after renting with dodson for a full year, i can easily say this has been the absolute worst living experience of my entire life. starting from the very poor cleaning of the house before moving in, it just got worse. wish i could give them zero stars. to start off, the first month i tried to pay rent, i used an account that i was unaware was non-transactional. the payment was declined and i got fined a $250 late fee and $60 bank fee. i had to call my bank and have them formally write a letter to dodson saying that i did not know and requested that they take down the late fee, which in response, dodson only took down the $250 but still made me pay an extra $60 with no information about their bank or who/what it was going to. a few months after our move-in, we started getting notices of needing to take care of the lawn (trim grass, etc) which was reasonable, but we got 3 separate warnings in regards to overgrown trees and branches in the alley behind the house. there were vines completely wrapped around the trunks of trees, branches sticking all the way across the back road, etc that had VERY obviously been there for years prior to us residing there. it took my roommates and i almost two full days to get all of it done and all we got was a "thank you" from the property manager, along with a note in the email saying that we should have notified them earlier when they take about a week to respond to emails and absolutely NEVER under ANY circumstance pick up the phone. by the time we would have gotten a response from reaching out, we would have been fined. we also had to buy lawn tools ourselves, nothing was provided. not long after, our washing machine and dryer began to act up due to the prior tenants overfilling them. we also began having issues with drainage in one of the showers which a MAINTENANCE MAN said was due to poor installation. then, there was a drainage issue in a sink. since we moved in, it took a bit of time for the water to go down but progressively got worse. when the vendor showed up, i stood at the door watching him fix it the entire time. in our portal to pay rent for the month, there was a $75 charge for "unclogging sink full of hair". we were never given a price before the meld was done, there was no hair pulled out when i watched the entire time, and that price for unclogging a sink is ridiculous. dodson refused to take it down and we paid anyway. next, we had the misfortune of finding bed bugs. although in the contract it said they were not responsible for pests, they refused to help 4 college students paying rent paycheck to paycheck with even a cent for a near $1000 treatment to get rid of the bugs. the vendor helped us out with the cost and was kinder to us than this god awful property management. after this happened, we got an email a little while later regarding renewing our contract. 2 of us stated that we were not, while the other two had not decided yet, mentioning that they were unsure since we were in the midst of dealing with the bedbugs. that night at 10pm, we got another email saying they terminated it anyway. lastly, we were supposed to pay a prorated amount for the last month since we would only be there for half of it. they charged us for the full month and did not say anything until we noticed and mentioned that they owed us about $300, then taking weeks to send us the refund check. at this point, it's very clear that we were taken advantage of since we appeared as inexperienced. upon our move-out inspection, we cleaned the house until it was shining and took care of the lawn - making it look even better than what it was when we moved in. we were told that it went better than most, and only had to take care of some missing lightbulbs and 2 broken blinds. we immediately spoke to them about buying some bulbs to drop off and knock some off the security deposit charge, but they never got back to us. we were then charged $40 FOR A FEW LIGHTBULBS and $108 FOR TWO REPLACED BLINDS about a week later. if you decide to rent with them, don't, but good luck!! read more

Fredericksburg location is straight liar. My landlord had sold the property and these scam con artist people is now the property manager. When they took over the place I had 5 more months to go in my lease, month before my lease was up. I get a nasty email saying that they wasn't renewing my lease that I had to move vacate the premises. I called her then she began to tell me the reason why they wasn't renewing my lease because they was going to remodel the apartments, mind you before I move there the previous landlord had already did a bunch of upgrades to the place it was nothing that needed to be done everything was new. I have spoke with her several times before this and her tone was off with me from day one, I can almost guess what that was all about!! but anyway I went ahead and moved before my lease was up because I wasn't gonna sit there like she wanted me to until the last minute and then move and couldn't find something else because the housing market is very slim to none here in downtown Fredericksburg. The realtors here have a real big problem renting to minorities you won't even get a call back if you try reaching out about a property for rent or if you get a call back you meet them & Con you the fill out the application take the application fees and you won't hear back from them. Dodson They didn't offer me another place that they might have for rent, And the crazy part is they moved someone in there as soon as I vacated the apartment! Didn't upgrade or fix anything like she said they was going too. read more

