WA renters say unregulated 'junk fees' are being used to retaliate, discriminate

In the midst of a summer heat wave in July 2023, Vancouver resident ShaWayne Hodges walked out to her porch and saw a notice posted on her front door.

A drive-by inspection of her four-bedroom house had found “brown, long and dying grass on the front yards,” the notice said. It meant Hodges wasn’t maintaining the landscaping to the standard set forth by her lease.

She owed $125 to the property management company, Zenith Properties NW, for noncompliance with her lease. She owed another $125 to Zenith for taping the piece of paper on her front door.

“They gave me a notice for letting my grass die in the middle of summer, and they charged me $250 for it,” said Hodges, 40. A low-income single mother of five, Hodges is one of many Washington renters facing accumulating rental fees, which have taken off as pandemic-era protections for renters ended, according to tenant advocates, attorneys and policymakers around the state.

https://washingtonstatestandard.com/2024/08/09/wa-renters-say-unregulated-junk-fees-are-being-used-to-retaliate-discriminate/