Do not rent from them!! Their houses are not taken care of. We had mold, water damage, bugs, among other things. Maintenance shows up with no warning. They charged us $3000 on top of our security deposit when we moved out for damage that was caused by foundational issues with the house. Communication is bad, and they're very unprofessional. Everyone I talk to about MTR has a bad experience. read more

I would not recommend MTR to any college student looking to rent in Ames. PLEASE READ THIS: My friends and I all wanted to live in a house in college because we thought it would be fun, but we knew it wouldn't be perfect. Realistically houses need upkeep and things are more expensive (utilities, etc.). It's a cheap college house it Ames, we did not expect a palace. From the first day we received the keys to our house we've had problems. The second we walked through the door we noticed our house was NOT cleaned properly, or maybe even at all. Cabinets were yellow from no ventilation and knobs in the bathroom were covered in mold. There was dog hair everywhere, even a thick coat in the air vents, from the previous renters. We cleaned everything and they came to replace the knobs. They also forgot to mention we had to bring in our own washer and dryer. As time went on we noticed more. Our oven didn't work, our shower is ALWAYS cold, insects everywhere, one even came up out of our drain. Our bathroom ceiling gets quickly covered in mold no matter how many times I clean it. The downstairs bedroom started flooding after a big storm. Any time I've had a problem and I try to call them, NO ANSWER. EVER. I've began to text them and their responses are always less than helpful. Very sloppy management. I wish I did my research before applying with this company. Please do not sign with MTR Properties. We are so disappointed and cannot wait to be moved out. read more

This company is the shittiest company around and will literally rob your kids. My son and 4 others lived in one of their shitty properties for 2 years. once their lease was up they are now charging them over $5,000.00 to Replace closet doors that were never there put a new counter top in that they did nothing to, replace blinds that we already replaced once etc. I have never in my life see anything like it. While they lived there they had a fire, sewer back up and broken into to. I would never ever recommend this company and they need to go out of business!! read more

0 Stars PLEASE DO NOT RENT FROM THEM!!!! DO NOT SEND YOUR CHILDREN TO LIVE IN MTR PROPERTIES!!!!!!! Bats and Mice have been in our house multiple times, and they continue to blame us. The washer and dryer have been broke for 3 months without resolution in sight. Do not even try calling them; they will not answer. They are money-hungry and neglectful people, especially with college students, which is unfair. Rent is reasonable for a damn reason. Will say, though, the maintenance guys are our saving grace!!!! They help as much as they can. Our house specifically is a three unit property and the stinky downstairs neighbors house smells travels through the vents, and the heat goes through his apartment before our house. ABSOLUTELY unacceptable, DO BETTER!!!! read more

0 stars. They will penny pinch you for everything and the management is bad. Only positives are the workers on maintenance requests those guys are beauties. Houses lowkey falling apart read more

DO NO RENT FROM MTR. Frequently show up without notice (such as walking around on our roof while I was in an interview, which I was told was unprofessional lost the chance to work for them) which is clearly against renters rights. (They also ignored me when I texted them about this issue.) Came to fix the shed in our backyard and left nails and screws EVERY WHERE. Took a smaller shed out from the end of the backyard and left plastic and garbage everywhere, including a car battery from previous renters. They find the shittiest handy men on the planet who will cut every corner possible. We were told there would have professional cleaning before we moved in and everything would be fixed and ready to go. Moved into a shower head duck tapped to the wall, dog hair covering every inch of the carpet in one bedroom, dust and hair covering every inch of the stairs going both upstairs and downstairs, and beer cans and beer cases all over the backyard. Over 50% (that is serious, not exaggerated) of locks on the windows in the house do not work. Many sets of blinds were also missing small parts as they feel like they are made of paper and don't help at all. Don't expect timely responses at all. If you are asking for something that will cost them even a dime, they will just ignore you until you stop pestering them. Over summer break while we all had jobs and families to deal with out of town, we got charged several hundred dollars for them to mow our lawn, without giving us a single warning about it. As someone else said, 10/10 recommend if you are looking for a company to ruin your college experience as much as possible, want a disgusting house to live in, and want as many problems as possible read more