If it were possible to give a company zero stars I would do this for Dodson Property Management. My husband and I used them to manage our rental for 2.5 years. That was 2.5 years too long. When we first spoke with them they seemed like a great company who was going to take great care of us as a homeowner as well as our property. It wasn't more then a few months before things started to go south. Here are just a few examples of why I would never recommend them to even my worst enemy. Our tenant put in a request for a broken sink faucet. We received a quote from Dodson's preferred vendor for $600 to fix. We asked why a $85 faucet was going to be so expensive (mind you the house is also only 3 years old) and they didn't have an answer. We then asked for a second company to come quote the work and it somehow managed to come in at only $200 that time. Which is just under the limit we set for them to have to ask us before fixing it. They promise to do 6 month inspections and over the 2.5 years I received one after asking for it. (We got lucky and had great tenants, but I have other friends who also used Dodson who were not so lucky and the tenant was smoking in the home when this was against their contract. Dodson should have know this if they were doing these inspections properly and dealt with it immediately.) Dodsons ability to communicate to their home owners is terrible. The company has a huge turn over making it almost impossible to know who your point of contacts is, and even if you do know, good luck getting them to respond to e-mails of phone calls. On our final inspection before taking the property back over we decided the home needed cleaned and the cost would come out of the tenants deposit. Dodson hired a vendor, who did not properly clean the house but still charge the tenant $250 for doing nothing. Dodson paid the vendor without verifying that the work had been done. When I spoke to Dodson about this they blamed me for it and said it was not their responsibility since they no longer manage the property. So I ended up with a filthy home and my tenant, who had been great, had $250 essentially stolen from them. I would strongly erg anyone to stay as far away from Dodson property management as possible. read more

DO NOT rent from this company. They never respond or resolve issues. And if someone is entrusting their property in the hands of this company then they are worthless. I made the mistake of thinking that all management companies for personal property rentals follow the same rules, regulations, and guidelines but I was sorely mistaken. I've had many unresolved issues and one of which I've contacted them about for months is still not resolved and they are just now trying to work on ONLY because the HOA contacted the owner to fix the issue immediately, how very sad. Don't rent out a property if you're not prepared to take care of it. I asked before submitting an application if the property would be cleaned before move-in but it wasn't thoroughly cleaned. I didn't even want my family to bathe in either bathroom. Instead of cleaning the mildew they caulked over it. There are chew marks, probably from the previous renters dog, on the window handles, bottoms of doors, bathroom sink, kitchen cabinets, etc. The kitchen was so filthy I didn't want to cook in it or even put food away in the pantry. The drain was crusted in mildew. There was crud on all floorboards, just absolutely grimy. Things I didn't notice when I first viewed the property since the previous renters things were still in the apt. They didn't paint any walls, there's marks all over the walls, including closets, and they stated it's been noted so I wouldn't be responsible for it. Luckily, my daughter already started walking because I would've died if she was still crawling. The dryer was coated in dog hair and the washing machine was filled with I don't even know what. The dishwasher is rusted and crusted with mildew and leaking but i believe they fixed the leak. The vents are extremely nasty. I've never in my life seen anything so dirty. They charge $30 for a once every 3 month filter that I change every 30 days for clean, breathable air and I bought air purifiers since the vents blew out the grossest smell. My family literally got sick the first few months of living here breathing in the filth. When I first changed the filter I thought it was charcoal, no, it was just the amount of dirt caked up in the filter that produced a thick, brownish-gray fuzz. There's a crater under the bathroom sink. There's a crack in one of the bedroom windows sucking out my heat and a/c probably caused by the lawn service with a rock or their trimmer. The laminate wood floor boards don't stay put. You can tell the cheap labor the owner paid for by the way they slide and pieces of carpet around edges where a carpet used to be before they switched to the laminate wood flooring. Just left and right issues and I constantly have a different team assigned to me, 3 in less than a year. The only good thing about this place is that I have nice, quiet neighbors above me and on the sides(condo). All these things I contacted them about and more and they stated I was responsible for it. If they charged the previous renters for anything they surely didn't use the money to actually fix anything. I loved my previous property managed by Joyner Fine Properties and only moved because the owner was selling. Do yourself a favor and look at all the property reviews and pictures Dodson has to offer and look at the disgusting filth they believe is up to code and livable. I hired a professional cleaning service to deep clean where I now reside and plan on moving from because it was that terrible upon move-in. So when I move out it will actually be in better condition then when I moved in. Also, the previous renters were that gross and they broke their lease to buy a house which means their house will be just as gross. The neighbors are great and it's quiet here but if I were a neighbor to this property I'd be worried that this rental would negatively affect my property value. I will NEVER rent from any of the properties that they manage ever again. AND they had the nerve to increase my rent and add admin fees when they do absolutely nothing. If you see Dodson do yourself a favor and skip over the listings. read more

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Is it possible to give zero stars. Maintenance is terrible. Consistently takes several days to get a vendor in for maintenance repairs.

