We reported a resident for literally throwing garbage off their balcony. Not a small issue, not a misunderstanding. saw it happen. I even sent video showing the aftermath right after it happened. Management's response? Basically, "since you didn't capture the exact second it happened on video, there's nothing we can do." So just to be clear, according to this building's management, someone can dump trash off their balcony and as long as no one is actively filming the exact moment, it doesn't count. Apparently witnessing it with your own eyes means nothing here. Even worse, the tone of the response felt dismissive and borderline accusatory, like I was making it up. I have zero reason to lie about something like this. I reported it because it's disgusting and unsafe. This isn't just about one incident. It's about how management handles problems. If this is how they deal with something as obvious as people throwing garbage off balconies, I wouldn't trust them to handle anything properly. If you're considering living here, just know that basic issues like cleanliness and accountability don't seem to be taken seriously unless you can provide perfectly timed surveillance footage. Really disappointing. read more

It's nearly impossible to reach the property manager, and the company's service line has not resolved any issues.

Always pushing new projects needed or not as they get a percentage of every project for overseeing it. High fees, extra fees and all for poor service. We have had to hire our own concierge company, first services has put in two full time building managers, one who only seem to oversee the other one who does a little work. No one ever seems to check if various workers who come in are doing a good job, actually completing the maintenance work they bill us for. All First Services wants is money for their stock holders in the USA. Our maintenance fees go straight to their head office in Vegas. They want exorbitant late fees which sometimes happen because billings from them are often received from them after the pay date. And you have to phone Vegas to try to get it straightened out. read more

I am a resident here. The other day as I was coming in the front door the medics were taking a man out on a stretcher. As soon as he was out the door a senior staff member & another staff member started joking about it & laughing out loud saying " we should send some of that in a baggie & get tested.....so buddy can come back & weigh ot & say it's short my dealer shorted me! When it was us all along!" I was shocked at the lack of professionalism! They seem to think we live here for their amusement or something like they are better than we are. There's a fate worse than Hell for people like this! Oh well they created it for themselves with their shity conduct thinking they are better than others who have actual life xp! Wow! read more

It is extremely difficult--almost impossible--to contact the strata manager directly. In my case, Steve Maddess can only be reached through an online support system, which often takes more than two business days to provide a response. When you finally do get an answer, the experience is disappointing. Instead of properly investigating the facts, the strata manager tends to make quick judgments and does so in a very arrogant manner. read more

Shocking organisation, we moved into the building on the 18th July. on the 30th July we were informed to move our tires from our parking spot. Fair enough we did and since then nothing in the parking spot. However there were over 30 other violations which were not being enforced. We had 4 tires in our parking spot. When we questioned why we were targeted, they refused to answer just kept telling us to remove the tires (WHICH HAVE BEEN REMOVED). They continaully ignored why we were the only ones targeted. They were provided evidence of the targetting and other violations however still did nothing about those. These violations had been present since before we moved in. The picture of our tires are attached. The other images are those they refused to enforce. read more

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Is anyone planning to sue this organization? I requested at least one years ago to have a face to face meet up with their manager to discuss the huge fines, which i never intentianly to avoid, i got nothing, one day they increased the service fee(no service at all), i didn't know, then fines come again, they didn't bother to email, txt, phone you about the situation, just easily send fine bill. read more

They robbed me for no reason, you cannot talk with anyone, they just send letter saying you have to pay a fine, for no reason!! Totally crazy!! Avoid this strata at all cost!! read more

Everything. But I see you are not alone. Corporate rentals are violating renter rights and I've not found one agency who can handle the complaints. They are swamped. Vancouver is not a renter friendly city. Here's my list...over ten years. Deck floods in winter, moldy, no paint for over 10 years, serial appliance failure replaced by damaged ones, yearly rent increases, no lease, won't deal with noise issues, abusive managers, poor upkeep, dogs on one floor. Poor building maintence, ordinance violations, no window covering, broken or no light shades, break ins no security or repair. read more