Couldn't be worse. Similar experience to every other review. Disgusting unsafe home with undrinkable water + thousands of dollars in fees we weren't made aware of until move out. Rents are low to get you to sign but you'll end up paying more than competing properties in unexpected extremely overpriced fees. Also landlord called me fat?? read more

They are slum lords, the worst renting experience I have ever had. House was gross and they charged us for damage that was nonexistent basically tried to scam us out of 900 dollars plus took our entire security. Do not rent from these crooks!!!!!! read more

I have rented with MTR for two years now. During my first few months living here in the fall of 2023 I really enjoyed it as the property was close to campus and appeared to be well maintained. Because of this I decided to renew my lease for the following year. However, I quickly regretted this as the heat goes out frequently leaving my roommates and I living in temperatures equivalent with the outside in winter months. When the heating works it does not reach all parts of the house which has left all of the bedrooms freezing, causing us to use space heaters which increases the electric bill. During January of 2025 my roommates and I were charged a $125 shoveling fee for 4 inches of snow being shoveled from our 15 ft sidewalk. We tried to call MTR several times to figure out what this charge was for and what day this incident happened but they do not answer the phone when you call. We finally emailed them when we were charged a $100 late fee. Their response was extremely rude, unhelpful and unprofessional. 10/10 recommend if you are a young college student wanting to be taken advantage of. read more

I've been renting from MTR for over a year and a half and I've had nothing but issues. They frequently just show up without any warning. Just recently they showed up for maintenance I did not request, entered the home even though nobody was there. This is an issue because I own a large male German Shepherd who was out. Thankfully my boy is well behaved but I can't guarantee he wouldn't feel threatened enough to bite an intruder into his home. And if he had, I'm sure they would have laid the blame on me. The maintenance guy also fell on my stairs, and I'm sure they are going to blame me for that because it snowed recently and I haven't gotten around to clearing the snow off yet. Because I wasn't expecting anyone to show up! I'm tired of never knowing when they are going to just let themselves in. This has happened numerous times. I also had large branches fall from the trees out front and they sat there for 5 months before a guy who'd helped out with a previous problem cleaned it up without being asked. MTR refused to do anything about them. I also have a mouse infestation that I've brought up but nothing gets done about. Do not recommend. Soon as my lease is up this summer, I'm going elsewhere. read more

These people are criminals. They sent us our security deposit 2 months after moving out with over 2,000 dollars in repairs. (The house was better when we moved out then when we moved in) The rent was cheap, but it was cheap for a reason. There was tons of mold in the house that we told them about and they failed to do anything about it. They charged us for things that were broken when we moved in. DO NOT RENT FROM THESE CRIMINALS. read more

TLDR; never rent from them. First, the house we lived in was terrible, with lots of things you wouldn't notice in a tour or until you actually live there. Dealt with a mouse problem for months after we moved in, snakes in the basement the whole time we lived there including a 4 foot bull snake in a bedroom. Mold and a rotting floor behind the refrigerator they never fixed and fallen trees in the backyard area. Management shifted a year after we moved in and communication was awful before but got infinitely worse. Maintenance in our house without warning and even in our house when they were supposed to be at a different address. Told us we needed to repair a leak in our kitchen sink ourselves until we bothered them several times about it. Went back on what they said multiple times and started doing pretty major renovations while we were trying to pack and move. Slapped us with $2,500 + bill after move out claiming outrageous amounts for minor repairs and things that didn't exist at all or were broken when we moved in. 0/10 do not recommend read more

DO NOT APPLY FOR ANY PROPERTIES. They scammed my friend and I out of $500, we didn't sign onto the property, just put down a deposit. After learning more about the company (past tenants call them the slumlords of Ames), we requested our deposit back and were denied. They were rude, and dodged our calls for two weeks. I've rented with a few different companies in Ames, and I've never had a worse experience. read more