Absolutely terrible property management company. We had others managing our property previously without issue. However, once Dodson took over repairs were expensive, receipts from the contractors were not provided, communication was horrible and after numerous "property is good shape" inspections our last inspection was that the property was in terrible shape. Terrible indeed! It cost us $20,000 to fix things we had paid previously to have fixed. Stay far away from this company. There are numerous other property managers to entrust your home to in this area. read more

I rented for two years and the last 10 months was totally a nightmare. The homeowner refused to do major repairs to her home and I was constantly having to reach out to Dodson. I don't feel that they really cared about my needs, since the owner was actually paying them. I was told by Chris that their hands were tied and they couldn't force the owner to make repairs in a timely manner. My situation was so bad that I had to contact the County to step in. I could sit in the home I rented and water would run down the wall when it rained, mold was all over and to top it all of termites was eating the home. Once someone else stepped in they was forced to make repairs to avoid fines. I asked to be let out of the lease, and was told no since I had a binding contract. In 24 months, never was the rent late and I feel that I definitely held up my end of the agreement but, did not receive that in return. What really top this off is that they withheld money from my security deposit illegal and gave me some poor excuse as to why. I will take this to every level that I can and make everyone aware, please do your homework before renting from this company. I wish I had and could have saved my self some of the unnecessary stress that I had to deal with and is still dealing with. read more

Our experience with this company has been utterly awful. The apartments are dirty and not well maintained. Out of 8 washers, perhaps 2 were in working order. The elevator was not working on many occasions. The stairwells are full of dog feces and often with homeless people sleeping there. The office staff has been rude and completely unhelpful not to mention incompetent. read more

Horrible customer service! If you think you will call the phone number and get a person to speak to you are wrong! You get put in internal loop of answering machines and no one ever calls you back. No one online returns your emails either. After 2 hours of making phone calls and trying to get a human I finally hit a dept I didn't need just to try to talk to someone. That person was extremely rude and refused to transfer me to the Richmond Office, she would not leave a message for them either and said she could not help me. Extremely poor customer service! Went to see a property, Dodson representative said no one else was interested in the house so far. We went home filled out application and paid $50 per person, my husband and myself for $100 total. Only to get a text message at 8am the next morning that the property was already rented??? If no one else had been interested, then how can it be rented already? The property is still listed on the website as available. This company is a scam. They just scammed us out of $100. Beware, don't give them any of your money! Good luck trying to reach anyone by phone to get your money back. Canceling the transaction with our CC company and reporting them to the better business bureau. Richmond Office has 23 current complaints against them, and YELP has horrible reviews of only 1 out of 5 stars. Don't use this company! read more

I was in a time constraint and rented through them. The building was not up to code, no water pressure, hvac was not set up properly, no insulation so either freezing or sweating depending on what time of year it was. Within 6 months I had bees in the bedroom, contacted management (DODSON) and no response after 3 weeks. I knew the landlords so I contacted them (Dodson is supposed to handle this as the landlords are paying them to) only to get a response after another week. So now I have bees in my bedroom for over a month, it took 4 more weeks to get someone in to take care of the problem. SOOOO. 2 months of bees Dodson is notorious for making appointments to "inspect" the apartment every 3-6 months. I want to be there when it happens, but they never showed up. Wasting my time. No follow up, no alerting me that they weren't coming. They require 2 months before the lease is up to let them know if you are renewing, but only 1 day to decide. All in all Dodson sucks at being professional, their job is to maintain the properties and handle the rentals, they get the rentals in and then forget about it. For every issue I had to actually go to the landlords to get things handled since Dodson didn't do their job. I know for a fact the Landlords are searching for a new property manager since Dodson couldn't seem to do the job. DON'T RENT FROM A DODSON CONTROLLED BUILDING read more

This company is horrible to work with or rent from. Dodson previously managed my property allowing over $4,000.00 of damage to occur do to their neglect and inability to manage. I have nothing good to say about Dodson, I would not recommend them to anyone. read more

I have a property in the Fan that I've rented out for nearly five years now, first for four years with friends and as of December 2016 with Dodson. So far, the experience has been great - Chris Johnson handles my account/house and things have gone quite smoothly, from getting the house listed, getting a couple repairs done in the meantime, and getting a tenant in. I live abroad, so communication is even more vital for me with regards to understanding what is happening with my property, the tenant, and everything else that has to be taken care of. As long as the level of communication remains the same, my tenant remains happy, and the house is taken care of, I'll be happy with Dodson's and specifically Chris' efforts! read more

