Des Moines Neighborhood Inspection Division

I just don't understand how they operate. You see rental properties across town and even in reviews here that highlight a complete disregard for providing clean and safe housing. Yet they find the time to give respectable landlords a hard time with their properties. This is exactly the reason why some landlord are selling their Des Moines rental units and moving out of the city. Until the neighborhood inspection department fixes their internal issues, we'll continue to have an extreme shortage of nice rental properties in the City.

Got one, but it was kinda bad, not only did they rush in with out a month notice, told them about our heat not being on for months on, iv been freezing for months before snow, not only that I got sick and others too, why are heating so hard to just get ones ourselves, my feet freeze and my cloths barely warm because I have to wear layers just for my place, yeez where's the heads if this happens to us will it effect higher ups, it's so bad especially poor examples of timing some of us are either sick or disable, give us at least 3 half weeks for some to left 200 to 400 pound of items in our home before the week, my arms hurt because of being rush I crush my feet deep cleaning ow! Talk about harsh on our community!

My apartment has no legal fire egress from my basement bedroom, the city of Des Moines solution is to play phone tag and ignore it so that I am unable to file a complaint against the apartment they sign off on which under no part of the law is legal. My only window is nailed and glued shut and below both legal minimum square inches requirements with too small of a window well, my apartment pays part of two other units heat and one units hot water, which we are not refunded for, the only exit is through an unfinished adjoining room that the landlord is no longer including which means it is no longer habitable space, the door in that room sticks and opens inward anyways and he put bars on the windows in there, we cannot even secure our unit because that door can easily be broken into, though since the tenant that kept breaking in is friends with the landlord he ignored us, and our door can be popped open just as easily as the lock is installed so it can be removed from the other room. Apparently slums in Des Moines are because the city is fully complicit. As my ceiling is only sort of finished with sagging tiles, if a fire were to begin downstairs in the center it would be upstairs blocking any exit too fast for us to get out. Yet we can't reach the person signing off on this unit. Maybe I am wrong but it definitely appears to be a matter of money not safety. James Robbins owns the property through a contract of ellingsons apartments.

They refuse to do re-inspection after I filed a complaint about my apartment complex and the complex didn't fix the biggest problems. I have reported them to the Obudsman. I suggest that everyone who has been refused a proper inspection, lives in a rental unit that is under code but the city inspector office passed it go the Obudsman because until enough people complain about it this will continue.

The inspectors I have worked with for rental certificates have been attentive, upfront and informative. I have found, If you are honest and forth coming with any issues, they will take the time to explain the violation and the "why" it needs to be corrected.

The phone number associated with this link is a non working number

Doesn’t believe in constitutional rights.