About Us

About Us & Bridgeport

Thanks for checking out our little web site. Best Rents is a small real estate company located in "Bridgeport USA" and we pride ourselves on making apartments available that are usually a little under market prices to be competitive. We have been here for a quarter of a century and are in it for the "long run". Some of our tenants have been with us from the very beginning which speaks for itself.

Keeping apartment rental prices reasonable is an increasingly difficult challenge, especially in this new economy.. The Chicago real estate taxes have been raised to 3 times more than the rest of the state. Add to that the price of rising insurance premiums, garbage removal, pest control, plumbing, roofing, contractors, evictions, legal costs, cleaning, water bills, mortgages, the list goes on and our bills add up . Never-the-less we are still determined to do everything possible to provide decent rental prices. That often includes working with the tenants as "partners" creating a team to keep unnecessary costs as low as possible.

Most of our properties are in, or nearby Bridgeport. If you are not familiar with Bridgeport it is a unique "low key" neighborhood where 3 Chicago mayors have lived during their term in office and is conveniently located right off of the Dan Ryan Expressway and a few blocks to I-55 and Lake Shore Drive. The downtown "loop" area is usually only about 10 minutes away. You may see movie crews on location filming world class movies, as well as world famous Cellular Field on 35th Street. All the great food of China Town is just a few blocks away and there are many new condos and lofts available. Look at those rental prices and compare it to what we have to offer from time to time.

What You Can Expect

When you become one of our tenants you get a direct line to our office routed to "Bill" who is very accessible to talk to personally every business day. To keep expenses as low as possible we have no employees and Bill takes pride in showing every unit personally. There is a direct maintenance number for independent contractors who we work closely with and you may usually call them directly. Sometimes a building manager is assigned by us to help you with little things day to day.

Bill has a different attitude than you may have been used to in the past, and is a progressive thinker always open to new ideas. He gets along well with young local students from the neighborhood (IIT college, UIC college and College of Optometry) as well as older retired tenants always thinking "outside the box" and viewing life with fresh perspectives open to new suggestions. Bill still gets a kick out of a few Christmas cards we always receive and display each year from our younger tenants sometimes addressed to "The Cool Landlord".

We believe his creativity and problem solving ability was acquired from his many years early in life as a successful rock musician & bandleader. In 1976 & 1977 he even lived in a van for a couple of years when he had difficulty finding anyone who would rent to him. BestRents supports our new president Barack Obama and Bill goes way back to the early 1970's when he worked full time for many years with international blues star Otis Rush before equal rights was fashionable. (Musical Biography)

Unlike some owners he enjoys seeing the buildings decorated for Halloween, Christmas, Valentines Day and just about any celebration that makes the tenants happy. He worked in the Bridgeport area Kiwanis Club (Articles) for many years and is a sponsor for several animal rights groups. (Bills Silly Cat Page) Bill understands bad luck when he recently lost 4 apartment buildings in a real estate scam by well known convicted criminal Lezlie Keebler, but he takes it all in stride and prides himself on doing the right thing by treating other people the way he would like to be treated.

Our Theory

Our theory is that if an apartment is priced fairly it will keep tenants around after their lease has run out (although each lease usually only runs from year to year). We have learned from other owners that if an apartment is overpriced (or even just at top market price), often renters move out after their lease is up and are constantly looking for a better deal. We simply want to try to keep our tenants happy so they will stay year after year. The average vacancy rate in Chicago is about 10% and ours is less than 2%. We are proud of our long term tenants who have been with us. We take pride in our apartments and we hope you will too. Bill will not show an apartment until it is presentable and he is proud to show it.

Saving Your Cash

By saving renters money another one of our goals that we enjoy seeing, is to make it possible for tenants to put their savings toward a down payment on a house of their own. Bill has helped tenants do this and although we hate to see good tenants leave us, we are very happy for them and shake their hand when we see them in the local grocery store as new homeowners. On a couple of rare occasions we have actually sold the rental property directly to the tenants who live there by way of creative financing, giving them an opportunity they might not have otherwise had.

And finally just to be clear, we are simply everyday people trying to do the right thing but we are not running a charity, and we are not a non-profit organization. We have no employees and we work very hard to make ends meet. We feel it is not unethical or indecent for someone who takes a risk by starting a small business to try to earn a reasonable return for their hard work.. After all, we plan to still be here in another 25 years.

More about Bridgeport.