This is the kind of customer service they provide to owners who they are frustrated with. This manager is telling an owner that my concerns are a waste of his time. Thanks for your hard work! Honestly, I don't know how else to explain to you. I am not going to keep arguing over e-mail a 33.00 CAD chargeback it's a waste of my time. read more

They looked after one of our properties for 10 years. We trusted them to care for it so never visited the unit. When we took it over to manage ourselves, it was filthy, covered up damage, poor paint job, chipped stone counters, leaky faucet that damaged the cabinet, the kitchen cabinets were chipped in several places. I sent emails and phoned several times to speak to them about this and received the silent treatment each time. A very unpleasant experience and costly for us. They basically lied about the care for the unit and hid from us when it was time to be accountable. Two months of renovation work and it is near completed. Do not permit this company to care for your property in any way! read more

It is so hard to get hold of the strata manager. emailed, called and left messages through customer service, 2 days no response. The minutes they sent was missing part of it, called to check, no reply. They just know charging you but not responsible at all. read more

This review is long but it's important that you read all of it. I currently live in a building "managed" by First Service Residential. I've lived in the building well over 20 years and I have never seen such a lack of respect for the care of the property and the tenants. In October 2019, I had a huge leak in my apartment which was no fault of my own. I must say the acted quickly getting the restoration company there with the big fans and heaters to dry up the walls. At first, I thought this company is on the ball. Up until this point I had little to no interaction with dealing with the property manager. I couldn't have been more WRONG! The day of the leak I was advised that in a few days I would be required to leave my apartment as they would need to open the walls which they suspected had asbestos. It took days to get the information from the Property Manager, who's super power is ducking phone calls. Finally, she got back to me advising when I need to leave my apartment and for how long. In the meantime, my insurance company requested information to get my claim started and even then the property manager was dragging her heels. It took the property manager 7 days to reply to my insurance company and confirm how much I pay for rent. Now we come to the replacement of the carpet (which at first they said they would not replace). I was asked to once again leave my apartment on October 29th. I was not able to return to my apartment until December 18th, 2019. In between October 29th and December 18th there were weeks when no work was being done in my apartment. When I contacted the senior property manager about when the work would begin, she said she didn't know and advised me of this prior - BULLSHIT! She lead me to believe that the work would take two weeks and I would be able to return to my apartment mid November. When I suggested that maybe I should return until they figure it out, her only suggestion is that we can mutually agree to end tenancy. In the meantime, the building manager who was onsite left the position. A HUGE LOSS!! He was the only one in the company that had any customer service skills, compassion and professionalism. To make matters more chaotic the property manager was replaced by someone new and she was promoted - WTH FYI: if you lack professionalism, able to duck all forms of communication, blow off tenants then this is the company for you. The new property manager is almost worst than the last, I didn't think it was possible. Prior to returning to my apartment I had some correspondence with the new property manager. They had put in new flooring but no baseboards. So yes, you guessed it there are huge gaps between the wall and flooring. Finally, I got a response from the new property manager who told me that since I didn't have baseboards before (I had carpeting), they would not be replacing. WHAT?? I stayed in a hotel a week Ionger than I needed because it took them that long they were finished and they would not be installing baseboards, even the ones they ripped out to do the work. I will be including pictures. OH it took them no time to let me know that as of December 18th, they would start charging me rent even though none of my personal belongings had been returned to my apartment. Since the old onsite apartment manager left the building has gone done already. The cleanliness of the building is nothing I have seen since living here. The laundry room is filthy with lint and dust behind the dryers, there is dirt on the washers, the floors are filthy, the garbage container has not been replaced in weeks, the garbage area below has crud and food particles all over its terrible!! Oh yes, at one point we even had mushrooms growing in one of the back hallway. Sadly, my situation is not an isolated incident other tenants have told me they've had trouble getting in contact with the property manager. Long and short this company is HORRIBLE. If you are renter make sure you find out who is managing the building. If it's these people, think twice steer clear away. They lack professionalism, takes forever for anything to get done, communication is almost non existent - they just don't care and it shows. They don't care about the service they provide to the property owners and they certainly do not care about the tenants. read more

