Blue Sage Realty Sucks: “I’m Rejecting Your Application. Get Out.”
This is a story about dealing with a Colorado realtor, Blue Sage Realty. Blue Sage Realty employees were rude and awful to deal with, and actually kicked us out of the leasing office when we asked for an in-writing solution to the problem of a nonfunctional air conditioner. In short, this story has been posted as a warning to anyone else: do not deal with Blue Sage realty. They will make you miserable.
Blue Sage Realty in Colorado Sucks
My fiancee and I were looking for houses to rent in Colorado and found one that looked like a good size in our price range, so we scheduled a viewing with Blue Sage Realty in Colorado, the management company for the property. When my fiancee and I showed up to the place to look around, the kitchen floor had just been cleaned, and the fridge had been pulled out of the kitchen, blocking the doorway. We were unable to see the kitchen or anything that could only be reached by walking through the kitchen, meaning we were unable to see the kitchen, the dining room, the garage, the porch, or the back yard.
Despite being unable to see half the house, we loved it, and sent an application (and a check) within an hour of leaving. Our credit was checked (we have great credit), our current landlord was called (we’ve been great tenants), and we were approved for the house within a day.
Johleen Belliston, a Blue Sage Realty employee, told us we were approved and we should come in to sign the lease. We explained that we had not yet seen the entire unit, and she warned us that if we didn’t act fast that we might lose the house to another renter. Worried, we scheduled another showing as soon as we could.
The second time through the house, we were able to walk into every room. The problem was that the electricity didn’t work upstairs, and the A/C wasn’t running. This prevented us from seeing any upstairs rooms without windows, since lights couldn’t be turned on. It also meant we couldn’t stay upstairs long, since it was extremely hot. We still liked the house a great deal, but were concerned that if the A/C didn’t do a good job, it would be unlivable.
Though we were being pressured into signing a lease immediately after this second showing, we wanted to think things over and measure our furniture to make sure everything would fit, and she once again tried bullying us with threats that someone else may snatch up the house. Worried again, we scheduled a lease signing for the next morning.
We were concerned that the A/C may not fully cool the house, and we expressed our concern to Johleen at Blue Sage Realty. I also asked that the carpets, which were heavily stained, be shampooed. She told us we were being “nitpicky“.
We met with her the next day to sign the lease, pay stubs and money order in hand, as requested. Johleen from Blue Sage Realty explained that the A/C worked fine, but that sometimes A/Cs don’t cool a whole house that well, and hey, shit happens. I was going to ask for an in-writing assurance the A/C would work, but Johlene refused to do so before I could even ask.
We requested the lease be amended to give us 30 days after move-in to evaluate the A/C, the electricity, and see the upstairs bathroom for the first time. We had hoped that they wouldn’t think we were jerking them around, since we’d be unlikely to pay for moving expenses and then leave after 30 days just to be annoying, but 30 days would also give us time to make sure everything worked correctly. We thought this was a good solution for everyone.
Johleen sighed with annoyance and said she’d get her manager. The manager for Blue Sage Realty, Kathryn MacGeraghty, entered the room, already irritated, and asked what we wanted. I re-explained, politely, that it’d be nice to get 30 days to make sure that everything in the house worked. She curtly told us that was unheard of and “not going to happen.” “No,” she said.
I told her that she was being a bit rude, and she told me “Well, you’re free to leave.”
I asked her if this was how their company was going to be as landlords. If our roof was leaking and we called them, would they tell us we were being nitpicky? She told me, “I’m rejecting your application. Get out.”
So we left. It was unfortunate, since the house was so nice, but it seemed clear that they’d be awful landlords. I just want to get this story out there so that anyone else looking for homes in the Colorado area knows what they’re getting into with Blue Sage Realty.
Just to make sure everyone knows the exact company I’m talking about, it’s Blue Sage Realty in Colorado, located at:
Blue Sage Realty, Inc
8471 Turnpike Dr, Suite 220
Westminster, CO 80031
(303) 432-9898 Office
http://www.bluesagerealtyinc.com
Absolutely No Machete Juggling is a blog about software, programming, computers, and me. I'm a programmer working in Colorado, mostly with Java and Ruby. 
Blue Sage Realty Sucks, Apparently - MINDSculpt:
[...] new place in Colorado. After a lot of searching they found a house they liked that is managed by Blue Sage Realty. You can read for yourself, but he was treated horribly by them. Despite the problems I am [...]
