Moldy apartment in Southwest Topeka gets makeover
4:21 p.m. Tuesday, September 9, 2008
A property that's received recent complaints now is getting new life.
Last month, we reported on a moldy apartment at Country Club Apartments at 29th and Topeka Boulevard. Resident Brandi Goslin said the mold issue in a vacant apartment was making her and other tenants sick.
The residents were also worried about their safety. They discovered the mold after someone kicked in the door to the apartment and worried their doors could be next.
Now, their worries are subsiding. That's because the moldy apartment complex, which went into foreclosure, now it has a new name and a new owner. Brewster Place Retirement Community now owns what has been renamed the Fairway Apartments.
"The last management wasn't communicating with the residents, so they didn't know what kind of issue was down here," Travis Maurath, with Rental Management Solutions, said.
RMS is replacing kitchen cabinets, walls and a majority of the bathroom fixtures and floor.
The pictures Goslin took in the apartment showed a rusted-out sink and damage to the walls and doors throughout. Mold was creeping up the walls.
"The problem was the main line had backed up and this was a vacant apartment at the time of the backup," Travis Maurath, with Rental Management Solutions, said.
The mold has now been eliminated, and renovations are underway.
Brewster Place bought the property after it hit the auction block. The new owners say there's always been an interest in acquiring the property.
"Over the years Brewster Place has kind of grown up around Fairway Apartments. They both started about the same time in the early '60s, and we now surround them on all three sides," Tom Akins, with Brewster Place, said.
Akins says the complex could someday become part of Brewster Place, but says nothing is set in stone.
"It may be a wellness pavilion we could share with the community in terms of a pool," Akins said.
Any changes would come after three years.
Akins wants to assure tenants of the old Country Club Apartments that they will not lose their homes.
"Those folks who keep their rent up and are good neighbors to the other folks that are here. Those are the folks that we want, that anybody would want as neighbors," he said.
The new owners say the rent will not go up immediately, but that could change along with improvements. Akins says the improvements will include landscaping and a new security gate.
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