation everything move-​in related was done via e-​mail/​fax. We did a «sight unseen» rental which even MPM recommends against. It worked out pretty good for us though. We ended up at the Quarry Ridge apartments. They’re nice. Good location, all the amenities, decent little yard, you know — that stuff you like to have in an apartment.
But what happens when something goes wrong?
Disposal starts shooting water into the cabinet? Send Becky an e-​mail, within 48 hours we have a new disposal.
Folding door comes off the tracks? Send Becky an e-​mail, within 48 hours the door is fixed.
Fridge starts filling with water? Send Becky an e-​mail, within 12 hours the fridge is fixed.
Some idiot engages in a random act of stupidity and tosses a rock through our window? (It should be noted that this was the only issue of that sort we had staying here.) Make a phone call to emergency maintenance, window is boarded up within an hour. Send Becky an e-​mail (complete with pertinent details like a police report number,) within 48 hours the glass company is looking at the window. We moved out before it was fixed (less than 1 week between the incident and move out) but things were moving at a reasonable pace and given past history I feel confident in saying it would have been fixed soon. MPM isn’t even trying to have us pay the damages (or our rental insurance) and it doesn’t have any effect on our deposit.
When it came time for move out we got e-​mails telling us exactly what the expectations were. Easy. They didn’t even make us go back to their office to drop keys off. We simply left them in the unit.
Bottom line:
MPM made our rental experience easy. All we had to do was tell them about a problem and it was fixed. Despite all the questions and e-​mails I sent Becky during our last few weeks living at quarry ridge (and that whole window thing) she was never anything but pleasant and professional. I’d definitely rent from MPM again.

We lived in MPM apartments for several years. Not everything was bad, but Becky is the most disgusting human being I have ever encountered.
Our heating failed in the dead of winter. She told me that someone would be there in 2 hours. When I called 3 hours later she said it would be another two hours. When I said that was unacceptable she gave me the most passive aggressive «Have a nice weekend!» imaginable and HUNG UP! This wasn’t the first time that she had behaved this way.
I emailed MPM about this and never heard a peep. Enjoy your one star review.

Madison, I want to love and adore you. But my move here has not started off well.
First, I will admit we leased an apartment without seeing it. Yes, that is entirely our fault. We lived in Milwaukee and apartments in the month of August are a hot commodity in Madison, so we took a chance. However there are a ton of flaws that should have been fixed/​taken care of before we moved in.
We arrive at the apartment to move in and my father in law notices a huge leak downstairs in the basement. No one noticed that prior to us moving in?
We can’t fit our furniture through the doors. The back door is so insanely narrow and the front door is at such a terrible angle that we had to abandon the couch we purchased before the move as well as a desk. There goes hundreds of dollars worth of furniture, and we have literally never had this happen to us before when renting.
The bathroom? A, pardon my french, fucking joke. I will post pictures to demonstrate the water damage on the floor and the decrepit shower. I have literally refused to shower in there and have taken to showering at my gym instead.
The back bedroom, I’m not sure how they can call it a bedroom when the hallway to get there could physically not accommodate the width of our moving boxes, I can’t imagine someone actually having to use that as a bedroom as I don’t think a mattress could literally fit.
And, the cherry on top, they asked us to mow. Okay, fine, we are the primary resident, no problemo.
Oh, but wait, they don’t give us a mower. They expect us to buy or «borrow» a mower.
WE RENT. If you want that done, you have to provide something for us to use!
We have been in our new place for 2 weeks and we are already talking about how soon we can afford to get a new place and get out of here. On top of all of this, we pay an extra 80 bucks a month for our pets and there is not carpeting here. And besides that, what could they do to this place that could make it any worse?
Truly unhappy with the quality, or definite lack their of, the apartment we have rented and the lack of care given by the company renting it to us.

I moved to Madison last year and lived with a roommate for 6 months. I was leery about renting my own apartment with the fear of non-​responsive landlords or property management companies. Upon moving into my apartment, there were a few things to get fixed and the response time was immediate. MPM had everything fixed within a week or two. I was estatic!
I had a snag with paying my rent online and was charged late fees. After looking into the matter, MPM kindly refunded the late charge! This was beyond what I expected and I was so grateful that someone in accounting could see this was a technical error and gave me my money back.
This company is quick to respond and takes care of their tenants. They handle everything in a highly professional manner. I can’t say enough good about this company! So happy to find an amazing apartment and an even better management company to deal with :)

MPM used deplorable tactics to retain 95% of our security deposit. This sort of behavior can only be described as predatory. When we came to see the town house prior to move-​in, simply put, it was trashed. The tenants did little to keep the home clean and uncluttered. On the move-​in day you could see half of the furniture and junk the prior tenants left were sitting on the curbside waiting to be picked up. MPM had redone the carpets in the entire 3br house, repainted the walls, fixed all the doors, and a host of other improvements. They’ll never admit to it, but the likely reason our deposit was withheld was so that MPM could recoup the resources they put in the house to make it presentable. I have also heard similar stories from friends, and other acquaintances. This was roughly three years ago, and I’m still bitter about it enough to write this scathing Unilocal review.

