Kateleen Vqn
map-marker San Jose, California

Terrible and unprofessional Land Lord

I am a Marine that received orders to work in Mountain View California. I was stationed in Southern California and was looking for a house to rent online.

I came across Steven Wu's property and thought it was a good deal so we went ahead and set up an agreement over the phone to meet. Since I was still in Southern California I couldn't meet with Steven Wu to look at the property so I had my mother in Law, who was going to live with us, meet With Mr. Wu and look at the property. She saw the property and told us that it was not the best but since we were short on time to find a place we decided to go with that one.

Steven wu drafted the contract and faxed it to us so my wife and I can sign. Upon receiving the contract we noticed that the property is described as having a microwave, dishwasher, and sink disposal included. The house did not have any of this and we brought it up to his attention making note that we will not sign the contract until he either removes those items from the contract or includes them in the house. he did neither.

We paid him a security deposit plus first and last months rent to move in We moved in on the 15th of January of 2013. Upon moving in, my mother in law discovers multiple discrepancies with the house. The yard was a mess that showed signs of absolute neglect, Steven Wu said he would have someone clean it. It is now March 31 and he still has not sent anyone to clean the yard.

Our next issue is the electrical. I have experience in electrical work to know that the circuit breaker box for the house is below code and standard for the state of California. My family and I were all watching television in the living room when all of a sudden our lights in the whole house went off. I went to check on the circuit breakers to find that they have been tripped.

Not only did I notice that they have been tripped but I also found that the circuit breakers only consisted of four 20 amp breakers and one main breaker for the whole house. This house has one living room, 3 bedrooms, a garage, 2 bathrooms, and outside lights. Each room is supposed to have at least one 20 amp circuit breaker. What this house has is 4.

The hot wires from multiple rooms were pigtailed (joined) to make one wire that connects to a single circuit breaker. There is obviously an overload that causes the breakers to trip. The circuit breakers trip multiple times a day and during the night as well which caused the house to become uncomfortably cold at night. We have two babies both under 3 years old that have had to suffer cold nights because of this.

We brought this up to Steven Wu's attention in emails, texts, calls, and in person. At first he told us that it was our responsibility to hire someone to fix the electricity, an issue that was present prior to us moving in. After conducting research I found out that it is the landlord who is responsible for that. We told him this and he said he will send someone to fix this.

From January to now (March 31), there has not been a single person present to fix the issue. My wife has emailed him threatening legal action if he continues to neglect our reach out to him and he has not answered. He never answers his phone or texts unless he is calling to collect money which we have been paying every month since we have been here. We asked for lowered rent due to the poor living conditions he has provided and he has refused to do so.

As good tenants we paid what he asked of us even after pointing these issues out. He tried to over charge us for the trash pick up fee. He sent me emails and texts asking for double what it normally costs. I Called to city to find out how much trash pickup is and I came to find out that he was charging us for our residence and his residence fee.

I only gave him what we legitimately got provided. We have reached a point where we are moving out of this house without notice to him because we can't contact him and it has been a nightmare the whole time we have dealt with him. We probably wont see our security deposit of $3,000 plus first and last months rent ($2,350 a month). We are willing to settle for our losses if it means we will live better somewhere else.

if anyone is trying to conduct business with this joke of a "professional" I highly encourage everyone to seek help elsewhere. This individual should have his license taken away and should pay reparations for those he has wronged. I am a service member that has been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan who has fought to give this person the freedom to own a business in this country. What we get in return is constant negligence, demand of outrageous rent for poor living conditions, breach of an unsigned lease agreement that we still have not signed, and we are out a few thousand dollars because of his incompetence and unprofessionalism.

A little more information on Steven Wu.

He claims that he is not the property owner, that the property owner is another person he claims as his brother Max Wu. After saying this I asked him if I should make the rent checks to Max Wu and he told me no, to make them to himself, Steven Wu. His business logo that is located outside his office has the name Steven Wu.

