A Dallas real-estate firm is ready to rescue the Huntwick Apartments on FM 1960 near Wunderlich Rd. from receivership — and also from its management, before that, by Louisiana real-estate investor Michael B. Smuck.
As of last year, just as it prepared to file for bankruptcy, Smuck’s Louisiana-based MBS Companies owned 65 apartment buildings in Texas — 33 of them in the Houston area. Even prior to that, the company’s property-maintenance skills had reached legendary status. The president and executive vice president of the Houston Apartment Association relayed complaints from residents and neighbors of MBS apartments to the Wall Street Journal last year, and reported that the griping had only increased after the influx of residents fleeing Hurricane Katrina in late 2005.
Here’s a commenter on the Houston Politics blog back in April (quoted in Swamplot), describing the scene at the 288-unit Huntwick:
Balconies have collapsed, lots of overgrown vegetation, the paint is peeling, there is obviously a total lack of maintenance. A large tree split in half on their property adjacent to Coral Gables Dr., and after the dead half lay on the ground (in plain view) for over 6 months, a crew finally cut it into smaller pieces, which then lay in the same spot for another 6 months.
After the jump: What’s happening to the Huntwick, plus the complete Michael B. Smuck Houston apartment roster!
***
Globe St.‘s Amy Wolff Sorter reports that a joint venture led by Dallas’s Triumph Land & Capital Management has bought the Huntwick (along with the Timbers of Pine Hollow, another former Smuck property in Conroe) and plans to pump $4 million dollars into the property over the next two years. The renovation “will include interiors, new clubhouse and addition of a resort-style swimming pool,” she reports. Plus: A name change, a rehab cliche. The property will henceforth be known as the Providence at Champion.
Timbers of Pine Hollow will get $2 million and a flip — to a buyer skittish about bankruptcy deals.
What about the rest of the Michael B. Smuck properties? Sorter notes that “the bulk” of the portfolio went into receivership. MBS’s way-out-of-date website lists these complexes in the Houston area:
- Cornerstone Ranch, Houston (352 units)
- Ashley House, Houston (276 units)
- Merrywood, Katy (228 units)
- Las Ventanas, Houston (376 units)
- Signature Palms, Houston (396 units)
- The Lodge at Baybrook, Houston (322 units)
- Fountains of Tomball, Houston (160 units)
- Forest Cove, Seabrook (276 units)
- Serrano, Houston (438 units)
- Cranbrook Forest, Houston (261 units)
- The Huntwick, Houston (288 units)
- River Pointe, Houston (300 units)
- Willow Tree, Houston (100 units)
- Steeplecrest, Houston (260 units)
- Hunt Garden, Houston (100 units)
- Bayberrytree, Houston (268 units)
- Oaks of Ashford Point II, Houston (56 units)
- The Windward, Clear Lake City (274 units)
- The Leeward, Clear Lake City (256 units)
- The Belvedere, Houston (201 units)
- Pine Forest, Houston (161 units)
- Northern Oaks, Houston (448 units)
- The Chancellor, Houston (224 units)
- Oaks of Ashford Point, Houston (199 units)
- Woodland Hills, Kingwood (260 units)
- Country Village, Alvin (152 units)
- Timbers of Pine Hollow, Conroe (228 units)
- Rain Forest, Houston (128 units)
- Villages of Loch Katrine I, Houston (60 units)
- Villages of Loch Katrine II, Houston (216 units)
- Red Oak Place, Houston (186 units)
- Inwood Oaks, Houston (248 units)
- The Claridge, Houston (173 units)
(CoStar has a slightly different list.)
Grand total: 7,871 individual Michael B. Smuck-tended apartments! And some of them are famous! Remember the Serrano?
dead animals in the pools, falling/leaning down gates, open apartments with wet ceilings hanging down, grass knee high, and residents have complained of non-working ac, appliances, and no hot water. There are homeless living underneath the stairs, and if you walk in the complex, there are rats out in the open.
A number of the Smuck properties have sold already, and are possibly making progress under new identities as part of standard apartment-protection programs. But has anyone really tracked the path — or the damage — of Hurricane Smuck as it rolled through Houston?
Hey, that sounds like fun!
If you have information about the disposition or condition of any of the apartments listed above, please share what you know in the comments!
- JV Takes On $18M Debt in 576-Unit Double Play [Globe St.]
