Public Storage

Great staff

Public Storage at Westbard Avenue is a great place. Great location. Super clean. Jason helped me find just the right unit to meet my needs, and even helped me figure out how to best fit everything. Super awesome guy. Thank you Jason!!!

Jason was very helpful with move in today!

Clean and good service. Jason was very helpful

Update: Five years later, and things became much worse, but with a silver lining. Over time, the increases came fast and punishing until the rent was 3.2x higher than when I started. I threatened to leave, but of course didn’t get around to it because I was too busy, plus every other competing company had pretty much the same bs business model. Over time I had become aware that one way to keep costs lower was to periodically vacate your space while simultaneously opening a new, initially less expensive, one which restarts the whole process. But moving the stuff can be a time-consuming pain, and I hadn’t done it yet. Public depends on this.
So what is the silver lining? Out of the blue, I was contacted by Jason, a new site manager at the location. He told me that he could offer me a new identical space right next to my old one at less than half the current price. This was so convenient that I immediately went for it. Even though I had to redo all the paperwork, Jason made the whole process easy. Having the old and new storage units adjacent minimized the effort required to transfer my stuff - it took about 30 minutes. Although I know it will only be a few months before Public starts jacking up the rent again, and I will have to repeat the whole process, at least for now the rent is tolerable. I don’t understand why they force this ridiculous process on everybody and not have a reasonably priced long-term rent option (a normal lease!). But meanwhile, my thanks to Jason for providing good customer service.

Originally posted 5 years ago:
Beware: the initial rate is often actually a teaser rate. Expect to soon be paying more!

After 5 months I received a notice that that ezStorage was raising the rent 15% - no honest explanation given. The letter gave the vague statement 'We periodically review our rental rates...' I did some research, and it turns out, this is more true than the average customer knows, in fact, it's a central part of the company's sneaky business model. After 5 months, a computer algorithm at headquarters (not the local branch) pretty much automatically raises rates if you started at a 'discounted' price. Subsequently, a rate 'review' (read very possible rent increase) is conducted annually. This 'informal' schedule is not mentioned in the contract, which only stipulates that the rent is month-to-month and can be raised upon 30 day notice. But it doesn't tell you to expect an increase within a few months.

When I contacted a manager of my storage facility (who surmised what my concern was before I even told him; apparently for him this is a routine conversation he has with customers), the only defense he offered was that such rent increases were headquarters controlled and were consistent with industry practice.

This is truly a lousy way for a business to treat its customers.