Bayside Management

We have the pleasure of renting a sumptuous, well maintained home thanks to Bayside Management. Our property manager is Joanelle Russell. She is exceptional & simply the best. She professional, clear, efficient, responsive and greatly cares for her clients’ well being & satisfaction (landlords & tenants).

My wife and my family have lived in a property managed by Bayside Management for the past 3 years, and they have been excellent. Super responsive, attentive and very customer service-​friendly. In particular our point of contact Joanelle is excellent. We are past landlords ourselves (we owned rental property for a number of years) and have hired property management companies to manage our own rental properties, so we know how difficult the job is. Also, I run my own business so I appreciate the value of a good team. Bayside has a dynamic team which I would highly recommend, whether you are a property owner considering using them as your property management company or if you are a prospective tenant considering renting one of their properties.

I lived in an apartment that was managed by Bayside. The manager assigned was Judy Ustad. She was very responsive and kind. We had our times of disagreement but overall I was quite pleased. I was concerned about a particular situation and requested a meeting with the owner of Bayside and Judy. Both attended, were very professional and thoughtful. The matter was mutually resolved. I was impressed with both people. They are restricted by whomever owns the property. I was not happy that my rent was raised every year however it is the owner that prompts that, not Bayside Management. Bayside is contractually bound to be in compliance with the owners decisions/​requests. I would use Bayside Management again for sure… and a special thank you to Judy Ustad and Jeff!

We were living in a Mill Valley apartment for four years. Our rent was $ 1775. The owner hired a S F property management company and the rent was promptly raised to $ 2400/​month. A 39% increase or $ 625.
We are an older couple living on a fixed income AND my husband has advanced Alzheimer’s so any move would be disorienting/​distressing to him. I was unable to find anything satisfactory; we wanted to remain in Mill Valley because we have roots and community here.
By a fluke, the family living in the apartment next door (building owned by someone else), is moving. A kind neighbor hooked us up with them and Bayside Management. Peter Boda smoothed the application process for me. We are moving next door at the OLD rent of $ 1800 and my husband will be minimally uprooted by moving to the same floor plan in the same neighborhood.
I am so grateful for Peter’s compassion and support for us in a difficult situation.

This company is horrible! No one is on the same page. The maintenance worker came into my apartment without notice. I only knew because I could tell someone had moved my bed. Afterwards they offered no apology, except from a secretary who was just doing her job and didn’t know what to say.

Peter Boda of Bayside management helped us tremendously with a real estate transaction that really made a difference for our family. We can not speak highly enough of his dedication and professionalism during a stressful time. As a mother of two and having just been diagnosed with cancer, we needed to downsize to a less expensive home. Peter really went to bat for us and thanks to him we are saving money each month while staying in our same beloved neighborhood.

Rental was nice and price was fair. However, upon vacating the home, Bayside Management held back a portion of our deposit with limited explanation even though we had been told that we would receive the entire deposit back.

My girlfriend and I were looking for apartments in Marin, and came across a Craigslist page from Bayside for a spot in San Rafael. Our emails were promptly returned, and Dylan was very helpful in setting up a viewing time and taking us around the space. This particular apartment wasn’t a fit for us, but we had a great experience working with Dylan and will gladly work with him to find a better fit in the future.

Bayside Management is everything you’d expect from a 1950s company. Nothing electronic, business hours of a 1950s bank, and service of the USPS circa 10

we rented a house in Mill Valley listed by Bayside. The owner of the house was too cheap to have BS manage her place unfortunately. It would have been a lot more enjoyable for me to deal with BS than our Landlord. I enjoyed dealing with Peter and was always helpful and friendly. We later used Bayside again to find a new home and Peter made the whole process very easy for us. I think what people forget here is that BS does not own the properties they just manage them the best they can. I would recommend BSM.

I saw an apartment that I liked on the Bayside web page. I called and spoke to Peter. He was polite and kind. He guided me through the process even though I was a pest. he was very patient. I love the apartment. It’s bright and airy. If I do have an issue, I call the apartment manager, Viktoria. She either calls or comes by that same day to see if she can fix the problem right then. If not, she’ll get it taken care of right away. I am happy with the apartment and the service that the Broker, Peter and the apartment manager, Viktoria have given me. I recommend Bayside. Management.