- MBS Apartment Titan Struggles Against Defaults [Wall St. Journal]
- TROUBLE IN TEXAS: Huge Multifamily Owner Nears Collapse [CoStar Group]
- Houston apartments: Help us find the blight [Houston Politics]
- Low-Rent Apartment Complexes are Hot! [Swamplot]
- Apartment Complex Changes Hands; Tenants Endure Meaningless Name Change [Swamplot]
Photo of Huntwick Apartments: Apartments.com
I actually worked for MBS for a very short time. As an old veteran of the apt. biz, I can tell you most people have worked for them for literally 24 to 36 hours before walking out. Most vendors in town would not do business with them, (carpet, supplies, etc.) due to their lack of payment. Normally in the business you start out as a leasing consultant, then have to work your way up to Assitant Manager, handling the books, and only after you have proven some level of competence, judgement skills, and experience will a normal company hire/promote you to be the Manager. You are after all in charge of a multi-million dollar real estate asset.
MBS on the other hand would hire some teenager, literally, that was working at a fast food place or Walgreens, then the next thing you know they are managing the property. The dregs of the apartment business that couldn’t get hired anywhere else would end up there, for awhile at least, but the lunacy of the organization ultimately would drive most sane people away. They drove all their properties downhill in no time through a level of incompetence that was mind numbing to everyone else in the business. The kind of people they had as area Supervisors would be lucky to be hired as an Assistant Mgr at a place like Camden or Trammel Crow. The Sr VP, Mary Lynn I think was her name, started out as the receptionist or secretary, and ended up Sr. VP in just a few years. They were the joke of the apartment buisiness.
I was living in the apartment community called the Leeward in Webster TX until a year and a half ago. The conditions there are horrendous and cannot even believe it is allowed to stay open. I was fed up with the Mold, the homeless crawling through my attic to get to vacant apartments, wild racoons fighting in the walls, too much to put it all in this message …. I finally had enough and moved out because It was dangerous for my girlfriend and her son to be there alone( I worked the 3rd shift) and I could not get Mgmt. to try anything to help these situations. I have so many pictures of the conditions we were forced to live in. They are now trying to get me to pay $2,000 for breaking my lease!! Therefore, keeping me from getting into a new place to live.
I WAS A RESIDENT AT THE HUNTWICK APTS. I LIVED THERE FOR A SHORT TIME BEFORE I WAS WRONGFULLY EVICTED. THE LADIES IN THE LEASING OFFICE WERE SPENDING THE RENT MONEY THAT THE RESIDENTS WERE GIVING THEM. THESE APARTMENTS SHOULD OF NEVER BEEN ALLOWED TO RESIDE FAMILIES. THE INSIDE OF THE APARTMENTS WERE GROSS. WE HAD TREMENDOUS AMOUNTS OF MOLD AND LEAKING WATER. THERE WAS ALOYT OF TRASH AND RATS ON THE PROPERTY. NO ONE HAD WORKING AIR UNLESS YOU PAID THE GUYS TO FIX IT. I HAD NO OTHER PLACE TO GO AT THE TIME , BUT IF I HAD A CHOICE I WOULD OF NEVER SIGNED A LEASE . WE HAD HPD WALKING AROUND FOR OUR SAFETY BUT THEY WERE BUSY FLIRTING AND DOING DRUGS WITH THE RESIDENTS .. AGAIN THE HUNTWICK WAS A LIVING HELL AND I AM SEEKING PEOPLE WHO WOULD LIKE TO DO A LAW SUIT AGAIST MBS FOR ALLOWING PEOPLE TO LIVE IN SUCH TRASH
I have been both a resident and an emplyee of MBS and I can tell you that there are worse things to have happened on the properties than most people can imagine! As a resident on one of their class A properties everything worked great for us, but of course they are going to take care of the nice properties and they are going to pay the bills and make sure those people have working appliances. I started to notice something was wrong when the pool turned green and the hot tub stopped working! I was friends with the girls in the office and when I mentioned something they said they were working on it and then they mentioned that there was an opening in the company and that I should apply for it. Well, I got hired and was told that I would be trained. Long story made short, I was never trained and was put at a property all alone with no manager. I was alone until they hired a manager and then fired her 6 wks later. A new company finally came in and took over, but I had already been offered a position with another company and cose to leave. About 9 mths later I was offered a promotion to go back to the other property, but I just couldn’t do it!! I am now very happily working for a great managment company and can now laugh about my experience with MBS!!!!