2 July 2008, 12:41 pmCatherine:
I bet with some easy peasy searching you could find the owner’s name of the house and let them know why their mortgage isn’t being covered this month. Not that karma won’t take care of Blue Sage Realty all on her own.
2 July 2008, 1:35 pmRod:
Catherine,
I actually did just that. Got the owner’s name, but I can’t find a phone number for them.
2 July 2008, 1:39 pmRoss:
Wow sorry to hear you’ve had such a horrible experience in finding a place to live. Hopefully karma will hit them back hard soon. On the upside you aren’t actually going to have to deal with them ever again. Our first landlord was awful he tried to charge us to have the heat fixed.
2 July 2008, 10:22 pmda kine:
Wow. If I got ’service’ like that, I’d be throwing D-cell batteries all around the office.
3 July 2008, 8:24 amReview of Blue Sage Realty in Westminster, CO — It Sucks! at blog.bharper: the blog of brandon harper:
[...] buddy Rod recently had a really bizarre and unprofessional experience at Blue Sage Realty. It sounds like a good place to avoid at all costs. You can read more about his experience [...]
3 July 2008, 9:00 pmThe Ko Home » Blue Sage Realty sucks:
[...] Here’s the post. [...]
7 July 2008, 4:13 pmLauren:
Yeah blue sage sucks! My boyfriend and I rented a place from them and its been the worst landlord I’ve ever had. They pulled that same stuff about signing the lease. When we showed up on the day we were to move in, we realized they hadn’t had the house cleaned at all. The carpets were stained with all sorts of weird stuff, there was dust everywhere, pop cans, trash, food caked on to the fridge, oven etc. Then when we asked them to clean it and fix the carpets, they told us they wouldn’t do anything about the carpets and only cleaned some of it and acted like we were being picky and it took them a week to get that done- meanwhile we were stalling on moving in all of our furniture hoping they would clean it. I’ve rented from a lot of places and I’ve never dealt with this level of unprofessionalism, and lack of costumer service skills. Whatever you do-don’t rent from them!!!! Its been a nightmare!
23 October 2008, 9:50 amJR:
Add me to the list of people who have been royally screwed by Blue Sage. I wrote a short version of it on yelp, after your post. I’m in the process of taking them to court.
29 January 2009, 1:58 pmDavid:
You are lucky you didn’t sign with them. Our landlords (Metro Brokers-also in Colorado) are just as bad.
16 February 2009, 6:32 pmJR:
Okay, I took down the Yelp review since I got the BBB and the Colorado Division of Real Estate involved and I don’t want it to look like I’m going against BS unfairly. But here’s my story:
Two friends and I rented a house from Blue Sage for two years. We had put down $1595 for the deposit, so we made sure to clean the house top to bottom when we moved out. We also took video footage as proof that the house was in better condition than it had been when we moved in. Blue Sage returned only about a third of the deposit to us, claiming multiple deductions. We agreed that some of these were fair, but they owed us $350 more. We had also asked repeatedly to be present during the final walk though, but they did it without us. On top of that, the check they wrote for the returned portion was not cashable; Kathryn wrote it to the three of us plus a fourth person who had not paid into the deposit, and had since moved out of state. We had already told her repeatedly that the check should be written to just the three of us, and had provided a written statement from the fourth person to this effect. Kathryn refused to write us a corrected, valid check, or to communicate further with us until we had removed a negative posting we made about them online. After a couple of months, we sent them a form letter demanding repayment of the disputed amount within seven days. We threatened to take them to small claims court for triple the amount otherwise. Since their first check wasn’t cashable, we asked for a check for the total amount: the portion that they had (poorly) tried to return to us, plus the disputed amount. Blue Sage sent us the check within a week, and we thought that was the end of it. Months later, we got a call from a collections agency. Apparently we had an unpaid debt of the amount we had disputed with Blue Sage, plus fees. BLUE SAGE RETURNED THE DISPUTED MONEY TO US, THEN REPORTED IT AS DEBT TO A COLLECTIONS AGENCY. It is still on all of our credit reports and my credit score has dropped by 100 points. The only reason they gave us the check was to avoid the triple damages clause, and now they think they can blackball all three of us out of spite.
24 April 2009, 9:51 amRod:
Holy Jesus. Blue sage sucks.
Sorry, JR. Let me know how the BBB stuff works out.
30 April 2009, 9:38 am