Up until this month, my experience with Dodson Property Management has been OK. Most requested repairs were completed (or attempted) eventually. The problem this month arose after I received word of another tenant planning a show in the basement of our building, in the unlocked boiler room. I notified our property manager, Tim Wehner of the situation two weeks in advance of the event. He did notify the police during a band practice around then, but did nothing to secure the basement (as I had advised). As far as I can tell, the only action taken was a phone call to said tenant. On Sunday of last week, I arrived from work to find the tenant preparing for his basement show. I let him know that I was not OK with it and headed to my apartment. I notified Tim once again, who left it upon me to call the police and bring some peace to our building. Night came, people arrived and the show began. I notified the police, who cleared the basement eventually. My roommate and I stepped out back to watch the commotion, at which point the tenant from downstairs pointed us out to his guests and commenced a shouting match. Soon, the crowd (numbering 50 or so) began throwing rocks and bottles at my roommate and I, shattering two exterior windows. Several of our neighbor's guests shouted threats of vandalism and violence and rushed up the steps to our third floor unit. Not trusting the shoddy dead-bolt on the back door to provide any security, I returned to the porch with my rifle on my shoulder and called the police, who returned to settle the situation definitively for the night. No charges were filed against me, as the police seemed to understand the situation. The following night, my car was heavily vandalized (total damages amounting to $2,600) and I moved to dissolve the lease based on Tim's violation of Article 4, 55-248.21 of the 2011 VRLTA (failure to resolve the situation given repeated and advance warning). Before I could get any official paperwork together, I received a 72 hour notice of eviction based on the fact that I brandished my rifle. We complied with the eviction but now, my roommate and I are being held liable for the remainder of the rent. Mr. Wehner was too busy to secure this property and take any real action to prevent the basement show, forcing me to take steps to defend myself and my roommate against a crowd of fifty complete strangers. For this, we were both evicted. Do not lease with Dodson Property Management, their property managers fail to live up to their duties. read more

I will definitely continue to use Dodson to manage my property. Fairly seamless process. They listed the property and found tenants within the month. They do checkins throughout the year and provide a comprehensive report. The tenants have signed on for year two :-) read more

I don't understand all the bad reviews Dodson Properties is getting. I have been a tenet in a property managed by Dodson for a year, and have never had any issues with them. When I have called to request repairs or ask questions my call was always returned quickly and problems were resolved within a day. The house I rent was clean and everything was in perfect order when I moved in. There have got to be more tenets out there who have had positive results when dealing with this company. Let's hear from you guys. read more

DO NOT RENT FROM THESE PEOPLE. Unprofessional and disrespectful staff, especially Trevor Wood They will use your lease against you when it is convenient and violate when they feel like it and when convenient for them.. The Richmond office is run by young kids who do not know what they are doing read more

If I could give Dotson property management negative stars I would! I had a property with them in Fredericksburg and I was happy with their management. They took over for a previous property manager that found the tenant I have, so they did little to nothing but collect a check. I have a home that I bought in Henrico VA that I could no longer live in. I turned to Dodson to manage this one as well. I was assigned Ryan Fitz to manage my property and it took him over a week to get back to me about the listing. This was very disheartening to know this person that was representing me couldn't be bothered to talk to me in any way or from i.e. e-mail, text, or call. I was finally able to talk to Ryan after he got around to me. It took Ryan 5 days to get the house listed and when it was the pictures were upside down and sideways. This is not a professional way to list the house, and once again I was very disappointed. I also tried to look up the property listing on Zillow and Rent finder and the property was not listed for two weeks. This was very frustrating to me and once again I had to get the run around trying to get in contact with Ryan. I would call his phone and leave a voicemail asking him to call back, he would always email me. I should have cut ties with them then and just walked away but I didn't and that's where it gets even worse. They had the property for 3 months and couldn't get someone in there to rent it. I was told by Ryan that there was interest in it but the market was just slow and maybe I should offer incentives like knocking some money off the first months rent (witch would come out of my money but they were still going to charge me as if I received the full amount for that rent ,to me sounded like I take all the loss because they can't get someone in the house). I had checked on the house one day when I was in the area and found that there was trash inside that was not left by myself and the doors where not all locked and the kitchen faucet was now broken! I had enough of the disrespect from Ryan and Dodson property management and let them know that I would be moving my business somewhere else, that is when the bullying started. I was told that I had to pay Dotson $971.25 because all the work they had done trying to get the property rented. First of all, they never got anyone into the house and second some of the stuff they did to list the house was wrong and was spotted by me. I was paying for a house that I was not living in and loosing money to Dodson for not doing their job! I am a 5 time combat veteran that is disabled, with limited funds and was told Dodson doesn't care about me or my issues, they wanted their money for the half wrong work they did. Ryan Fitz was no longer going to deal with me and turned me over to Elizabeth Cane to deal with the termination fee. I tried negotiating with Elizabeth about the termination fee bringing up the fact that if I was charged the fee, I would take away the property Dodson was managing for me in Fredericksburg. I was told I was going to be charged no matter what and the amount would be taken out of the rent coming from my house in Fredericksburg. This was devastating for me and it left me to be late on the mortgage and no real way to put food on my family's table. Now let me do some math for you and Dodson: $140 (was what I payed them to manage my one house) x 24 (the amount of months I had a contract for)= $3360 That is what they lost out on just to charge me a fee for services that didn't amount to my house getting a tenant. I took the loss on not only not having my property rented but paying the fee just to get out from Dodson's oppressive yoke. I took my property to Candice Bolt of RVA Rental Properties and she got a tenant into the property in 4 days of having it! This showed me that Dodson was the problem the whole time and even though I lost money to the inept way of managing I don't want the same thing to happen to you. I have put my life on the line for this country that I love, and to be treated this way was disheartening. read more