In no place did I find anything that said Max Wu. We believe that he is using the other name to have a finger to point when things get messy for him.

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Loss:
$7700
ANUJ J Eku
map-marker Cupertino, California

Bad Experience with Real Estate Agent - W-Star (Steven Wu and Irene Tang)

Hi,

Want to share my bad experience with Real Estate Agent - W-Star Investments Inc (Steven Wu and Irene Tang) 2130 Ringwood Avenue, San Jose CA 95131

Phone: 510-396-****

Fax: 408-228-****

.

I decided to go with them to sell my house and resulted in very bitter experience. Following are the few points:

"¢ Didnt share all the offers with me. Came to know when few buyer started knocking on the door to find out what happened to their offer.

"¢ If you call them their voice mail is always full and never receive/return the call.

"¢ Never visited the property during the open house.

"¢ Lot of potential buyers with good offers never received any response of their offers/emails/phone calls. The reason is all the offers that came to me were the ones where they had some interest to make money from buyer side also.

"¢ They made the listing agreement with me with happy talks and now threatening me when I requested to cancel the contract. I have to now seek legal help to get out of contract. NEVER sign a contract without reading the dates and cancellation terms

And the list goes on…………………

Question: Any website suggestions to post reviews about real estate agents? I spent enough time and surprise to notice didn't find one (might be a good idea to start one). Did anybody else faced the same situation? Any suggestions like…

"¢ File compliant with Department of Real Estate

"¢ Legal action (Do not want to opt this one as this one take lot of time and money)

"¢ Share or post your reviews , Where???

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16 comments
Guest

I had a similar experience. I am wondering if the NC Real Estate Licensing Commission is interested in the truth or are they fraudulent as well?

Guest

I don't know how Steven Wu does on buying or selling houses, he was hired as my property manager. He might be sincere looking or talking,but don't be fooled by his appearance.

I put up with him for so many years and finally decided to get rid of him. He failed to to his job and trying to avoid me all these years. I never get any records or reports from him, never returning my emails. I had to do my own bookkeeping, and thank God that I did.

Rent deposited to my account were always late - I found out he collected the rent on the first, but deposited after 20th of each month.

Sometimes rent would fluctuate from month to month without any explanation to me. And there was one month rent of $1830 that went completely missing.

I'm filing complains through BBB and Bureau of Real Estate(CalBRE) and waiting for the results....

Kateleen Vqn
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-806413

It's sad on how Steven Wu neglects his clients and tenants. We had to resort to not paying rent just to be able to talk to him after all means for attempting to contact him failed.

We did that for 2 months and to no one's surprise he was the first one to contact us on the second day of the month when the rent was a day late.

Those were the only opportunities we had to talk to him to resolve issues with the property we were renting at the time. It's truly sad knowing he is still conducting business in such haineous fashion.

Kateleen Vqn

I am a Marine that received orders to work in Mountain View California. I was stationed in Southern California and was looking for a house to rent online.

I came across Steven Wu's property and thought it was a good deal so we went ahead and set up an agreement over the phone to meet. Since I was still in Southern California I couldn't meet with Steven Wu to look at the property so I had my mother in Law, who was going to live with us, meet With Mr. Wu and look at the property. She saw the property and told us that it was not the best but since we were short on time to find a place we decided to go with that one.

Steven wu drafted the contract and faxed it to us so my wife and I can sign. Upon receiving the contract we noticed that the property is described as having a microwave, dishwasher, and sink disposal included. The house did not have any of this and we brought it up to his attention making note that we will not sign the contract until he either removes those items from the contract or includes them in the house. he did neither.

We paid him a security deposit plus first and last months rent to move in We moved in on the 15th of January of 2013. Upon moving in, my mother in law discovers multiple discrepancies with the house. The yard was a mess that showed signs of absolute neglect, Steven Wu said he would have someone clean it. It is now March 31 and he still has not sent anyone to clean the yard.

