(ABC 6 News) – If you lived at the Gates of Rochester, Heritage Manor, or similar properties between 2019 and early 2022, your former landlords probably owe you money. 

That’s the subject of a class action suit that wrapped up in late February – where an Olmsted County judge concluded that the owners of those properties, Olympik Village, Eden Park, and more, collected fees they had not discussed in lease agreements. 

And if you rented from Monarch Investment and Management Group (MIMG) before 2022, you can file a claim to get utility money back … plus extra. 

MIMG is a Colorado-based company that owns 15 properties across Minnesota – including the Gates and Heritage Manor in Rochester, Les Chateaux in Duluth, and the City Limits in Minneapolis. 

It is one of the largest multifamily apartment owners in Minnesota. And until recently, the class action says, landlords at MIMG properties allegedly used “deceptive and confusing leases to impose excessive fees and deprive tenants of their statutory habitability rights.” 

ABC 6 News reached out to MIMG, the Gates of Rochester, and assorted other Rochester properties, and did not receive a response. 

Laura Hamersma spent nearly three years in and out of court after being evicted from the Gates of Rochester in 2019. 

She took MIMG to small claims court after she says they overbilled her post-eviction.

But when Hamersma went to a local law office, “they saw, like, all the weird charges and stuff,” she said. 

On top of nearly $300 in utility costs, Hamersa had been billed for $2,700 in what a complaint called “hidden fees.”

Among the charges: $1,678 for “lease term fees,” $100 for a “lot clean out towing charge,” and an additional $16 for “utility billing fees” on top of her actual utility bills. 

Monarch had evicted a lot of people for not paying hidden service, leasing, or utility fees, attorney Drew Glasnovich with Stinson LLP said. 

Tenants could face 100 dollars or so a month in charges they didn’t know to expect – wrecking their financial plans. 

“It’s not that they didn’t pay their full monthly rent – let’s say rent is a thousand a month – but they’d be evicted for 500 dollars,” Glasnovich said. “It wasn’t just rent. There was a $25 service fee, or a $50 leasing fee .. or these weird charges they didn’t fully understand when they entered into the lease.”

Several tenants were charged hundreds of dollars for their own evictions. Another was charged $145 for owing $1,200 in rent, then another $387 in “late fees.” A third charge read “Owes $110 in garages for March” – another $35.48 charge. 

In the past couple of years, Minnesota passed laws requiring a “cover sheet” of charges within leases. But between 2019 and 2022, it was “very common practice” to hide fees, Glasnovich said. 

In 2022, Hamersma joined 11 other current and former tenants across the state, who collectively represented everyone who’d rented with MIMG  in the previous years.

It started out as 11 individuals seeking damages for deceptive leases and unlawful charges. 

“The lease agreements are excessively long, disorganized, and contain dozens of addenda,” one complaint read. “The lease agreements cause widespread confusion among MIMG’s tenants as to their rights and responsibilities under the lease…”

MIMG argued that the tenants had no right to claim damages on behalf of residents in other apartment complexes, especially after most of the representatives’ leases had ended. 

“Plaintiffs’ alleged losses, if any, were caused by their own actions or inactions and fault and are therefore not recoverable or must be reduced,” one MIMG filing read.  

The suit ended Feb. 21 ended with negotiations for repayment for anyone in Minnesota who leased with MIMG through the first month of 2022. 

Hamersma and the other class representatives’ patience paid off – to the tune of $7,000 for each “class representative.”

Not everyone will get quite that much of a payout. 

Other previous Monarch tenants can file a claim by September 16th for a flat repayment of $125, plus 115 percent of whatever they paid in sewer and water utilities during their leases before 2022. 

Those who are eligible for the settlement should have received a letter or email – but if you didn’t (or threw it out), information on how to file a claim is available from HOME Line, a Minnesota tenants’ rights nonprofit.

Hamersma said it was a long road – particularly when Monarch began reworking contracts to fully disclose all the fees landlords could charge. 

“It seemed to be very dodgy on monarch’s part, of … fully fulfilling those stipulations of how they wrote the lease,” she said. “Each time, they said Okay, we did it, the lawyers reviewed and were like ‘Ehhh, this is still tricky wording, it isn’t fair to people who are signing your leases to understand what they’re paying for.’”

Glasnovich said for many tenants, the second part of the settlement is the real victory. 

Whether or not they file a claim, close to 500 eviction records related to nonpayment will be expunged. And any outstanding bills from before 2022 related to non-rent charges should be wiped out. 

Again, if you leased with Monarch Investment complexes before February 2022, you have to file a claim to get repaid – there’s no automatic check in the mail.

Go to homelinesettlement.com or call HOME Line at 1-888-788-3665 if you’re eligible for the settlement.