I have been using Bayside Management for about 14 years for a rental property in Mill Valley. They have always been professional and reliable. My current property manager is Mr. Peter Boda and has been for several years. Mr. Boda has always been very prompt and professional in handling any problem and keeping me informed of various situations and options in managing the property. I recommend Bayside and Mr. Boda to all my friends.
Rob O.
Mill Valley, CA

I’ve lived in a B.M. rental for a little under 2 months now.
I left a check with this month’s rent, along with a note requesting that someone look at a few run down items and see if they could be fixed, on Monday. My check was promptly cashed within a couple days, but no one’s called me or stopped by to fix the items in question.
It’s inconvenient that they have not set up electronic rent pay yet. Is it really that difficult to set up, B. M?

Renting a house through them was simply the worst customer service experience I’ve ever had. If I could give them zero stars I would. When we received our first PG&E bill at the rental it was for several hundred dollars for the small 1200 square foot house. This continued throughout the winter paying $ 500 – 700 per month. We called to complain about the how drafty the house was many many times and they simply screened out calls.
At one point they decided to paint the house. Our daughter was an infant at the time so we were worried about lead paint exposure. I tested the paint and it was indeed lead paint. We let them know about the presence of lead and our concerns that the job be done correctly. They hired a scab crew who scraped down everything leaving paint chips everywhere without any lead mitigation. We temporarily moved out and filed a claim with Marin County. Again, when we complained they simply screened our calls. We had similar experiences with sewer problems, leaking roofs etc. Stay far away.
UPDATE:
This is a response to the Business Owner comment posted 3 years after my review:
Claiming that your telephone system is set up in a way that doesn’t permit calls to be screened is silly. The woman who answered the phone would simply tell us she would pass on our messages to Peter and he would never respond. This happened dozens of times.
Saying that having astronomically high heating bills is a «lifestyle choice» is also ridiculous. Our current house, which is larger and in the same neighborhood, costs ¹⁄₃ as much to heat so I think our «lifestyle» doesn’t necessarily require a $ 700/​month heating bill. When we did have our own independent contractor come out to check out the problem. He found a number of problems, the funniest of which was the fact that the back of the refrigerator compartment was completely open to the elements (!).
In regards to Bayside’s ignoring our complaints about being exposed to lead paint dust, if you truly feel that this was a decision that the owner was completely responsible for then you should have put is in contact with them instead of ignoring our concerns for months on end until we finally felt forced to leave.

Bayside Management is the perfect place to go if you want to see how properties SHOULD NOT be managed.
I lived at a rental property for 14 months that they «managed». I never received a copy of the lease or even a lease to sign. I had to request one myself months later, while our direct contact there, Peter, fumbled through 4 or 5 different attempts trying to get the information right. The reason I wanted a signed lease was for the eventuality that they would screw me when I was ready to move out. And, yes, they tried to screw me.
***As a side note, I would have not given them any stars if Unilocal didn’t require at least one.
Their form of management is letting one of the renters at our house call all the shots even though he only rents. Its easier to just take his word than to actually be involved themselves. Whatever this guy would tell Peter, Peter would do. Otherwise, you never saw hide nor hair of them. When it came time to fix things at the house, they tried to weasel out of it commonly.
As far as Peter goes, besides being inept at his job and careless, he is also rather rude. He has tried to screw me out of part of my hefty $ 1350 security deposit by charging me, after I moved out, for repairs that were not related to me. It was only after I threatened to sue that he has decided to pay… over a month after I moved out! This is despite the fact that the deposit was supposed to be paid within 21 days of moving. But he is still trying to withhold $ 50 for some bogus charge. He stated that I should be fine with it because that’s not much to pay for living somewhere for 14 months. It is if you haven’t caused any damages! When I tried to explain this to him very calmly, HE HUNG UP!
Peter is also real good at not returning his calls and taking extended vacations quite often, not to mention his short 4-​hour work day. And the secretary is pretty slow to boot.
So if classless, uptight, lazy, irresponsible and thievery are all things you look for in a property management company, that invest, rather, lose your money with Bayside!
UPDATE: 3÷30÷2011: I got my $ 50 back (+ court fees) after taking this swindler to Marin County Court). And I’m sure he’s still trying to rip somebody off as we speak.

I have found that over the years working with various property managers, that Bayside has been the most personable. While you can’t please all of the people all of the time, if I have made my requests known, they delivered.

We found our place through their craigslist ad. Meeting Dylan and working with him to get into our home was a good experience.