InterWest Properties

We hired Interwest Properties about five years ago to manage a rental home that we own. When we hired them, we were told they would inspect the inside of the property every six months. We were lucky if they came every two years to inspect the inside of the house. When they did come and inspect the inside of the house, an Interwest employee would always check off that the furnace was fine, when, in fact, it was leaking water and there was obviously rust on the furnace. We only found out about this when we had to replace the air conditioner and the technician looked at the furnace and told us about it. We had to replace the furnace, partly because of its age and partly because it had rusted away and we had not been told about this by Interwest Properties.
About the only thing Interwest did on a regular basis was a «curbside inspection», which was not cheap.
Also, the roof on the house and garage have moss that grows on it and I always had to ask Interwest to treat the moss. They never noticed it during the curbside inspections that they did.
We have decided to manage the property ourselves, which we never wanted to do, but we can no longer trust Interwest to look after our investment.
The ladies who work in the office were always very nice and helpful, but overall not a good company at all.
P. S. This is in response to Bobby’s response to my review.
Interwest Properties charged us $ 191.00 for the terrible job of trimming our trees, which we did not ask them to do. When I asked for that money back I was told they would not refund the money.

Allow me to begin with saying I’ve never found it worth my time to go out of my way to post a negative review about a business before now.
In short, I’ve rented with interwest for a year. There was an issue with an online rent payment, where I was unaware that it had not processed. They called me the next business day, inquiring about our rent payment, we identified that the payment had not gone through. All in all, what looked what first looked like a simple mistake bloomed into an unfortunate fiasco. I was continually differed to an assistant, avoided, and when I finally got so fed up that I left a message informing them that I would reach out to the BBB, Robert «Bobby» Johnson, the VP of the company returned my call. Robert insisted was it was a ‘user error,’ offered zero transparency in how they determined this or the possibility of issues with payment, citing «their technical team looked into it.» Despite conceding to the point that they wouldn’t be able to tell if a payment was initiated, but not completed, he adopted an increasingly condescending tone that implied I didn’t know how to use the internet (mind you, I’m a twenty something with a tech-​oriented job). He threw statistics at me («44% of renters use the online service, and no one has an issue but you») and later reminded me that «contracts don’t have feelings that I could change when I liked.» Finally, he implied that this entire situation had some issue with my personal finances («you can’t adjust the terms of the contract if you can’t afford it»). This patronizing tone carried into his reply on my BBB complaint accusing me of being ‘retaliatory’ and ‘bullying.‘
All this over 140 $.
I’m lucky enough to say that I can handle losing 140 $, which isn’t the case for some of the folks that rent from them in less-​fortunate circumstances. However, what I cannot abide is the childishness, evasiveness, and overall entirely unprofessional attitude of this company’s Vice President displayed both in my original interactions around the rent payment and their disappointingly vindictive response to my BBB complaint (which is a free space for consumers to air grievances).
Although I hadn’t had much in the way of issues prior to this unfortunate experience, it is enough for me to seek a different property management company. If this is how this business treats its loyal renters, I’d be extremely apprehensive to see how they’d respond if I truly needed their help. Please, don’t rent from interwest, and encourage your friends to avoid their properties as well. Thank you.

Stay away from these people they hide behind emails and phone and there so called decision committee is a lie it’s really the husband and wife claiming to be a committee that you can’t make appts with or find when they meet cause you would have to be at their dinner table. To the property owners who are foolish enough to allow them to manage, the owner of my rental was kept completely in the dark on years of issues from tenants years before me. Even the long term maintenance people will tell you Interwest was a good outfit and many of the good staff members have moved on and the new workers are far less qualified.

I am very disappointed with this company. The leasing agent pretty much told me it was my responsibility to let her know I was first in line to view the apartment I was interested in. Even though she saw me waiting for her on the steps when she pulled up, and iI gave her a call 45 minutes before she showed up to let her know I was there already. She let another applicant that arrived at the property 30 minutes after me be the first in line. And because of her failure to pay attention to details, I am now back at square one. Her excuse was «she is all over the place» and she was sorry. Agents name is Genny. Never again!!!