I am subleasing for the summer and got charged late fees when they did not provide me the ability to pay it until five days after it was due. Totaled $100 in late fees. They were rude throughout the process of working it out with them and kept brushing it off, do not recommend leasing through them if possible. read more

When renting a property under them, they charged my roommates and I a little over $1,000 for outrageous charges. If we did owe them anything, it could've easily been covered by our security deposit we never got back. The charges insisted of several "late rent fees" we had paid but they had lost /misplaced, charges on items in the house that had already been broken prior to moving in--but it doesn't stop there. They had the AUDACITY to replace ALL the binds in the home and even charge us for the ones that didn't need to be replaced. I wouldn't have such a problem with MTR if they did their job correctly. Instead, they send a debt collector to my parents' house MONTHS after we contacted them almost a year ago trying to dispute the charges. We thought they had dropped the matter but they haven't. Not to mention the house we lived in SEVERELY violated habitable living conditions that the landlord is obligated to maintain. The VERY foundation of the house was slanted to the point a ball could roll from one side of the living room to the front porch without even being touched. The basement was ATROCIOUS. The bedroom I roomed in leaked DIRT from the walls and so did my roommates'. The house itself was so old its basement ceilings were poorly constructed that countless spiders and crickets seeped into our rooms. My poor roommate even had to stuff cotton balls around the walls of her room to prevent even more spiders from crawling through, and every now and then my walls would leak water onto the carpeted floors after it had rained. Seeing as to how horrible of an experience it was for me and my roommates with that rented house, I can't imagine how worse it was for the previous tenants before us. I can 100% say that all the reviews on here about MTR are indeed accurate. If I had the physical and emotional energy to further complain about our experiences with maintenance, I would write an entire novel mentioning all the ways they've wronged my roommates and I. Seeing as how my review is long enough, I won't waste more of my breath on these money-hungry crooks. Bottom line: Their maintenance was an absolute nightmare and so was communication with their landlord Emily. Don't rent from them! I believe serious shifts in management need to be made to save this sorry excuse of a rental company. read more

-6 out of 5 stars. Go suck a sock. Do not rent from here. Only bad experiences here AND they added an absolutely absurd amount in fees. Also the maintenance guy made my roommate cry which was rude. If I made a list of all the things wrong with this company it would end up being longer than Homestuck. Nothing in the world should be longer than Homestuck. Be better MTR. read more

The house we lived in was a absolute mess. Our expectations were low, because we were shown the house and it was rough to say the least. However, the worst part was the property management itself. Our sewage line got clogged about a month into our lease and we had sewage flooding our basement. We contacted MTR, but they were quick to push the blame on us. I went back and forth with them, but they were atrociously rude and told us that per the lease, all clogs were our responsibility. Ultimately the cause of the clog was due to a massive tree in the front yard (right above the sewage line) because the only thing that the maintenance guys pulled out was roots. I relayed this new information to MTR, but they basically told me to kick rocks. I sent the lease to an attourney to get their opinion and they told me that the lease was horrible and could push almost all of the blame onto the tenants. At the end of the academic year we also kept getting emails about mowing the lawn. All of us were graduating and had jobs lined up so we wouldn't be in the area anymore. We also knew that a fine for an un-mowed lawn could be hundreds of dollars EACH TIME they had to mow. After struggling to find a solution, we tried calling MTR and once again they told us that we would just have to figure it out ourselves... I know this review is long, but if at all possible, DO NOT USE MTR. But if you have no choice, Iowa State has a legal counsel that can help students out in situations like this (we just found out about it too late) so use them. They are truly taking advantage of the students in the area. read more

Quite literally the worst property rental agency in the midwest. Long response times, even worse communication, hidden fees. We were charged 700 dollars for a month of utilities when we were not even living on the premise. No help from MTR even when the city said everything pointed at them. They took 1200 dollars from our security deposit when the house was cleaner than when we moved in. Mold all over multiple houses that we toured and nothing was ever done about it. They'll just continue to exploit college students because they think there wont be repercussions. DO NOT RENT FROM MTR, THEY ARE CROOKS. read more

