(LEWES, Del.) - Behind the walls of apartment building 18 at the Vineyards lies a problem.
One concerned resident tells WRDE, "My roommate's clothes and all of his stuff were all moldy. His pictures and his diplomas in his room would all get wrinkled because they would just get wet from all the moisture."
A pair of roommates that moved in back in June told me that they started noticing issues within weeks of living here.
Another resident who wishes to remain anonymous said, "I got really sick. I had a lot of respiratory issues. I couldn't eat for a while. I had my parents come visit me and they had stayed in my bedroom and when they left, my stepmom got really sick- all upper respiratory and my roommate himself mid-August had to go to the ER because he had significant trouble breathing."
Their apartment was quarantined and they were moved to a model unit while their things were taken to be cleaned, most of which they went weeks without.
Another resident tells me that his dog got sick from living here . "There was mold on the bottom of the bed and from that, I was able to go ahead and check my dog. He had a reaction on his chest and his stomach."
Several residents came together and prepared statements about what was going on. "People who live here have had to miss multiple days of work in order to be available for meetings with management. They have experienced financial losses because of damage to their belongings and serious health issues such as nose-bleeds so severe they needed to be cauterized in the emergency department."
The residents say they felt blamed for the problem and that they were told they may not have had their air conditioning on the right temperature or that they were leaving their doors open for too long. At the time we spoke with them, they had not been compensated for their rent or their lost belongings. WRDE went to the property manager as well as the regional construction manager to get to the bottom of this.
Property Manager, Lynn Andrews tells WRDE, "Our community consists of 108 units and out of that 108 units, 6 were effected by the issue. One of the side effects of the issue was nontoxic mold and we learned that it actually came from the air conditioning that we found out about in August."
Fernmoor Homes, the company that built the Vineyards, says this HVAC unit was constructed by a different contractor than the rest of their buildings and that it was fixed as soon as they confirmed there was a problem.
Regional Construction Manager, David Steele, explains the two problems that occurred. "First in the main common area, the air conditioning unit breaker had tripped, which turned it off for a couple of days and the other was in the units themselves. We had some modiffications to the air conditioning systems."
Fernmoor Homes is currently working on a case-by-case basis to ensure that those effected are fairly compensated. Safety and wellness is their priority and they are asking that any concerned residents reach out to their leasing office at 302-703-5560