Bob thinks he can ignore people dodge meetings ignore reviews bottom line people I wrote down everything damaged by the previous tenant and they charged me $ 2400 for it and wouldn’t give me a meeting bob is a slumlord and he and his wife kim are not stand up people and they have no class to even protect their reputation I told him stealing from me would cost him future business so people of Portland ask yourself before you move in if you want to pay thousands to remodel a dump when you move out. Have a great day bob

WARNING: DO NOT RENT FROM THIS PROPERTY MANAGEMENT COMPANY AND IF I WERE YOU I WOULD NOT USE THEM TO «TAKE CARE» of your property!
We rented from this company for two years and it was honestly one of the most awful experiences I have ever had. They are EXTREMELY unprofessional and clearly lack a proper protocol. When we moved in we were given a unit with issues such as tack strips showing, blatant holes in the walls never covered up from previous tenants, and various outdoor items left on the back patio as well as a BROKEN dryer that they never told us about! So did they let the owner of the property know that they were renting the unit out with multiple things wrong? The washer and dryer broke four different times throughout our stay there and nearly all of their maintenance work is outsourced so it always took over a week to get fixed! On top of that they would fix something poorly and would have to call again and wait again to have someone come do the same thing! A real inconvenience and they could not have cared less. On top of that for all maintenance re quests we had CLEAR instructions that no one is to enter the unit without our permission first and someone being there to see the person in our place… I came home early one day with my child to find that someone from interwest had let themselves in WITHOUT calling me or my husband to ask if they could or even to let us know they had received the electronic maintenance request! This company is beyond unprofessional and was by far the worst rental experience myself or my husband have ever had. If I were a property owner looking for a prop. management company I would NEVER use them and I would NEVER rent a property from them again! They do not even schedule to have someone do a walkthrough with you at the end of the lease and did not even ask for my forwarding address until I emailed them, after they requested I leave the unit unlocked and keys on the counter… so lazy! Thank god we bought a house and got out of there! AWFUL COMPANY, BAD SERVICE!

this has been such a terrible experience. we moved into a property that was a good deal, which meant we knew there were going to be things wrong with it…
we have tons of dry rot that they have no desire to address, we have ants that they wont take care of, a drain that doesnt stay plugged and many other issues. some of which, thankfully they have addressed.
maintenance is impossible to get a hold of and when we do they arent friendly…
we have had the guilt trip played on us more than once.
we had a sick dog and 2 sick young children, plus a broken gutter which was letting water in our house. so we though MOLD. had a mold test and they found and had to replace a small area.
but maintenance told us what we were costing the owner and how it was all so minuscule.
I wrote to the top, and he had been receiving all the emails also and didnt seem to think anything of it… they are so rude and unprofessional.
probably been the worst experience. no one is friendly if you can even get a hold of someone.
i would never work with them, or rent from them again…

Interwest was a gem to deal with. I had to break my lease to move for my job and everything went really well. I even got my entire deposit back! Easy to communicate with, their maintenance was great (very quick) and I loved my little duplex. Bummed that I had to leave!

It’s hard to find a property manager. We interviewed a few and went with Interwest. There was no problem as long as there were no problems with the property. As soon as some attention or work was needed I had difficulty. I wouldn’t get calls back, I would get messages that made no sense, emails went unanswered, and the tone of replies, when I did get replies, was snotty and sharp. I ended up doing a lot of work, making calls and emails, arranging repairs, that they should have done. I had a lot of trouble communicating with Bruce, I felt he was the most condescending and resistant to working collaboratively. Steve just didn’t respond to me when I asked questions. Samantha was the most helpful in the office. I’m glad the house is selling and we don’t need the service anymore.
I read the owner comment, wrote a response but then deleted it. Suffice to say that they have their viewpoint, I have mine, we disagree. The owner emailed me privately taking responsibility, going so far as to call a staff member «a grumpy old man.» His email and what he posted here are quite different. That’s just how we are going to have to leave it. After 6 years and the thousands of dollars I paid them, my experience wasn’t great and isn’t worth more of my time to explain or defend.