My experience with Dodson was great. If my family or friends are ever in need of a property management company, I'll definitely be sending them Greg's way. He was easy to get a hold of, pleasant, and always responsive. read more

Do not use this company. They add no value only cost. We had a tenant just move out and the house was not cleaned when they left. Property managers responce was "it is hard for them to move and clean the house. If you want it to be clean you will need to have it clean. We are different because we don't charge the tenant for cleaning." We had a dryer duct that needed to be cleaned. They asked if we wanted to have there maintenance guy clean it out. The bill was $600.00. Could go on but you have an idea of what they are all about. read more

Was really excited for a specific property and we scheduled a viewing, never once heard from an actual person only an automated text. It confirmed our tour time/date and then not even an hour later we get an automated text saying our viewing is canceled due to the property not being available anymore. But the property is still listed on Zillow as available??? Disappointed that we never heard from anyone and that the property went from available to not available within an hour. Why let us schedule a viewing if it was going to be gone that fast and there was clearly already someone pretty far in the process of getting the apartment? read more

I've been renting through Dodson Property (Fredericksburg, VA location) for two years. Up until now I had nothing but good things to say. Daniel handled the maintenance issues flawlessly. His replacement Tania is a different story. My hall way toilet, and now my bedroom toilet are not working properly. A plumber was sent out, he told me the pressure in the toilet was poor, and the toilets will continue to hold waste for periods of time because it's not enough pressure to rid it. Tania tells me she was told by the plumber the toilets are working better, and are functional. She told the owner this as well. The owner suggested letting me out my lease early which ends in a little over 30 days, and he would only fix the toilet if I went half! I obtained the work invoice from the plumbing company, and the plumber stated the pressure of the toilet was VERY LOW and the ONLY way to eliminate the issue was to get a new toilet. I have no clue why she downplayed this issue. In fact she just LIED! The only working toilet is the half bathroom. Completely unexpectedly especially because I pay my rent on time with absolutely no issues since I've been a tenant. This deal with it attitude especially based on lies is the worst I've seen. read more

If I could give Dotson property management zero starts I would. Now I see how many properties have been on the market for a long time without being rented. Naomi Sharp doesnt answer at all. I contacted her that I was interested on a few houses She had for rent and NO response at all. for the owners in these places ( Stafford Area) I would choose another property management, they dont even bother to show your places at all and they are sitting there who knows for how long. Reading the other reviews maybe I got lucky I was not contacted, if they dont bother to show places why they will bother to address any problem if I'm a tenant in one of her places. read more

I rented from Dodson over in west end. The house I rented wasn't great, but it was cute enough. My first property manager, Gabe, was fantastic! But about halfway through my lease, I was assigned a new property manager, Dave Ott. It was torturous trying to get in touch with him! I would leave endless messages and emails for him, after which I had to email my old property manager to find out what was going on. One of my biggest issues was that I had a water leak in the basement. I mopped it up after I contacted maintenance. ...who didn't show up for days. The handyman couldn't find the source of the leak, so they left after telling me they had "fixed it". My next water bill shows up and it's $500 instead of its average of $75. I call my prop manager, Gabe, at the time. We got contractors out and they finally figure out what it is after I was assigned to my new property manager Dave. There hadn't been proper maintenance or service on my upstairs toilet, so a valve inside the toilet was silently leaking on an almost constant basis. Not once did I hear the toilet running. I had to go back and forth with Dodson for months AFTER I moved out of their property before they finally gave me $200 towards the waterbill. Because they wouldn't settle it with me, I couldn't move my water service to my new address and had to go without water. Onto another big issue. When I moved in, they had done little to maintain the yard. There were YEARS worth of pine needles in the backyard. The yard was chainlink on 3 sides and open railed on the fourth, so I had to put up my own fence so my dogs couldn't get out. When I went to move out, they had told me to just mow the yard and trim the bushes and I'd be fine. However after I moved out, the tune changed. They took around $150 out of my deposit for yard work because there were so many pine needles in the back yard. Oh really? Well why didn't anyone take care of that when I moved in? Also previous to moving out, I had asked my property manager to come out and let me know I was in the clear and would be keeping my deposit, or if I needed to do anything differently. First, he chastised me for filling in the holes where I had pictures and told me I had to paint over the holes. Ok, fine. Then told me I would need to clean, also fine. I spent a week and a half deep cleaning the place and replacing any blinds that had broken slats. Low and behold I get an "all clear" on the day of moveout, but they tell me after I've moved out that they had to have cleaners to come in to clean because it was dirty. My mom had even come down to help me clean the house, it was spotless, so I call bull on that. All in all, I lost about $300 from my $1050 deposit for completely fabricated reasons. Do not rent from Dodson Property Management, they will frustrate you to the point of wanting to pull your hair out! read more