MPM and Jim’s team have managed our investment real estate on behalf of our family for over 10 years. Frankly before that, the management company we were with almost put us in a stature to consider selling. That said, the reason for this review is to once again thank them for coming to the rescue on a personal request to move an item too big for us to handle personally (2^nd time they came to our rescue)! What is really heartwarming is that throughout the relationship and the array of requests or needs on behalf of our buildings or residents, I can’t recall even one time where Jim or his team said no. Instead, they always find a way to make things happen. Now anyone who owns real estate and understands the unique challenges of doing business in Madison in a rental industry certainly understands the daily challenges of them being caught in the middle of tenant’s sometimes crazy requests and not taking responsibility for their actions and property owners who will not let MPM spend necessary $ to properly to work for the residents. So for our family, we do understand those challenges and are grateful for what the MPM staff does for our residents and the buildings we own… hats off to MPM!

After renting this place remotely (although a friend did go and check it out), I was in for a shock at move-​in. The place was incredibly dirty, even though I moved in two days after my lease had started. There were cobwebs everywhere, so much dust that I started coughing, dirt and other particles all over the floor, and of course, the actual structure and appliances were in disrepair. The tubs and sinks were peeling, there were rusted out drawers in the kitchen, soap scum that would not come out of the bathroom fixtures, and lights that were not operational/​rusted over. It was shocking, but I wrote to the property manager and they agreed to compensate me. However, it was a negotiation, and the property manager told me there was no way that the place required 8+ hours of cleaning at their professional rate stated in their lease.
Turns out, my upstairs neighbors had the same issue and moved into a filthy place. They were compensated double what I received.
Then, it was an uphill battle trying to get the owner of the property to fix anything inside. They said it would cost too much money and they needed the place to be empty and to raise rent before they could fix anything. (Funny thing is, I moved to a place in the same neighborhood for the same price that is MUCH newer, cleaner, etc., and it is the same price!) Therefore, I was left with many of the issues I mentioned above, but with no effort on the part of the owner to fix anything.
On top of that, their maintenance staff was usually very kind, but there were some times when they (or people they contracted to fix things) would come in and track mud around the apartment and/​or damage my belongings. I had to have MPM pay for a new trash can because they broke the lid!
In addition, once October rolled around and they started asking about renewing the lease, MPM began their showings. Other landlords in Madison (like my current landlord) try to schedule their showings in fairly short increments (30 mins or so) and on the same day/​time period. MPM would block off hour-​long periods at inconvenient times (e.g. 5:45pm on a Friday, 10am on a Saturday) and on consecutive days instead of one day (for instance, the company I currently rent with seems to go to certain properties on certain days of the week). It was incredibly difficult to feel like you were living in your own home. There were also incidents where a misunderstanding with the person showing the home led to unpleasant situations; this was mainly due to problems that MPM had with their keys to the place. In response, I would be asked to keep certain doors unsecured so staff could conduct showings, etc. It was incredibly frustrating, since this was an issue that was out of my hands.
Finally, after move-​out, I was told that the apartment required 7 hours of professional cleaning at the rate of $ 39.50. This was after I cleaned the apartment extensively over the course of three days; I estimate that I spent about 10 hours at the place Swiffering, vacuuming, getting on my hands and knees to use wood cleaner for the baseboards, floors, doors, shelves, etc., thoroughly cleaning the kitchen and bathroom appliances, and even using the wood solvent/​cleaner on the windowsills and inside of the windows. The truth is, the place is incredibly old and dust keeps on accumulating; in fact, pieces of the ceiling/​walls seemed to continually break off a little at a time and land on my furniture. I also noticed that dirt was being tracked in during showings, which were consistently happening while I was in the process of cleaning/​moving out. However, they were convinced that they would charge me for 7 hours of professional cleaning.
When I compared the photographs I took of my initial move-​in, I could see a lot of similarities to the kinds of problems they photographed (e.g. a scratch on the wooden floor, yellowing of the tiles on the wall, dirt on the outside of the window — which isn’t the tenant’s responsibility since it is on the outside of the building, etc). They were unwilling to admit that I needed 8+ hours of cleaning and did not compensate me fairly at move-​in. In fact, my building manager specifically said my documentation did not prove that the apartment required 8+ hours of cleaning. However, the photographic evidence presented at move-​out, which they claim amounts to 7 hours of cleaning, is definitely nowhere near as bad as the state of the apartment at move-​in. The amount of cleaning supplies used (one big packet of Swiffer wet wipes, almost an entire bottle of wood cleaner, multiple rounds of emptying the vaccum, a whole box of wipes, about ²⁄₃ of a bottle of all-​purpose Windex, ²⁄₃ of a pumice stone for the toilet, a substantial amount of bleach and bathroom cleaner, oven cleaner, multiple Magic Erasers, etc.) makes me skeptical about their claims.
I hope to contest this with MPM and find a resolution that is amenable to both parties. We’ll see what happens. Next step: contacting Wisconsin DATCP.