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FirstService Residential is a nightmare of a company. They "managed" our building in West Vancouver and when we finally fired them, they left our financials in complete disarray, they did not pay the insurance for our building and that left us open to lawsuits and liabilities. They did not do their job at all. Not responsive, not responsible. All they did was put our strata fees into their bank account and exposed us to calamity by not paying the insurance premium. RUN away from this company as fast as you can! HORRIBLE HORRIBLE HORRIBLE. I don't know how they stay in business. read more

One of the worst strata management company. Managers are not competent enough to handle the works.

First service residential is very good a stealing strata fees and doing nothing. Were getting the owners together to get rid of this criminal organization. My wife was told "not to write an email but discuss verbally over the phone". The strata manager is useless and doesn't even live here. Surprised at how much money these crooks are bringing in. I'm asking for a forensic audit. 9 buildings paying at least $600 each = tons of profit. FS monthly overhead is minimal so where is all this money going? First service still doing zoom meetings even though Covid is long over. we demand in person meetings to challenge the crooked incompetence but they cancel us. can't even ask a question. if they don't like the question, they just mute the person when challenged. maybe the CRA need to audit each strata member and their contractors cause something isn't adding up. First Service residential scammers. read more

3 years ago they went around my patio and removed many dead ever greens. they still have yet replace them. its not just an issue about privacy. I know I'm not that interesting ,ppl aren't watching me. But the hedges provided security. There are now gapping access to my patio and I've had items stolen. 3 years !!!! 3 years !!!!!!!! you know a company is shit when they write them selves fake 5 star reviews on google with fake accounts that have no pics and have only written 1 review. read more

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The concierge at 2288 Alpha Avenue are great at what they do. We've had a few rough months when there were break in attempts, shady looking characters loitering about in the residential premises but the Concierge led by Lead Rohini were always on top of everything to ensure everyone was safe in the building. read more

terrible service. 6 years of b.s. unhelpful, arrogant and useless. been told for years they can't mail me a bill regularly but have no problem sending me threats when I'm in arrears every time the fees go up. Which is regularly read more

Management is arrogant and not helpful. many of the things their property managers do are outright wrong. A manager's personal preference usually trumps what's best for the strata or what the council requests. read more

We have had 5-6 reps in 3 years...each of them completely inept. I have reported complaints about all of them. Got very little response from the company. You don't even get the company when you call and need help. You get an National service that says they will pass on the message. And no response. Brutal. We have talked about replacing them so many times but no one wants to do the work. read more

