Thank you for the responses. It seems assumptions are being made so let me provide more context. There's quite a bit of history with this property management company:
1) They failed to notify me when the original tenant stopped paying rent in early 2023. They had to evict the tenant and only informed me when the tenant was removed. I asked why they hadn't informed me before. No acknowledgement.
2) When they started the process of finding a new tenant, they forwarded an application for my approval. Then went silent. When I asked what happened with the applicant, they took weeks to inform me that squatters had moved into the property.
3) When I asked for a copy of the court paperwork they had filed (to ensure they were actually doing something about it and to discuss with my own lawyer), they reassured me vaguely they were taking steps while they moved slowly without telling me what exactly they were doing. Suddenly they asked for a copy of my deed so it was obvious it took months to file the eviction order with the court. Then months later, I received a copy of the court paperwork.
4) Fast forward to last month. They start searching for new tenants and asked for my approval of their search criteria. I made it clear that the minimum credit score and income requirement needed to be higher. They said my request was reasonable and agreed to update the criteria. Now I see that they reverted to the old criteria. As though my phone conversation with them had never taken place.
5) There was an applicant who signed the lease and was supposed to move in Nov 15th (by now). The PM was so eager to share that they had secured this tenant and that he had signed the lease. Mysteriously I got a vague notification that the listing went live again. Does this mean the applicant backed out? The burden is now on me to reach out and ask what happened.
The above also doesn't cover the dozen times I asked via email and phone for more regular communication. It's amazing how sincere they sound each time with their apologies/promises to do better moving forward. Yet again, they drop the ball. Especially when challenges arise.
This PM company is clearly out of their depth even though they told me last month that they had hired more staff and were making improvements to their processes. Their neglect has been egregious and it concerns me that issues keep coming up. Which is why I wanted to explore some kind of legal recourse. The reason I stayed so long is that every time I was about to take some kind of action, they would suddenly show progress. I'm very likely to sell the property but wanted to gather opinions from this forum first. Good news is that at least the PMC has agreed to a $1k credit.
Looking at the responses on this forum, I appreciated the thoroughness of a few answers and the genuine curiosity of another respondent. What is not helpful is the assumption that some responders made that the root cause is the PM's communication style was not to my "liking". Or hinting that property owners like to unnecessarily "complain" and that they're "lazy". Seeking to invalidate someone's perspective before asking for details is not productive. If you can't help but reflexively defend property managers without knowing the issues, even when their behavior might be unprofessional, all I can say is this: Investors, please take note. Be careful about working with PMs who don't really respect investors. This is my last note on the matter.