Our next issue is the electrical. I have experience in electrical work to know that the circuit breaker box for the house is below code and standard for the state of California. My family and I were all watching television in the living room when all of a sudden our lights in the whole house went off. I went to check on the circuit breakers to find that they have been tripped.

Not only did I notice that they have been tripped but I also found that the circuit breakers only consisted of four 20 amp breakers and one main breaker for the whole house. This house has one living room, 3 bedrooms, a garage, 2 bathrooms, and outside lights. Each room is supposed to have at least one 20 amp circuit breaker. What this house has is 4.

The hot wires from multiple rooms were pigtailed (joined) to make one wire that connects to a single circuit breaker. There is obviously an overload that causes the breakers to trip. The circuit breakers trip multiple times a day and during the night as well which caused the house to become uncomfortably cold at night. We have two babies both under 3 years old that have had to suffer cold nights because of this.

We brought this up to Steven Wu's attention in emails, texts, calls, and in person. At first he told us that it was our responsibility to hire someone to fix the electricity, an issue that was present prior to us moving in. After conducting research I found out that it is the landlord who is responsible for that. We told him this and he said he will send someone to fix this.

From January to now (March 31), there has not been a single person present to fix the issue. My wife has emailed him threatening legal action if he continues to neglect our reach out to him and he has not answered. He never answers his phone or texts unless he is calling to collect money which we have been paying every month since we have been here. We asked for lowered rent due to the poor living conditions he has provided and he has refused to do so.

As good tenants we paid what he asked of us even after pointing these issues out. He tried to over charge us for the trash pick up fee. He sent me emails and texts asking for double what it normally costs. I Called to city to find out how much trash pickup is and I came to find out that he was charging us for our residence and his residence fee.

I only gave him what we legitimately got provided. We have reached a point where we are moving out of this house without notice to him because we can't contact him and it has been a nightmare the whole time we have dealt with him. We probably wont see our security deposit of $3,000 plus first and last months rent ($2,350 a month). We are willing to settle for our losses if it means we will live better somewhere else.

if anyone is trying to conduct business with this joke of a "professional" I highly encourage everyone to seek help elsewhere. This individual should have his license taken away and should pay reparations for those he has wronged. I am a service member that has been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan who has fought to give this person the freedom to own a business in this country. What we get in return is constant negligence, demand of outrageous rent for poor living conditions, breach of an unsigned lease agreement that we still have not signed, and we are out a few thousand dollars because of his incompetence and unprofessionalism.

A little more information on Steven Wu.

He claims that he is not the property owner, that the property owner is another person he claims as his brother Max Wu. After saying this I asked him if I should make the rent checks to Max Wu and he told me no, to make them to himself, Steven Wu. His business logo that is located outside his office has the name Steven Wu.

In no place did I find anything that said Max Wu. We believe that he is using the other name to have a finger to point when things get messy for him.

Guest

Wow, they are just terrible. I was very skeptical, but they looked nice so I decided to take a chance anyway.

They made it seem like it is too good to be true, and it was.

The fee they quoted, the service, and everything else didn't match what I end up with. They lied about everything, but locked everything in contract that I could not get out, ended up in a very difficult situation.

Guest

Yea, Steven Wu from W-Star Investment is giving money in return of sexual favors. This is both unethnical and against the law to reduce or forgive fees in return for sexual favors with female clients.

Guest

Not only Steven Wu is a lying *** man, he was also having affairs with client's wife. Just look at him, you don't think Steven Wu is the type of person. My friend is now divorced thanks to Steven Wu coming between husband and wife.

Guest

Did any one file complaint already against with them?

Please post the procedure to help later who need to do the same procedure with them. I belive we will see more victim show up later.

We really need to do someting to stop this unethical practice.

Guest

Hi Janet, did you go though purchase a house by them?

What kind of bad experience you really did? This will be really good case for buyer to avoid mistake later.

Guest

My bad experience is as a buyer. It seems the other two are as sellers.

"Unhappy too", are you going to proceed with any legal action?

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