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I was one of the courtyard007 (renamed homeudream.com) victims and wanted to share my horrible (yet hilarious) experience with Holly (now calling herself Jenny) and the house with you. And I’d like to name it…. That Bitch Won’t Let You Win

To be more specific I think I took over the hutong house on Zhangzizhong Road after the tenants in your Story #2 moved out. And yes, even though that we and the former tenants found each other over social media network, Holly (Jenny) insisted us pay her the agent fee (one month rent). We end up splitting the 7000 kuai with the former couple, and I’m pretty sure that this was due to my “negotiation capability”, otherwise we would probably end up paying her 7000 kuai each. That was just the beginning.

During my 4 months staying in the hutong house (December 2015 to March 2016), I experienced so much drama with the house and Holly (Jenny) and Holly’s “assistants”.

First of all, they were not cooperative on the registration thing for my American boyfriend. They rescheduled 3 times and when they finally did, they brought a fake contract, fake landlord information, and told us to not speak a word in front of the police. Sketchy AF.

Secondly, everything in the house just kept getting broken — the AC, the heater, the shower, and the laundry machine. The most ridiculous one was the shower — it took 2 hours to get the water warm and it would get cold again when you use it for 10 mins, which is not even enough time for one person to finish shower. I texted Holly (Jenny) about the situation and it roughly took a month for her to finally get us a new machine. (This also involved me calling her 3 times a week and constantly sending WeChat messages to her assistants.)

The third thing was the bugs. Well, I know this may happen to a lot of the hutongs but I figured I should still point it out for tenants who are scared of bugs — I mean, they are huge ass motherfuckers. 5cm long beetles, and they even fly! Ohhh how can I forget about the scorpion that popped up in my bathroom at midnight? Wonderful! Since February everyday when I first came back home, the first thing to do was to kill bugs, but they kept finding their ways in. I texted Holly(Jenny) and asked them to fix this. No reply. Then one day at 3am, a beetle climbed on my bed and got under my blanket. I straight up flipped. I left the house that night and gave her an angry phone call, asking her to fix this in 3 days. I got a message for her the next day, promising to look into this. However, 3 days later when I got back to the house — nothing changed!

Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore and decided to move out earlier. Knowing how much of a bitch Holly(Jenny) is and there’s no way I could get my 2 months rent back, I offered to move out ahead of time, and she could keep the extra rent. ALL I WANTED was my deposit back (7000 kuai). So I moved out early April (my lease was till May 7), expecting to get my deposit in May. However, in May Holly(Jenny) texted me saying there were water stains on the mattress, and because of the damage she would keep the deposit.

I remembered it clearly that when I moved out in March the mattress was fine, so I challenged her. Then she replied that it was some sort of “sex juice”, trying to embarrass me. After I explained it wasn’t me, she shamelessly indicated that it could be my boyfriend cheating on me with some other girl. Great move Holly (Jenny), and I gave you the credit for your imagination. I was beyond pissed at that moment. I called her, told her straight up to cut the bullshit and that I wanted my money back. I told her I would be at her apartment 3 days later to pick up my money. She agreed.

Three days later, I showed up at her door at the time we agreed on. But of course, she was out having lunch — again, trying to add up that inconvenience. I power walked to the restaurant. She insisted to take 2000 kuai from my deposit for the mattress and brought up the sex juice thing again. I didn’t want to make a big scene in the restaurant, so I went home with 5000 kuai.

After that I was so pissed so I deleted her on WeChat. Thus I don’t have any screenshots except for this one of us talking about the bugs.

Two days ago my contact was passed to a friend of friend because this girl and her roommates were having some issues with the place they rented from courtyard 007 (now homeudream.com). Im a lawyer so they want some professional help.

The main issue about the situation is that the police came to my friends place saying the place is illegal and they gonna tear them down very soon, basically forcing my friends out because they are no longer allowed to live there once the official decision is made.

My friends just want their deposit back, and their lease gonna end within about 20 days.

The lease agreement they had was poorly and terribly drafted as well. I met these girls and talked about the solutions and they want me do the lawyer talk to the landlord.

I did, this morning, but with no reply. So at the afternoon i called her and pretend to be someone that wants apartment so i can get to meet her in person and talk about the issue.