I'm pretty frustrated. Despite reading some pretty worrisome reviews on here, I saw a beautiful property that they're renting and decided to reach out to them anyway. Just to "request" an appointment, I had to give a lot more information than I was comfortable with. Then I had to provide two times from which the landlord is supposedly going to choose, and then confirm my appointment. Well, that was one Monday, and the only thing i've heard back via email was that my request has been received, but not accepted. I tried to follow up but because I called from the same number i used to make the appointment, it basically refused to connect me and sent me to an automatic recording saying my request was being reviewed. Then i tried calling today from a different phone number, hoping that my first-choice 4:30 request would be acknowledged, but was sent to voicemail. I guess I should have paid more attention to all of the awful reviews. If it's this hard to schedule an appointment just to SEE a rental space, I can only imagine if maintenance issues were to come up how difficult that might be. I will not be renting from you, Dodson Property Management! Hopefully you can take to heart my feedback and the feedback of others. It'll only help everyone in the long run :) read more

Really good and active property management company. Professional staff that works hard to keep my property leased. Greg Manuel is the ultimate manager, always engaged and stays in contact. I feel I am in good hands with his ability. read more

All I can say at this moment, is that I agree with every bad review on here, I have experienced it all. They don't return calls, they don't care about their tenants, only about the on time rental payments. read more

Unfortunately we had nothing but problems during our time renting from Dodson (1 1/2 years). Concerns or issues were not addressed in a timely fashion and it took many emails or phone calls for rectification. (Ex: A broken door took over 2 months to get fixed, built in microwave was reported broken and 1 month later had still not been addressed, request to have house pressure washed took over 2 months, etc.) We also had 4 different property managers during our short time with Dodson. I would never rent a property managed by Dodson again. read more

Not sure how to feel. So far I've started the process to secure a rental property from this company. I saw it once and applied and got approved, that part was easy. Being that I didn't want to blindly jump into things, I asked to see the property again. It seemed that the agent didn't really want me to have a second look. Well at least before signing a binding document (lease). The business practices are iffy. I feel that if they were fully confident in their product (the property) that they would show it without such difficulty. That would help the potential renter build confidence in what they are renting and who they are renting from. Seems they are just trying to slang these potentially subpar rental properties like shady car salesmen. No one wants to be locked in to pay for a dud. If they had better sales skills they would use better methods of persuasion to close leases. Instead it feels more of like a take it or leave it situation. As Dodson employees I'm sure they can afford to have potential renters "leave it". It almost feels like the agent thinks I'll go for anything based on my demographic. I could sign the lease and pay for all 12 months upfront but I haven't been given the confidence I need to do such a thing because I've gotten zero reassurance. Sincerely On The Fence read more

My husband and I found a couple of properties that were rented through Dodson Properties. Our credit was not perfect and we did not know if we would even get approved! However, both Chet, Gabe and Tim (they have different properties) took us through the process without any properties and were approved within 24 hours. Although we chose another property, I will still recommend this company for future renters. Their customer service was very impressive and we say this not because they told us to but my husband and I really look at the customer service aspect and the turnaround time for the application process. They are an awesome company and with negative experience with other companies, I would definitely send all family and friends to them because they strive to assist you!!!! read more

This is the worst place that I have rented from. I moved in and my toilet was broken for a month despite the fact that I live right next door to one of the maintenance men. They also expect the tenant to pay for everything, do not respond to maintenance requests unless you badger them, and have locked me out of my own apartment over a long weekend. Avoid this company like the plague. Please note in the "reviews not counted" that a Duke D. (the owner is named Duke Dodson) tried to give this business a 5-star review, which was then erased for violating Yelp's Terms of Service. read more

I was doing some job hunting a little while back in the area. I contacted Gabe K at Dodson and he was very informative and patient.I recieved answers to all my questions with no run arounds or cheap gimicks. While I ultimately accepted another offer in the northeast I have full confidence should my work have led me to Richmond I would have gotten the lease I wanted thanks to Gabe and Dodson. read more

Hard to find a better property management company. I reviewed multiple before signing with them to manage our rental property. Their professionalism and promptness is fabulous. read more

If it was possible to give no stars I would. We were good tenants and paid our rent on time every month but whenever we had an issue with the house we were always made to feel like we had done something wrong and given the runaround about getting it fixed. Now that we have finally moved out( thank God!) we are still waiting for our deposit back and it's been 4 1/2 weeks. The condition of the house was better when we left than when we moved in but of course we are still waiting. Do yourself a favor and find a different company before renting from these people! read more

