Tristate Property Group – IREM

Gena Wilkinson Currie is a scam artist. She represented herself to me under a different real estate company that she was working for. She showed me a couple places, took my application fee and I never heard from her again. I filed a report with New Jersey Real estate board but have not heard back. She needs her license taken away.

Do not hire TriState to manage your property. I have never posted a review about a company before but after reading Nyota W comments, I felt compelled to support her and provide my own negative experience. I hired TriState via Gena Wilkinson Currie to manage a house in downtown Philly end of September. Gena found and placed a tenant quickly and the new tenant was in the house by end of October. The first four months were fine but then it all went pear shape. Before proceeding, I should inform you that I currently use two other property management companies in other states so have some experience with the process.
The first issue was late disbursement of renal income collected by TriState. After several phone calls and emails, I was finally contacted, received an apology and was sent a check. The next month, no monthly disbursement arrived so I spent a week trying to contact TriState. After more than a week, I was contacted with another apology and sent a check via FedEx. However, this time the check bounced due to insufficient funds. After another week of repeated phone calls and emails, I was contacted with another apology and sent a check with an additional amount to cover my bank service fee. The next month the disbursement check was three weeks late but at least it did not bounce.
The disbursement check for May’s rent never arrived so after 10 days of daily phone calls and emails, I finally received a call from Amanda who was recently hired by TriState. Amanda apologized and sent a check mid June. Unfortunately, this check bounced. I was also told the tenant wanted to break the lease due to a financial setback. I informed TriState to find another tenant. To date, I have yet to receive June’s disbursement check. I have contacted the company repeatedly via phone calls and emails but no response.
On June 23, I sent a letter via post to TriState terminating my contract with them pursuant to the terms of the property management agreement. I have repeatedly sent emails and left message to discuss the situation. I have yet to receive either a phone call or email from TriState. This week I sent a letter to TriState requesting the outstanding rental disbursement for two months. I have also sent a letter directly to the tenants informing them of the situation and agreeing to the request to break the lease. I have contacted several property management companies and in the process of hiring a new company. I remain hopeful that I will receive outstanding money owed, the tenants receive the deposit from TriState when they move out, and a legal course of action will not be needed. If not, hopefully Nyota’s lawyer will take my case.

By far the worst experience that I’ve ever had with a property management company. Seriously– don’t do it. I will describe my experience with a few key terms: Broken promises, disappearing acts, disappointed tenants and vendors, missing money, lawsuits.
I hired Tri-​State Property via their agent or owner Gena Wilkinson Currie to manage a few properties that I own in Philadelphia. Initially, this appeared to be a straightforward agreement until tori-​state breeched this from virtually every perspective. I bundled these into flags. The sad part is that this is not all inclusive of my experience. Some can be described as poor business service levels and others could be categorized as downright criminal. I’ve simply outlined the facts.
Flag 1: While selling their services, Tri-​state insisted that they were transitioning to an online payment option for tenants. This was an important selling attribute for me. During the first month, not only were directions for this online service not provided, but several tenants remained confused as to where or how to send rent in any mode, though I sent multiple reminders asking the company to follow up with the transition communications. (Oh and 3 months later, no online payment option had yet been established or communicated)
Flag 2: Though during initial discussions, Tri-​state insisted that they had access to handyman resources, the first request to have work competed for a newly vacant apartment was followed with, «yes, we have a network, but this job may not be large enough for them.» Huh, so who’s supposed to do it? I quickly engaged by hiring one of my contacts who did the job at less than half the price with no problem.
Flag 3: On several occasions, hired contractors that I’d previously worked with reached out to me when they were hired by Tri-​state but strangely were unable to get in contact with them when it was time to further discuss the project, meet at the property as needed or arrange for payment (Exterminator, plumber, rug cleaners).
Flag 4: Though the contract states I’d receive remittance from rent collection on the 20^th of each month via electronic payment and I previously provided the required information to allow for this, this never happened. The issue of remittance became a clown show that included sudden non acceptance of my calls, promises of delivery via mail post the 20^th (never arrived), blaming of the bank’s system, promises of a new electronic payment (that never came), FedEx arrival of a check in the wrong amount (that subsequently bounced). During their 3 month collection of rent, I NEVER RECEIVED ANY OWED MONEY.
Flag 5 (aka the straw that broke the camel’s back): I received an email from a tenant that had moved out thanking me for the time that I management the apartment, but displaying 100% disappointment once this was transitioned to TriState. Though the tenant had moved out on the 4^th, TriState had still not conducted a walk through as of the 18^th, which also meant they had made no attempts to rent out the now vacant apartment, since they didn’t have keys!!! (I attempted to meet to provide a copy of keys for all buildings several times and this never occurred. In fact this failure, is the only failure that actually worked to my benefit as it was one less thing to request when I subsequently needed to engage lawyers.)