When i got there, there was another white girl looking for new places so ended up both of us checking the apartment. i wasn’t looking and told the landlord actually im here for other stuff if you have time we can talk about it. she figured out i was the one that text her this morning and switch attitude to this “i dont know you and you have nothing to do with these, i can speak english so let your friends talk to me directly”.

i was trying to be polite but on point, laying out the facts about how many laws been broken and its her obligation to give back the deposit, whether the place will be demolished has no relevance here. But she just kept that attitude the whole, it was a short meet up and i think she doesn’t want the other white girl know what we were actually discussing (the white girl can understand and speak mandarin pretty well and we were talking in mandarin).

But anyway it ended up us she switch the topics and all these BS and drove away as i was still talking to her and she just got into the car and close the door. Refused any further discussion.

The whole idea about actually writing to you is, although I’m local and this is just a favor for a friend of friend who i met only twice. But i mean i feel like this lady is targeting at foreigners because of the language barrier and culture difference and more important you guys don’t know the laws here.

So what im thinking is, i know i said im a lawyer but actually I haven’t got my license yet, i work in a law firm and may know someone who is really damn good and specialize in this kinda area. You mentioned on the website that there are so many victims out there and i was thinking about possible class action or at lease some fines from government to this lady and her business.

Andy kindly shared me hi experience with her:

We are victims of the hutong vampire that haunts the narrowed laneways inside the second ring of old Beijing.

Some say she was once a bright girl named Jenny, who worked in her father’s fruit shop in south Gulou in the 1920’s. Yet another tale says she was called Holly (now called Jenny), and Dongsi was where she was a cleaner in the 1940’s.

There seem to be many tales, but they’ve been obfuscated and lost, like her original face, through changes to hide her predatory essence behind the the deft hands of plastic surgery.

She charges exorbitant amounts for her many homes, and though they may be decent, other agents are at least cheaper, provide a television, and have heard rumours of her dark nature.

She tries to charge us 10,000 per month even though there was a dreadful drain smell permeating from the bathroom shower, and her ghouls came not once but thrice to fix it, yet blaming the odious stench on other things.

We managed to negotiate it down 25 per cent, which made us feel like this person in question was of a decent nature, and not filled with avarice.

We were decieved. She seemed to have an excuse for many things or evaded an issue.

In fairness to the vampire, she seemed to once remember her human self, and sent her ghouls  to fix minor things but whenever a problem arose, she would send a picture of her on a drip saying she was ill.

However, these pictures were originating from her plastic laboratory, an expensive penchant she has for hiding her identity, just as she had changed her name after multiple legal debacles.

Her team of ghouls would also waste our time, say they’d come Monday at noon, not arrive all day, and I’d light the beacons to again request their aid, and again, I’d wait Tuesday during my free time and work time, and they’d not come, and Wednesday again, and then they’d appear on a Thursday when we weren’t there.

And the ghouls were argumentative and kept saying they were coming. This proved to be a particular problem when the vampire changed our Wi-Fi without our consent or informing us, and though it was faster, it became prone to continuous instability, requiring several more weekly waits for the ghouls to appear and repair.

The house also sustained water damage during the summer, and we’ve sent numerous pictures attest this fact to our vampiric liege.

She also forgot we lived in the house at one point asking who I was, and this makes perfect sense for what I’m about to say now:

We got a text from her two weeks ago asking us to hide. I called her and asked why? She said the landlord and “an official” (love the opaque answer) would be there to inspect the house at 4pm. She explained we weren’t meant to be there and had to hide.

This house wasn’t meant to be rented to foreigners but it turns put she does it anyway, because it’s more profitable, even if she’s caught, then not doing it. We are under the impression the landlord doesn’t know.

We grabbed everything foreign: booked, magnets, plugs, pictures, passports, animals, eeeeeverything, and dragged it out into two suitcases and waited by our canal.

She called us and then said we had to leave in two weeks, which was 12 days ago, the house was being taken, we weren’t meant to be living there so she lied. We learned she has fake contracts for the Chinese landlords, they don’t meet their tenants who aren’t Chinese, charges too much, and she knew this was happening because she thought we’d already vacated this house but our contract wasn’t up until the end of October because she’s perpetrating this illicit scam with many foreigners.

We’ve spent 12 days in a flurry trying to secure a new place, and other human agents have heard of this vampire and detest her.

I even saw her trying to sell cats for thousands and thousands of yuan. She’s a money-grubbing vampire and best avoid her grasp lest ye get screwed.

She wants us to leave the house tomorrow so her workers can inspect before she gives back the deposit… I don’t think so.

Yours sincerely,

Vampire haters.