Campus Estates

My roommate and I had frustrating and disappointing experiences with Nick Cochrane while living in a condo he managed at Benchmark Condominiums. We were both new to Austin, and my roommate toured the apartment before we signed. We wanted a short term lease with the opportunity to renew as we became familiar with the area. During this tour, Nick told my roommate directly that we could sign a 6 month lease with the opportunity to renew. When it came time for us to renew, Nick told us that someone would be moving in after our lease ended and needed to tour the apartment the next day. He later informed us that the owner would be moving into the unit, which he had not previously told us. He also changed his "touring times" with only hours notice. While we lived here, the locks on the post office box were also changed, and Nick never notified us that this was happening; we found out only after asking Nick after unsuccessful attempts to open our PO Box with our original keys. I had to ask multiple times for these new keys (which Nick never got to us); then eventually had to ask multiple additional times for the contact of the management company who had our new keys. It took over a month for us to get our new PO Box keys, and eventually I had to drive to an office 30 minutes away to pick them up from a third party. I was also locked out of the property due to gate code changes, which we were never notified about. It took Nick over a week of constant reminders from us to get us the new codes. Maintenance was always a nightmare. Within the first day of moving in, my roommate's doorknob fell off. When she submitted a maintenance request, Nick told her that it was her fault and she was liable to fix it. The balcony door off my room was not sealed properly, and caused issues with climate control and bugs in my room. It took over a week for someone to get sent to the property to fix it. During these multiple visits, nothing was fixed, and at one point, the maintenance team sealed the door completely shut so I could not open it again until someone came to break the seal. The door never got fixed and I ended up having to cover the gaps myself with towels to maintain insulation. We submitted multiple maintenance requests for pest control, which were all ignored, except for one. This one was a wasp issue, with active wasp nests in front of the front door (the only entrance to the unit) and on the balcony. This was less than two weeks before we were moving out, and I submitted the request after spraying the nests multiple times myself (something I shouldn't have had to do in the first place). I stated in the request that we had already tried spraying many times. Nick texted me after I submitted the request and told me to spray the nests (which, as I said, I already did), and then when I told him that didn't work, he said "that's impossible", and told me not to worry about it because we were "out of there in 10 days too". When I told him that we were worried about potential injury while we were moving out, he asked if I had tried hitting these active wasps nests with a broom. When I told him we would not be doing that due to fear of injury, he told us he would send someone over. The nests out front were knocked down by someone a few days later and left on the ground, and no one ever took care of the nests on the balcony. When we moved out, we asked when the security deposit would be returned. He told us within 30 days of moveout, but we never received it. After over a month, I reached back out and he said he sent it through our payment portal. There was no evident activity on either of our accounts. After discussion, he ended up Venmo-ing the remaining balance to us. Overall, our living situation was soured entirely by Nick's management (or lack thereof). While the property itself did work well for us, we are ultimately grateful we only lived there for 6 months because management was such a nightmare. I would recommend avoiding properties under his management, as it caused a lot of undue stress for myself and my roommate.