Some Provo tenants were left homeless after sudden relocation over damaged stairwell

PROVO — The Judd siblings are far from the only ones who have gripes with rental housing in Provo. They were among a handful of residents whose lives were upended in November over a sudden evacuation of their apartment due to a damaged staircase.

Superstar "Stella" Judd moved into Brookview Apartments, 442 N. 400 East, so she could be near her older brother, Caleb, who also lived there. Soon after moving in, the siblings noticed how wobbly the staircase at the apartment complex was.

"I was kinda horrified by the level of instability they had. I started telling other people, 'Hey, wanna see something scary?' and I would shake the whole staircase. A neighbor took a video and submitted it to the city or management and then they shut the whole place down," Caleb Judd said.

Just before 2 p.m. on Nov. 7, all tenants received an "important safety update regarding Building C" email from the Brookview management team. The email said structural concerns with the staircase were identified in "a recent inspection," but the rest of the building is structurally sound.

"The staircase requires immediate repair to ensure resident safety," the email said, and residents would be relocated to available units across the property.

Two hours later, another email said they would need to be out of their apartments by noon the next day, giving the college students just over 20 hours to pack up all of their belongings in the middle of midterms.

Judd's email said she would be temporarily relocated to a sister property while repairs are being done, or she could decide to terminate the lease.

"This transfer is mandatory and nonnegotiable for your safety," the email said. "At this time, we do not have an exact timeline for the completion of repairs, but our team is actively on-site assisting residents through this process."

Caleb Judd was relocated to a different apartment in the Brookview complex. Although after the mess of the situation, he has since sold his lease and moved elsewhere.

But Stella Judd wasn't so lucky.

Alternate housing for some

Judd said she reached out to Redstone Residential property manager Shelby Watson and was told that Liberty on Freedom was aware of the issue, and all Judd needed to do was go to the leasing office, and they would give her a new apartment. By the time Judd got this answer, however, the leasing office was closed.

So she packed everything up to be ready to move in the morning, since Liberty on Freedom's website said the leasing office would be open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Yet no one was at the leasing office the three separate times she went during the alleged open hours. She called Watson multiple times on Saturday to get help and was sent to voicemail each time.

With such late notice, Judd was forced to sleep in her brother's car that night. The next day, she was able to sleep on a neighbor's couch while actively looking for new housing and studying for a CNA skills test.

"There's something different when you don't have a place to call home. All my stuff is in the back of someone's car, I don't have a place to go," she said.

On Monday, following the evacuation, Judd finally received a response from Watson, who said they would cancel her Brookview lease so she could get one at a new apartment.

"The lack of any urgency. There was no apology. It was just, 'Hey, here you go. Go away. We don't want to deal with you," she said.

At the Liberty on Freedom leasing office, she was told the apartment complex had not been notified of displaced tenants seeking housing. Judd says she was then pressured over the next day and a half to sign a contract for Liberty that would last through August 2026, despite it being more expensive than her current rent.

"I was extremely uncomfortable, especially since Brookview had promised temporary housing — not a new, more expensive lease," she said.

At this point, she was frustrated and wanted her security deposit and rent back, which she had paid for the entire month of November, before getting kicked out just seven days into the month. She visited the Brookview office on Nov. 11, but was only given the regional manager's email to contact for help.

One of Judd's roommates, Gwen Elcock, had a very different experience. Elcock was given an apartment at The Omni, which was significantly further from campus, but she didn't have to go to a leasing office or sign a new contract. She was just told which apartment was hers and has continued to pay the same amount for rent that she did at Brookview.

"As far as I know, me and my roommate and only a couple other people from our complex were given alternative housing and then the rest were kinda just screwed. They had nowhere to go," Elcock said.

Elcock didn't receive any updates from Brookview until mid-January, when the property offered a lease renewal. "And I'm like, 'Absolutely not,'" she said.

"They have not said a single word to me since I moved out. They have not updated anything about the stairs. I drove past my old apartment and they have done nothing with the stairs, you can tell," she said.