I have been living in a brand new building managed by First Service for 6 months. Just once, i would love to see the people from First Service doing their job properly. there has been a number if somewhat minor situations that have been rather irritating but what happened today is totally unacceptable. Due to a car accident, the power for the building** was knocked out. **highrise with over 500 units** The power outage lasted 2 hours. After the power was restored, i noticed there was no hot water - 12:30pm. I phone the concierge who told me to just keep running the water until it started getting hot. I thought that was odd instruction but ok, i ran the water. 10 minutes of running the water and no change in the water temperature, which was ice cold. Call concierge back, tells me to keep running the water. Run the water for 90 minutes ...no change! Ice cold? yep! I decide that she doesn't seem well informed so i call the emergency line. After a 30 minute, the person tells me that since it's only my unit, it will have to wait until Monday. Keep in mind it's Saturday at 2pmish at this point. I assure the call center that it must be other units. He says before he can do anything, that will need to be confirmed. Since no one else was going to do anything, i started knocking on doors and asking my neighbors. Sure enough - no one has hot water! Not a big surprise. I go down to the lobby at this point to explain to the concierge that multiple units have no hot water. She tells me that she was told by the call center that she needs to confirm. I ask her what she will be doing to confirm she says "I'M NOT GOiNG TO TELL YOU". I wasn't mad until this point. I call the call center back, they tell me a vendor has been called and is on their way. 2 hours later, they call me to say that a vendor is on their way. INTERESTING, but ok. 7:30pm - i call to get an update since the stuff coming out of the taps is still ice. The final update i received is: "The vendor never did come and losing hot water is normal, it will resolve itself by Monday, we hope. If it doesn't, we'll call someone" WHAT. There have been so many more issues with the management team. Another example: My furnace was so loud it woke me up every-time it kicked in while i was sleeping. I took videos and sent them in; they said it was normal. I didn't agree and wanted a second opinion. Everything is still under warranty. So- I called the installer, sent them the video, they said that is NOT NORMAL and they sent someone out to fix it the same day. FREE OF CHARGE. No questions asked. THAT Is customer service. First Service runs their business by providing as little actual service as possible. That is how they make their money, by skimming off the top and staying under budget. Really disappointing and i can see why they are often referred to at WORST SERVICE RESIDENTIAL read more

the worst building management company! lack of professionalism and never things get done. We complained of noise from upstair for 11months, and until now there was no appropriate action applied. I can see that they don't give a shit of tenants right and quality of life in this building. read more

I guess the experience with FirstService really depends on the specific managers that residents have to deal with. My building, the Elan, where I lived in for a few years and now rent out to a tenant, is managed by FirstService. Our building manager, Will Lensink (employed by FirstService), is extremely professional, dedicated, reliable, and passionate about our building. He is intelligent and fair, and he resolves issues very quickly and effectively. I have also dealt with the strata manager through phone and email, and our communication was always polite and efficient. I read all the strata minutes and AGM notes, and they are impeccable. Every issue brought up by residents is clearly outlined with its resolution, voting results are clearly posted, and anything related to budgets and building conditions is transparent. The management team plus strata makes me feel confident that our building will continue to be kept in excellent condition, and this makes me very happy as a condo owner. Note: I now live in a different building that's close by, and the experience is much different. I seriously wish we had the team at Elan managing my current building! read more

Slimey company. Steals almost $200 dollars more than our rent, then ignored us. If you are a tenant, don't continue with automatic rent payments. They just take what they want. Mail a cheque. read more

Looks like there is a long history of agents being unprofessional etc. The agent for our building is also terrible in responding to emails and has lied about different issues. People are trying to get a hold of him and he does not answer emails etc. I was hoping it was a one off thing but with looking at all the reviews this is not the case. I have tried to get his direct managers contact information but the CSR cannot give that out to you until you identify yourself, the building etc. then only to send you to the agent that you are complaining about. (they search their system if your call display is active). read more

Awful experience. I have been trying to solve a simple issue regarding a noisy neighbor but I get no answer from the strata manager. After calling their terrible customer service and waiting for 40 minutes on the phone, they tell me that they can't do anything, the only one allowed to act is the unresponsive strata manager. So after putting an internal request (my guess is that the strata manager can't ignore this one) she calls me. In the call the strata manager complain to me that she is handling too many building at the same time and that she receives 200+ emails everyday, so for this reason she won't answer my emails, and that's that. Nothing I can do. When talking about the issue on the phone, she mentions that 70% of the building is rental so I won't get improvements to pass as investors don't care about these issues. Then she said my building is full of other problems and starts to mention that there was a homeless person living in the building at one point and that the only way someone got something done about it was through lawyers. It's been months now and I still don't get proper answers or a solution. The service is awful and they seem to abuse their workers. Please, do yourself a favor and avoid first service as if it was the plague. read more