The worst company to rent through. Emily is their only employee and does not do her job to respectfully communicate and talk to her renters. Maintenance comes in without any warnings and MTR will never take the blame. DO NOT RENT HERE. read more

Genuinely awful. DO NOT rent from them, you will regret every second. I cannot stress how much I would've rather just lived in an apartment then deal with their BS for another second. Bad business, worse people, and the worst tenant communication I've heard of in the Ames area. We lived in 2639 Hunt St from Aug 2021 - Aug 2022. A) we were significantly overcharged, and we know this because a friend two houses down with double the square footage paid the same to the same company. B) they were incredibly slow in responding to our concerns, from maintenance issues in the house to the backyard, However, the cherry on top was the security deposit, for which we only got half back, got no explanation outside of vague line items, and they REFUSED to communicate further. Didn't answer any emails, didn't send any photos or receipts, nothing. I cannot imagine renting from scummier businesspeople. I can only hope they go bankrupt so they cannot screw over another group of college students. read more

Called for broken furnace with no response for weeks and when MTR did send someone to fix the furnace.there was zero notice as to the day or time when the furnace would be fixed. read more

We rent a house from these landlords. Moved in and the basement has mold growing on the walls. Contacted landlords with the concern and they said it is our responsibility to get rid of the mold. I have never moved into such a dirty place. It took hours and hours to clean it to a livable standard. Since then the drain in the basement has backed up when the washing machine in going - apparently this is also a tenant responsibility. The carpet is 10+ years old and smells like pee but it "meets their standard" so they declined when we offered to replace it for only the cost of the carpet. I would not rent from them ever again! read more

Rented house from this place and had no problems. Loved it. It was great having a house rather than an apartment. Great experience. Lots of different options and locations. Would definitely recommend. read more

They seem nice at first, then you move and the place is disgusting. They do as little as possible to make repairs and if they do make repairs it's sloppy. They try to charge you for anything that goes wrong even wear and tear, which is illegal! Only words to describe these two brothers SCUM LORDS! read more

If I could give these CROOKS a 0 I would. We had so many issues with them. As the other reviews said these guys are SCUM LORDS and Crooks. The place was absolutely disgusting when we moved in but we were told it was "professionally cleaned" and then they had the nerve to keep over 1/4th of our deposit after we returned the place in way better condition just for cleaning. Our place had so many issues and they just kept doing band-aid fixes and acted like the problems were our issue. They are shady and the places are awful, then they keep your deposit for bogus charges that aren't even remotely justified. Oh and our whole bathroom floor was mold and the place flooded multiple times because they were to lazy to do correct fixes. Save yourself time money and the stress. NEVER rent from these Crooks. How they are a business baffles me. read more

After the company got new management everything got worse than it was. This company isn't very helpful with its tenants and is unwilling to do what it takes to go above and beyond for those who rent from them. Houses are cheap but not nearly cheap enough for how dirty they are. We had several issues that, over the course of the year, MTR failed to do anything about. My roommate had her light fixture duct taped to her ceiling and it never was fixed. We had ants get into our cupboards and into our food, even after several attempts to deep clean and spray ant spray inside and outdoors. We were told the ants were our problem to manage. Do not use MTR for property needs unless you are willing to sacrifice a comfortable living space for an overpriced dirt hole of a house. read more

Wish I could give zero stars as the only benefit to renting from them is cheapness. There is a reason for CHEAPNESS. When we moved in it looked like a toddler had painted in the dark, our key broke off in the lock the second day we lived there (locksmith said it was because the door was improperly placed) and mtr wouldn't reimburse us the $170 it took to let us in. They "fixed" our shower and toilet from leaking and running aka they ran and leaked more than before. The big window in the front of our duplex fell on me multiple times when I would try to open it, resulting in me getting injured each time. They simply said we may want to replace it ourselves since they would be expensive to replace it. They never dealt with horrible neighbors who were terrorizing us daily and when we left, they gauged our security deposit. At this point we just wanted to be over and done with them holy cow. NEVER rent from them if you want to live somewhere nice and safe. read more