On January 1st of 2009 my husband and I signed a lease agreement for ten months for a one bedroom apartment at the West Chestnut Apartments. The apartment was in fairly good condition except for one small thing which was mold. I did not notice the mold until after said lease was signed. The mold was in the bathroom along the caulking and in the tub and on the ceiling in the bathroom, as well as on the front door inside along the edges. At the time I was pregnant and did not find out how potentially hazardous the mold could be to me and the baby until I had asked my doctor about three months after moving in. I informed the manager of the mold problem after finding this information out and she said that she and the owner would come to take a look at it the next morning. That morning my brother and his wife (who were apartment managers in Kennewick at the time) came over to view the situation. The manager didn’t seem to know exactly what to do about the mold so my brother decided to step in and offer advice. He told the manager that she would need a dehumidifier in the apartment, get rid of the mold and then paint over the spots with Kilz to prevent the mold from coming back. She did not seem to like the idea of some one telling her how to do her job and maybe somehow felt embarrassed around the owner. After this happened she seemed to treat my husband and I with great disrespect and did not want to help us find somewhere suitable for us to stay while the apartment was painted (the paint is toxic to breath when drying) or offer us the number to the owner. She said that we could stay in the empty apartment downstairs but there was no bed for me to sleep on (I had back problems since I was pregnant), or any other living necessities. I was getting very frustrated with how the manager was treating us, so finally I searched for the owner’s number myself and discussed the situation. He seemed to feel bad about how the owner had treated us and about my exposure to the mold, so he told me that he would let up on the lease and pro-rate me for the amount of time we had to leave the apartment. I ended up getting the $300 deposit back plus another $119. Now the manager is giving us a bad reference to new apartments for no reason whatsoever just because she has some qualms with us. So after days of trying I finally was able to get ahold of the apartment manager. I asked her why she gave us a bad reference and she gave me no specific reason. I kept asking her what we had done wrong and that we were not at fault. She became very angry towards me and started using very profane words and hung up on me. The next day I was able to talk to the owner and tell him what was going on (he was on vacation for two weeks before that). I gave him the number to the new apartments and he said that he would get things straightened out. Well the apartments called me and told me that the owner had given the same statement as the manager. Neither the manager nor the owner has any specific complaint towards my husband and me. All they say is that "they wouldn't rent to us again". We had always paid our rent on time, kept the apartment clean and had no complaints from the other tenants. The new apartments have completely denied us and so now I have just wasted my time and a $60 application fee.