News 12 at 11 o'clock / Wednesday, August 18, 2010

When Brandi Holland and her two teenage children moved to Augusta back in July, they were expecting to move into an apartment free of problems. Holland says she selected the Greens on Washington after seeing the listing on the Internet and after visiting and seeing the model apartment. But when she arrived in Augusta with her moving truck, she says she not only to discovered her new home was not ready--- but it wasn't what she expected. She says there were violations and things that needed to be fixed before she could move in. She moved in anyway, only to move out two weeks later after the Augusta License and Inspections Department deems her unit "unfit for human habitation."

"Just because it looks good on the Internet, doesn't mean it's good," said Holland. "When I got to Augusta and saw the unit I was moving into I was thinking, what have I gotten myself into?"

If you search on line in a number of apartment rental sites for The Greens on Washington, you will find the listing reads "beautiful spacious apartments provided with best service in town." It also includes a long amenities list which includes on-site maintenance among features. But Brandie Holland says that's not what she got. Augusta code enforcement officials agreed -- and shut down the doors to her apartment.

News 12 was there on Wednesday morning when the code enforcement office showed up again for another inspection.They found several more violations and threatened to shut down other properties.

Holland says she called the License and Inspection Department because she didn't know what else to do.

"I called the code enforcement office and Mr Larry Lariscy contacted me," said Holland."He came out and looked at my apartment the following day and condemned my apartment."

News 12 has documents from the License and Inspections Department dated on July 22 that does show Holland's unit - 1026-A - was listed as "unfit for human habitation." The recommendation given by the inspector was to "vacate the unit until repaired." Holland says because of the all the problems - she was released from her lease, but not without paying a penalty. She says she lost a lot of money.

"It cost me about 3,000 dollars to move here,"said Holland. "They were even going to charge me the rest of my lease.But because my apartment was condemned, they let me out of my lease and told me they'd give me 250 dollars back."

Holland has moved to a new place but says the experience with the apartment complex has left her sore.

"Being a newcomer to Augusta, it really put a bad taste in my mouth," said Holland. "If that's somewhere you have to go, look at your apartment really, really good and get the code enforcement out there to see if there' s anything wrong with it."