I have rented from many landlords. MPM is the best.
We had four guys renting a non-​campus house from MPM. As other Unilocalers mention, MPM doesn’t actually own the properties, they just manage them. That is how it works. It shouldn’t surprise anyone.
Every single time I had a maintenance issue, MPM had someone to my house in less than 24 hours. When it came time to show our house, they were prompt in giving us advance notice and helpful when issues arose. If you forget your rent (like I did a few times), you wont be immediately evicted. They understand people forget things and will politely remind you.
Best of all, MPM is the most dog friendly apartment manager in Madison. I have a dog that is generally prohibited at apartments, however, MPM was willing to work with us.
Madison Property may seem like a big company, however, I was always treated as a real person. I would highly recommend anyone go with MPM.

I lived at Equinox a few years back. The building manager is a good guy — very helpful and responsive. Overall the apartments are nice, come furnished, and all utilities are included so that is convenient. Nonetheless, I felt like I was paying way too much for what I was getting. I also didn’t really like renting from MPM because they would NEVER EVER cut tenants any slack. We had a few issues during our lease and we would always have to haul our asses down to their Regent headquarters just to talk about it. Not a huge deal but it just was annoying that we could not handle problems on site. I live at Palisades now and management is extremely reasonable and flexible with their tenants. If you are wanting to live in one of the high rise apartments, Equinox definitely wasn’t a bad choice but I prefer Palisades no doubt.

These guys don’t actually own any of the properties. They manage them for other owners. This means that there are wildly different service levels given to each property based on what the owners of the buildings are willing to spend on maintenance. I rented from them for two years in a house on Langdon St. Our first building rep seemed pretty inept, but as I found out from our second building rep, it had more to do with the fact that the actual owner of the property didn’t want to spend anything on repairing it, so she just made excuses on his behalf. I won’t make the mistake of renting from them again. The total lack of vertical integration, combined with high turnover of staff and some shady folks who own properties that MPM manages means I won’t be back.

Not the worse place to rent from in Madison, not the best either. I rented from MPM for two years, different places each year but same building. We had to move all our stuff to the street in between so we waited for the day with our stuff. Some cleaners came to clean and were out in 5 minutes. they said «Looks like someone already cleaned» (yeah, us!). We still got charged for two hours of cleaning! The next year we got charged nothing though, and our dog had pissed all over the carpet, so who knows! One big complaint is a cleaning lady who cleaned mutual spaces left a key in our door that had a key to our apartment, and it was there all weekend until I returned home. I had to call the police to have them search my apartment because I was scared. When I called to complained I got an apology and a request for the keys back. I didn’t send them back, instead I got an extra pair of keys for my trouble. All in all not terrible, a bit expensive but clean apartments.

These people have been horrible to rent from. When I moved in there were so many problems with the place: raw sewage (yes, human SHIT) backed up in the basement, the front door had no lock, the door to the apartment had no working lock. After weeks with no response to these issues (I didn’t feel safe in my apt since neither one of the doors locked properly) I called the building inspector, and they found FIVE PAGES worth of things that needed repair and weren’t up to code. They also love to send people in to do work with zero notice. And, the people they hire to do the ‘maintenance’ are lowlifes. I’ve had a chain-​smoking alcoholic-​type guy with booze on his breath, a mentally challenged woman who I just felt sorry for (she came in, with no notice, of course, to put rat poison in my apt even though I have cats– I yelled at her and told her to get out) I also filed a complaint with DATCP. Now, Just this week, I discovered that while doing ‘maintenance’ someone stole a steel sculpture I put in front to try and give our place some character. That took me years to make and was priceless to me. I have had numerous other things stolen including: my compost bin, my toolbox (was my late father’s– also priceless). After two years of being an excellent tenant, I am still treated like dirt and my things are routinely tampered with or stolen. DO NOT RENT FROM THIS COMPANY!!! EVER EVER EVER!!!

Not too bad. Seem responsive. Properties are in OK condition (not stellar but not horrible either). Typical problems arise bc it’s a big org, but they also give you a one-​person contact from the company which makes it seem more friendly and responsive as well.