This week we had some fun with our apartment complex. For those of you who have not visited us, our complex is very small and the actual apartment building with the entrances to each unit are all within a gate, with the residents-only parking lot within yet another gate outside the apartment gate. It is double-gated.
The parking for guests is all on the street, and it is very limited. When people come see us, they have to park somewhere on the street that is not prohibited by signs, and then call us so that we can let them into the gate that allows access to the apartment building itself. There is active and aggressive towing in force if you park outside the signs.
Recently, the city removed half of the on-street guest parking to create a turn lane at the end of the street. There is now not enough parking for us to have more than 2 cars visit us anymore.
This week our car was in the shop being repaired, and we had a rental car. I did not feel comfortable parking the rental car on the street, because most of the spots were taken and it would have to be very far away. So I went into the residents-only parking lot and parked the rental car there. I did not have a "residents" sticker on it, because it is a rental car. The stickers are on the cars we actually own and they don't come off easily.
In the morning, we got up and the rental car had been towed. We had to pay $145 to the towing company to get the car back. The apartment complex explained that this towing company is allowed to take any car without a sticker, regardless of whether it was a resident or had a BIG HUGE ENTERPRISE RENTAL STICKER ON IT. Apparently there were temporary permit tags available that we had not been told about during the 1.5 years we have lived in this complex. They said that they regretted that we could not be reimbursed the towing fee despite the fact that we live there and pay rent to park in the lot.
That, in combination with the fact that now we can no longer have more than 2 people over to our house at any time, is making us think about moving up our plans to move out of the apartment. We had originally planned to wait until the first month of 2008 to look at moving. We'll be running this by our Community in the next week or so, to see if we are making the right decision and what they think. This weekend we might go and take a look at some rental houses. Any feedback from anyone who reads this? C'mon...you guys know how to comment! :-)