Living in a Dodson property for the past 2 to 3 years has been a horrible experience, The least of which has been the rude and Untrained staff they employ. The foundation of the issue lies in the Innaccesiblity of any leasing staff whether it be for maintenance or new business due to the hell hole that happens to be there CRM hotline it is necessary to go into the office for the smallest questions.Upon arrival I have had multiple instances of showing up to a leasing office and being told that paperwork was missed placed or processed incorrectly. Their approach to property management appears to be "You pay us to live here, if you have qualms with our service leave". Love our building and apartment but would be weary of living in any property managed by Dodson read more

Great at first, until you try to move on. While I believe Yelp should allow zero star ratings, Dodson gets a 1 in my book. When my wife and I were looking for a rental house in Richmond, we found a great & affordable place near Willow Lawn. Chris Johnson was the property manager at the time, and he was great (the reason for the 1 star vs 0). He was very helpful with showing us a couple places, and helping us lock down the house in a high demand market. We did notice some water in the basement, which we pointed out to Chris at the time of viewing. Fast-forward a month or two to move in day. The house was filthy, covered in dog hair, and the water remained in the basement. The water would enter every time it rained due to a poor landscape job outside, which I repeatedly mentioned to Dodson. This ultimately lead to a black mold problem. This place was in need of a professional cleaning. We eventually settle in and things are going fine for a while. We started to have bats appear inside the house, not uncommon, but unusual to have multiple within a few days. We contacted Chris, and he quickly got a professional out to take a look. The professional opens the pull-down attic (which we hadn't bothered to open as we had no need for extra storage), and he is showered in bat guano. He climbs up and asks if he can film the scene as he has never seen such an infested attic and wants to share it on his facebook page (video is still there). There are piles, and piles, and even more piles of bat guano throughout the attic and in the walls. Bat guano can be very toxic when breathed in. This is years and years of buildup, never addressed by Dodson. Eventually the attic is cleaned and sealed. We continue to live in the house until we decide to buy our own home. Apparently we had a new property manager at this point, named Whit. We notify Dodson of our intention to leave and begin addressing the checklist we are sent for move out. We deep clean every inch of the house, leaving it far cleaner that we found it. We changed every single light bulb the day we left (as requested in the lease), and moved out. ~35 days later, I tried calling Dodson to check the status of our security deposit. The office makes it incredibly difficult to contact someone directly, but somehow I tracked down the assistant property manager's cell number (Chloe, who was very helpful). She informs me the check has not been written and that they would be charging me $300 for lightbulbs, replacement blinds, and a cleaning fee. I discussed with her that we changed all of the lightbulbs and left the property in better and cleaner condition than we found it, and she agreed we should not be charged because it was in better shape. She said she would be in touch with Whit and suggested I contact him as well. I emailed Whit, and in his response he said "I agree with you, it wasn't as clean as it should have been. However, we still needed to get it to a move-in ready point." So he agreed the property was nasty when we moved in, but was going to charge us to make clean it again, even though we deep cleaned it. I would love to talk to the replacement tenant and find out if it was actually "professionally cleaned." He also included invoices, which listed lightbulb replacement for $100. Are you kidding me? Where are you getting these lightbulbs? Not to mention we REPLACED them all the day we moved out. There was nothing wrong with the blinds indicated either, we left them down as the window faced our neighbors and we wanted the privacy. He also supplied the move out pictures in which you can see every single light is turned on in the photo backgrounds (taken before the alleged professional lightbulb replacement). So to summarize, $300 charge for lightbulbs and cleaning, despite the house was a guano infested rats nest when we moved in. After some back-and-forth, his solution was to ask the owner to split the cost. Wow. Do your job and accept the fact you will have to eat some charges here and there to keep the property healthy. At this point, I didn't care to delay this any longer and unwillingly accepted our returned deposit, less $150. This house was in need of some TLC long before us. Believe the Yelp reviews, I don't know how the Google reviews are higher. The turnover is so high for these property managers, there is no way anyone has a good grasp on any of the properties (with the exception of Chris and Chloe). Do not expect your deposits fully returned. RESPONSE TO OWNER: Yeah there was absolutely nothing done about the water/mold, though it was brought to Dodson's attention. You would also think it would be noticed that it was getting worse at each bi-annual inspection. But much like the guano, it went ignored. The $150 should be returned as a "sorry you were breathing years of toxic bat guano" reparation. read more

Been using Dodson for over 2 years. Property manager has always been very personable and easy to reach. Exactly what I need from a property management company: quality tenants each time, fair rates, great communication and explanation, plenty of heads up about anything out of the norm, long leases, etc. I have recommended Dodson to 3 of my friends who have all listed a rental property with them. Dodson gets my highest recommendation. read more

Moving is undoubtedly difficult, particularly where there are so many options in Downtown Richmond. Candice was extremely helpful in recommending properties which might fit my interest. She was easy to work with and made the touring and application process a breeze. read more

