COMMERCE CITY, Colo. (KDVR) — A group of women visiting the metro say their rental property in Commerce City was infested with mice.

Heather Hamilton, Jendayi Stafford and another colleague were in town last Friday for the American College of Lifestyle Medicine event held nearby at the Gaylord Rockies Resort and Convention Center. Between sponsorship, exhibitor fees and travel costs, the event cost the small grassroots organization well over $15,000.

The Saturday morning after they arrived, they say they found mice had eaten through a bag of bread they just bought. That’s when Hamilton reached out to the property manager via Evolve, the rental site.

One of the first few texts received from the manager read in part: “That’s really bad! We set up traps before you checked in and didn’t find anything when we removed it but it’s obviously still a problem.”

Renters come home to a gruesome discovery

Hamilton said that was the first major red flag for their group.

“That struck me the wrong way, because clearly they knew that they had a problem with mice and said nothing to us and let us check in,” Hamilton said.

The group said nothing was done that day, and they were gone all day Sunday. The property manager told Hamilton they would be by that day to set traps.

When they arrived at the home that night, they say they found multiple mice shrieking throughout the home, dying in the glue traps.

Stafford and the other woman staying with them are both veterans and say seeing and hearing that was traumatizing for them.

“All these things that happen in the military, it’s just like, it brings a flood of them back that you paid good money when you were active duty to work through. It’s affected me so terribly. I can’t sleep. I probably woke my husband up like five times just jumping out of my sleep screaming,” she said.

Evolve rental company responds

FOX31 reached out to Evolve and received this statement:

“Cleanliness is one of Evolve’s core property standards and we stand by that commitment if a guest encounters any issues during their stay. In this instance, our homeowner worked directly with the guest to resolve this issue initially, including reimbursement for food items and bringing over mouse traps – both resolutions which the guest accepted based on information provided to Evolve. That said, we encourage our guests to reach out to Evolve directly if they are ever in a situation where they would like to enact our Rest Easy Promise, and we will do our best to make it right. As this guest chose to utilize the property for the full length of their booking, we have offered to refund them 50% of their reservation amount. We have since received evidence from our homeowner verifying that their home was professionally treated for pests immediately after checkout and is guest-ready for future stays.”

Evolve

Hamilton said she still feels it wasn’t handled properly and thinks more needs to be done.

“To say it was traumatizing and upsetting would be an understatement. And I don’t even know what somebody does honestly to recover from something like this, when the rental company Evolve so clearly wants nothing to do with any kind of ownership or even care for those of us who were staying in the home.” Hamilton said.