I am a resident of LOTUS in Richmond BC (BCS2884). Despite multiple reports to our new Building Manager Italo Araujo, the door knob on the door access to ground floor parkage and garbage room has been broken for almost one and half months since February 16, 2022 until today.  Residents got stuck in the parkage and can only walked through the garage gate to the second floor to take the elevator if they have the master fob, but for those who only have the small fob wishing to come back to the building have to access from outside walked through the garage gate to the main entrance, about 150 meters, in the dark, chill and rainy evening. (0-star) The same door knob had broken once in 2017, there was a printed white sticker with an upward arrow on the handle stated 'turn counter clockwise to open' and the broken door knob was fixed in a couple days. (5-stars) read more

I rented an apartment managed by FirstService Residential. Although the apartment was nice, the management was terrible. When I moved out, I attended my move-out inspection during which I provided my forwarding address. Under British Columbia law, FirstService was obligated to either return my deposits or file a dispute resolution within 15 days of moving out, but they failed to do so. FirstService Residential did not receive my written consent to retain the deposits nor file an application for dispute resolution. I contacted FirstService through email and phone calls numerous times and was ignored. I ended up receiving my refund cheque 50 days after moving out. This is irresponsible and also against the law. Section 38(6) of the BC Residential Tenancy Act states that if the landlord does not return the deposit(s) or file a claim against the tenant within fifteen days, the landlord must pay the tenant double the amount of the deposits. So, FirstService Residential owes me money and after numerous attempts to contact them, they still have failed to pay me. read more

As a owner at one of your property, I kindly opened the door and let restoration in to fix strata issue, it is water leak from fire sprinkler and caused my whole kitchen wall has black mold, I even took days off to stay at home to let them in to fix once to twice per week, and in the end, I have to pay for the bill of recovery, it seriously affected my life and health for long time, and FSR did not feel bad at all for this, and very nice to ask us to pay this bill. from the beginning till today, it has been over 7 weeks, they never follow up with me, they don't pick up the phone call, never report what phase of this restoration is. It was always me to chase them to figure out the situation. Nice work! read more

It's funny FSR left an message/email on the negative reviews asking for more feedback and contacting through email, but it all for just a show, you email them and nothing happened, just exactly like how the while companies services is. Slacking , slow response , don't really care about the residence who paying for their services, and paying more then other management companies, for such a bs service. read more

Terrible service from all levels of management. Rude, unprofessional, insincere, and unhelpful. Avoid at all costs.

A great experience when I went to the head quarters. Everyone was polite ( greeted me very well) and the property manager 'Claire' was very understanding of my situation. I am happy to give my hard earned money as a renter to this company. Thanks guys read more

Need to rethink their system for handling damages/insurance. A pipe burst in our upstairs neighbour's unit, flooding part of our unit. We've been suffering ever since. FirstService was supposed to figure out if my damages would fit within their deductible so they could say if we could have our repairs covered by them or not. They left us hanging for 4 months... It took somewhere between 5-8 hours for the leak to be stopped: - Upstairs tenants weren't home (travelling). - Resident manager was on vacation. - Backup contact info was wrong and didn't work (adding delays). - Strata emergency line sent someone to help, but they never came. I waited an hour or two. That guy called back that NIGHT apologizing. - They finally sent a plumber, but it was a 2 hour drive for him. Then I received a TON of misinformation: - Plumber offered to cut holes in our walls to find the leak, he said they would send someone to fix the walls if I agreed. No one came to fix anything. - Manager called me to let me know painters will be contacting me. - Restoration company kept saying they would be back for repairs in 2-4 weeks. We're in small apartment with a bunch of it not usable for months. As someone who didn't know the correct process in this situation, I would have hoped that strata would have kept me up to date rather than leaving me hanging. read more