"How are they getting away with this?" Elcock said. "People were literally homeless over the weekend. That should not be OK."

Damaged stairwell timeline

Elcock said a week before the evacuation, she overheard maintenance workers on the grounds talking about everything that needed to be redone for safety issues, such as the porch areas and stairwell. If the property owners knew there were things needing to be fixed, they shouldn't have had to evacuate the residents so suddenly, she said.

Judd and the other displaced tenants learned from former resident Paige Davis that the stairwell had been damaged more than a year prior in a bad storm in May 2024.

Photographs show a massive tree blew over and fell on the stairwell, causing cracks, breaking railings and damaging the foundation. Despite the apartment complex's email saying the damage had only been found in a recent inspection, Davis believes the photographs prove otherwise.

"The thing that makes me upset about this situation is that a couple days after the tree fell, they had people out there looking at the staircase and looking at the cracked bricks, and they still did nothing about it for like a year and a half. They knew the staircase was damaged," Davis said.

Stacey West, vice president of Utah student housing for Redstone Residential, confirmed to KSL that the evacuation was due to a tree that had fallen on the stairwell during a windstorm. But when asked about when the storm occurred and how long Redstone knew of the damage, she declined to answer.

"Out of an abundance of caution and to prioritize resident safety, we evacuated the building and coordinated alternate housing accommodations while the stairwell is being repaired/reconstructed," West said in an email.

West initially agreed to do a phone interview, but when KSL questioned further about the allegations of how the relocation was executed, West said, "I'm unable to share additional details or comment further on this matter while litigation is pending."

West's statement said Redstone teams were "communicating directly with impacted residents."

Judd and a group of tenants filled out an application for a mediator at the BYU Law School's Center for Peace and Conflict Resolution. But Brookview declined mediation, citing that it was not a BYU-contracted property.

When Judd tried getting help from the Provo City Housing Authority, she was told her case was outside their jurisdiction. Judd then sent an email to the regional property manager explaining in detail the situation and requesting compensation.

Refund offered with confidentiality clause

On Nov. 21, two weeks after the tenants were kicked out, Judd was sent a lease termination agreement. It said the lease with Brookview could be terminated and refunds for November rent and the security deposit would be processed if the agreement was signed that day.

But inside the termination agreement was a confidentiality clause saying no part of the agreement could be disclosed "to any third party for any reason, nor shall resident communicate in any form matters relating to their tenancy or any events which lead to this agreement."

The clause also said the residents would not be allowed to use any website or social media "to negatively discuss its tenancy, owner, or this agreement." And if the resident had already posted online about the situation, it must be removed within five days of signing, the agreement said.

Redstone declined to comment about the confidentiality clause. Judd said she decided not to sign the agreement because she did not want to be forced to remain silent on something that felt so unjust to her.

On Dec. 4, Judd sent the property management a final demand letter stating she would like compensation or she would file a small claims lawsuit. After no response, she filed the suit on Dec. 15 against Redstone Residential and Brookview Apartments, asking for $7,000 in compensation.

'Truly disheartening'

Judd eventually got a lease and moved into a similar-priced apartment, but said the ordeal left her stressed for weeks.

"I still worry. I still haven't settled in. I'm still stressed about the possibility of having to move just like that," Judd said.

Approximately 20 students were displaced by the evacuation, according to Judd.

Gary Schreiner reached out to KSL, saying his son received an evacuation notice while on an overnight shoot for a student film. By the time he returned, he had two hours to pack everything and move out.

Schreiner's son was given an address to move into, but when he tried, the current residents were not welcoming and said there was no beds available. He tried daily to get in contact with property management to get help, but for two weeks was never able to actually speak with someone, Schreiner told KSL.

Eventually, the student requested termination of his contract and signed the termination agreement, which meant he was unable to speak publicly about what had occurred. Schreiner said his son did get into new housing by December.

"The indifference of Redstone to the plight of the tenants they had to evacuate due to the unsafe condition of their property is truly disheartening. It makes one wonder if the stereotype is true that it is only about the money," Schreiner said.

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