I rent an apartment in a beautiful building that is managed by Dodson. Within the 2 years that I have lived here I have gone through at least 3 property managers to my knowledge. I say "to my knowledge" because I have only found out about a change in property management after calling every contact listed on their website until someone answered, let me know they weren't my property manager, confirmed that who I thought was my property manager was no longer, and that they'd pass it along to who the property manager is (never know the name to tell me at the moment so I have no way of following up with the correct person). I'm given the run-around each and every time I have an issue. We've had several issues with them over the last two years: (1) our house key was taken when my purse was stolen and after not hearing back from my property manager for 3 weeks I finally did only to find out that she no longer worked there, 3 weeks later I finally received a key replacement, (2) a clogged kitchen sink took 5 days to be resolved and only was after I called the emergency maintenance line, was hung up on, and continued calling until the person actually showed up, (3) plumbing issue that affected our downstairs neighbor took several days to complete (otherwise their maintenance is pretty timely and always friendly), (4) we never received communication about renewing our lease and when we did were given 24 hours to make a decision because we "missed the deadline" even though the deadline was never communicated to us, (5) rent was increased at the signing of a new lease without any prior notice, (6) pets were never included in the lease renewal and after pointing this out and following up with several more mistakes on their end, it took almost a month to get a lease that was correct signed by both parties. But this most recent issue is the straw that broke the camel's back. Our monthly rent was accidentally processed twice for January. We realized this immediately and called on the next business day to notify someone of the issue. The person whom we thought was our property manager was not listed in their directory so we left a message in the general mailbox. We didn't hear back from phone, but rather an email that stated there was nothing they could do. No signature on the email, no additional contact info provided, no explanation of who the person reaching out was (other than the name in her email address - Paula), and absolutely no response to the follow up emails and calls. I've worked in customer service for years and the only time I'd utter the phrase "there's nothing we can do" would be after I've actually tried to do something, anything about the issue. Seeing as this is an issue regarding someone's money, which has affected our bank account standing, the response we received via email was insensitive, at best. The best customer service I've received from them is from Mike who works for their maintenance company. He's timely and friendly and worth pointing out in contrast to their awful property management staff. There's also Katie (not sure of her last name) who works in the office - she at least responds within 7-10 days (still longer that I'd hope for, but better than never hearing back at all). Even thought this building is beautiful and in the best location for us, we will be opting out of our lease next year. Fed up. read more

Currently renting from Dodson. Would have been glad to give them a great review because we have been a tenant for the past year and have not had any major issues. Until now. Recently, a legal advertisement came to the house offering legal services to stop the foreclosure sale of the house. HUH?? Foreclosure?? WTF!!! Contacted Dodson over the weekend by email after the advertisement was received. Went to the office first thing the next business morning, was told that everybody we needed to talk to had not come in yet. Gave the receptionist a copy of the advertisement that came in the mail and asked for someone to call me ASAP. Didn't receive a phone call (unprofessional) only received an email that stated they had been in contact with the homeowner who was not aware of any problem and the homeowner would be contacting the bank to get things straight. Two days later, and the homeowner has not gotten back with Dodson with a status. After speaking with a manager was basically told that there wasn't much that they could do. As far as being moved to another property, we would be at the top of the list as a high priority. In my opinion, totally unacceptable. We are basically living with the ​fear of someone coming to the house one day and telling us that we have only so much time before we have to vacate. This is no way to live. This may not be the house that we own, but we call this house our home. And had planned on staying here for a couple of more years so could eventually buy our own house. I thought this was a great place to deal with. But now, I don't think so. The property management company seems to be more concerned about the homeowner than the tenants that are renting these properties. If we can get through this situation, if anybody were to ask me about Dodson, I would tell them to ​try renting from somebody else. They have some nice houses that are available to rent, but nobody seems to be checking on the homeowners to make sure that they are doing what they are supposed to be doing. read more

Hahaha so get this. If you file a complaint with the BBB, they will falsify documents in order to make them look better. I filed a complaint and they made up some documents making it seem like we didn't pay rent. Excuse me, we have documentation on YOUR website and through our banks, we also have a letter confirming that we have paid up for June....yet you still evicted us. WE OWE NOTHING and we have proof. Everyone be warned...you will have 5 property managers that tell you different things. RECORD all phone calls as well because these people cannot be trusted. I have never dealt with such inhumanity and non-compassion for other people. All they care about is their money. Nothing else. And the funny thing also is, they say there are no open maintenance calls, well hello...that is bc you deleted all of them a month before we moved out so that you can say there are no open calls. And didn't even fix any of the problems. Anything you need, you need to go online instead of calling them like a regular human would do. They don't want to deal with you and will block your calls. I would never want these ppl as property management bc they are the definition of slum lords. I will be calling BBB tommorrow and letting them know of their lies and provide proof as well. Deformation of character is in their line of business. Great to know and Army Veteran was treated so poorly. They will be out of business as soon as word gets out how badly they lie. read more