If you value responsiveness and professionalism, FSR may not be the company for you. New FOBs were requested with a timeline of two weeks. They were delayed, so I inquired again... and again. And again. Each time they were just two weeks away. Three months later, I was told they had been sitting there since the beginning and I just needed to come pick them up. Completely unacceptable. They were right at the office the whole time but the manager didn't bother to look until about the 6th time I got hold of her. She almost never return voice mails, does not pick up her phone, or reply to emails. It takes about 2 weeks between each reply. I follow up once or twice a week, usually with no reply. Right now it has been over two years since trying to correct a billing issue - we were charged a fee on a date before we took possession, and charged for moving out 5 days after moving in, which of course never happened. The worst part is she has asked for details from accounting, gotten replies, and promptly forgotten. She has now asked accounting the same question three times. She recently received very detailed information on the charges, and said she needs to confer with council... which we already did. In person. Over two years ago. Over these very charges. Also not sure what council has to do with erroneous charges. Their accountants are certainly on the ball - responsive, detailed, with action-items punctuating the end of every correspondence. Sadly my experiences with the building managers mirror others' reviews: forgetful, dismissive, incompetent, and worst of all expensive. On the flip side, if you have a road and need a can kicked down it, they may be the perfect fit. read more

This is the WORST experience I have ever had with a landlord. If I could leave the earth with ONE PIECE of advice it would be to never deal with this company or rent from them. They neglect all of their properties and I actually heard from one girl the hall way smells of pee and they won't send a cleaner or anyone to change light bulbs in the elevator. I used the option to pay online early and they still charged my bank account. I am out almost 5000 dollars as a single mom and they do not care that I have no money for groceries. They said I have to wait 2 WEEKS for them to even mail me my money back. I am out almost 5000 dollars. They said it was my fault even though it should be assumed if you pay online your account won't be charged twice. Not to mention I told them I have had plumbing issues since I moved in and no one has been called. Just don't deal with them unless you're ready to be fucked over. read more

Was on our strata council for over 10 years, but when we lost our very knowledgeable property manager a few years ago (who was arbitrarily replaced because our president at the time complained, unbeknownst to the majority of the rest of council), our service quality dropped significantly. The new manager was ineffective, and didn't last long. We've since had 2 other managers in short succession, neither of whom were very competent. This company was great before it was taken over by a US company (I believe it was locally owned). Now, the accounting system continually has errors, documents take forever to get posted to the website (my insurance agent was so frustrated she was ready to call them directly, as they couldn't post a binder that had been available for 2 months), there is NO continuity (no one can find any document that wasn't created within the last 2 years, and forget about finding old e-mails and correspondence from prior managers - which is not ideal when we're a 40+ year old strata). Minutes contain multiple spelling errors and factual errors - it would appear that no one proofreads ANYTHING that comes out of their office. Every single resolution from our last AGM had to be amended on the fly because there were substantive errors (not just typo's, either). The current manager's knowledge of the legislation and meeting rules is limited, and he's been incredibly rude in his e-mail responses to other owners. Wish we could switch companies, but I got so frustrated I left council. I will say the recent virtual AGM seemed to run smoothly (other than taking 3 hours which was mainly because our property manager seems to love listening to himself talk) - the platform used made it easy to vote, and the person helping the manager actually knew more about how to run a meeting than the manager did. read more

Firstservice is the company that manages my condo complex. We are on the 4th strata manager in almost 4 years. The current strata manager does not return calls or emails. When I called the head office I was told I'd get a response in 2 business days .... that was 14 days ago. Aside from poor communication , this company seems to deal with incompetent trades and have not followed up with work in the building and not informed owners why not. This company is unprofessional and not reliable. read more

My Strata Manager can only reply to ONE email a day which contains 1 sentence and just gives you the run around. I'm not sure what I pay my monthly strata fees for. read more

Just awful. The gym has been broken since we moved in last March. Nothing has been. The lobby door has been broken for a week leaving residents locked outside in the cold. We've called multiple times and the customer service could care less. They said they'll "send someone but they don't know when that will be". Clearly no one in this company could care less as long as they're collecting a paycheque. What a pathetic excuse for a strata. read more