****** - Furnished Apt In Sathorn. Stay Away!

[BittersweetFarang]

Just want to share my recent experience staying at ******, a new furnished apartment building in Sathorn. It is just down the street from Sathorn Saint View, where I had stayed previously and was looking for a bit of an upgrade. The place was just built. It has a rather attractive veneer, it is gated, and there is a security guard. The lobby is nicely appointed and the rooms are small but clean. It looked like a decent place to stay. A room on the 5th floor was available for 9,000 baht. Ok. We told the woman at the front desk we are interested. My wife and I came back within an hour with all of our luggage from the hotel and we were told that they had rented the room already, and that the only room available was for 12,000 baht per month. It was slightly bigger. Bait and switch. Not cool. But ok, too much of a pain to continue searching for an apartment with our luggage.

When I was inquiring about the facilities, I asked about the Internet, and I made it clear that Internet was very important for me, as I am a software developer and I cannot make a living without it. No LAN cables, only wireless. I asked where the wireless router was. They said it was on the first floor. That's a long way for a wireless signal to the 5th floor I thought. They sell Internet access cards for 1 day or 1 month. I asked if I could buy a one day card and test the connection. They said only after I sign a lease. This is the moment I should have walked out, but I asked, can I sign a one day lease and if everything is working, I will sign a 30 day lease. They agreed. Internet seemed to work well enough, so I signed a 30 day lease. Turned out that wireless routers were on all floors of the building, not just the first.

It turned out that the place was built with very cheap construction materials: Paper thin walls, the bed frame seemed to be made out of balsa wood but with a nice dark glazed finish. The sink felt like if I put my full weight (100kg) it would fall right off. The toilet did in fact separate from the thin veneer of cement holding it to the floor. Just really poor workmanship all around. But it looked good at first glance.

We moved our motorbike a day later, and were rudely told that we had to pay for parking. Fine.

As a "fully furnished" apartment, my wife inquired about towels as there were none in the bathroom. They said, they rent towels. Rent towels? Ok. We went out and bought our own, no problem.

Want a taxi? You pay for them to get you one. It's my style to tip the security guard for flagging one, rather than pay for this 'service'.

The nickel and diming was continuous and outrageous. It was clear to me that on every conceivable turn they were out to squeeze every penny. The Internet turned out to be spotty with major packet loss at times and often just inability to get a connection. My patience wore thin and I found a new place within a week.

I moved to the new apartment and I respectfully asked ****** if I could have my security deposit back early. They rudely told me NO! I explained that they could free the room up and get a new paying customer and make MORE money if they paid my security deposit and got their keys back. This line of reasoning fell on deaf ears. They were more interested in collecting 3 weeks interest on the 12,000 baht security deposit than having the room available for a new customer. 3 weeks later, on the day that the lease expired I went back for my security deposit. The woman made me wait in the lobby for 1 hour while she 'checked' everything. She came back with my water and electric bill. The electric bill was 2350 baht for less than a week of usage. Yes, I used the AC at night, but there is no way I consumed that much electricity. I was expecting 500 baht at most. This was the final insult that prompted this posting. The place I am staying at now has a full size refrigerator, an electric oven that we use regularly, twice the square meters with 2 ACs and for a full month of electricity usage cost us 1600 baht.

Beware of ******. From my experience, it seems clear that they are not looking for long term customers. They seem to just want to rip you off.

[Crossy]

Sorry BSF I'm going to have to remove the name of the apartment complex from your post, name-and-shame threads are a very dicey area legally for Thaivisa

I'm sure that anyone who wants to know can PM you.