This settlement covers renters at six apartment complexes in Virginia managed by AION Management, who were billed a pest control, trash removal, community amenity or administrative billing fee. If the court approves it, about $141 arrives by check automatically — there is no claim form to file, and the only reason to act before September 8, 2026 is to opt out or object.
Current Status
There is nothing to claim, and nothing you have to file. The court authorized notice to the class, and the mailed notice tells class members that if they do nothing they will receive a cash payment of approximately $141 once the settlement is final. The only deadline that requires action is September 8, 2026, the postmark date for opting out or objecting; the notice gives that date without a timezone. The final approval hearing is set for October 21, 2026 at 10:00 a.m. before Judge Robert E. Payne in the Eastern District of Virginia, Richmond Division. No final approval order has been entered, and no payment date had been announced as of August 17, 2026.What Changed Recently?
The parties filed their settlement agreement with the court on May 22, 2026, and notice has since gone out to the class with the court-set dates filled in: September 8, 2026 to opt out or object, and October 21, 2026 for the final approval hearing. That is what moved this case from a pending lawsuit to a settlement with a payment figure attached.The underlying case was filed on October 10, 2025 and amended on February 27, 2026. It alleges that AION Management LLC and AP 11 North LLC violated the Virginia Consumer Protection Act and the Virginia Residential Landlord Tenant Act by imposing and collecting four charges the complaint calls the Disputed Fees: a pest control fee, a trash removal fee, a community amenity fee, and an administrative billing fee. The defendants deny every allegation of wrongful conduct, deny that they are liable to the named plaintiff or to any class member, and deny that the case would qualify for class certification if it were litigated rather than settled. The court has not decided who is right; the agreement resolves the case without any admission of liability.
The agreement also records that the parties reached it after exchanging discovery and holding two in-person settlement conferences before a United States magistrate judge, along with follow-up conferences.
Who Qualifies?
The settlement class is defined as all consumers who executed a lease at one of the AION-managed properties and paid or were obligated to pay any of the Disputed Fees from October 10, 2023 through November 1, 2025. Being obligated to pay is enough — the class definition does not require that the fee was actually collected from you.The six Virginia apartment complexes covered by the settlement are:
- Pointe at River City
- James River Pointe
- Chesterfield Flats
- Reserves at Tidewater
- Harborstone Apartments
- Chesapeake Pointe
The class is estimated at approximately 5,508 people, drawn from a class list the defendants generate from their own leasing records. If you received a mailed notice, the defendants' records already identify you as a class member, and the notice names the specific complex your lease was signed at. Excluded from the class are the defendants' officers, directors and employees, counsel for the parties, any judge considering approval of the settlement, their immediate families and judicial staff, and anyone who validly opts out.
If the class list turns out to be larger than 5,508, the defendants pay an additional $141 into the fund for each additional class member, so a bigger class does not shrink anyone's payment. There is a limit on that: if the additional members exceed 5 percent of the original 5,508 figure, the defendants have the option to terminate or try to renegotiate the agreement.
How Much Can You Get?
The settlement fund is $776,628, and the class notice states the resulting payment as approximately $141 per class member. That figure is the fund divided evenly across the estimated class rather than a share scaled to how much any individual paid, so a renter who was billed one fee for a few months and a renter who was billed several for two years are described in the notice as receiving the same amount.Three features of the structure are worth knowing. First, attorneys' fees and costs of up to $388,314, notice and administration costs of $25,000, and a service award of up to $7,500 for the class representative are all paid separately by the defendants, subject to court approval, and none of them reduce the fund. Adding those to the fund gives a total commitment of $1,197,442 — arithmetic from the agreement's own figures, not a headline number the settlement publishes. Second, payment is a single check per class member, mailed by the administrator; there is no election between cash tiers and no documentation path for larger losses. Third, the court has not yet approved anything, and every dollar here is contingent on final approval and on the settlement becoming effective.
The money is not the only relief. The defendants also agreed not to include any of the four Disputed Fees in new leases or lease renewals at the six Virginia properties for five years from the Effective Date, and the proposed final approval order would enter that as an injunction. For a current tenant who plans to renew, that term may matter more over time than the one-time check.
What Proof or Notice ID Is Required?
None. This is an automatic-payment settlement: there is no claim form, no portal login, no Notice ID or PIN gate on the benefit, and no receipts or lease documents to upload. The administrator pays from the class list the defendants produce from their own leasing records, so a class member who never opens the notice still gets a check as long as the settlement is approved and they have not opted out.The one practical thing that can go wrong is an address. The class list carries the last known address AION had for you, and the administrator was required to run those addresses through the U.S. Postal Service National Change of Address system before mailing. For up to forty-five days after the first mailing, notices returned as undeliverable are re-mailed when a forwarding address is available or can be located by other reasonable means. If you have moved since your lease ended, check the official settlement website for how to give the administrator a current address before checks are issued.
What Is the Deadline?
There is no claim deadline, because there is no claim. The dates that exist are the ones for stepping out of the settlement or challenging it, and both fall on the same day.- Opt-out deadline: postmarked on or before September 8, 2026. A request for exclusion goes by mail to the settlement administrator and must be signed and state that you do not want to be part of the settlement class in Turnage v. AION, along with your name, address and telephone number. Opting out means you receive no money from the settlement, and you keep the right to pursue your own claims at your own expense.
- Objection deadline: postmarked on or before September 8, 2026. Objections are filed in writing with the Clerk of Court and served on counsel for both sides, and the agreement requires the objection to state its grounds with specificity along with the other information listed in the court's order. Anyone who opts out cannot also object.
- Final approval hearing: October 21, 2026 at 10:00 a.m. before Judge Robert E. Payne, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in Richmond. Attendance is not required. The notice says the court may move the hearing date without further notice to the class.
The notice states these dates without a timezone, so treat the postmark date as the outside limit rather than counting on a late cutoff hour.
How Do You Take Action?
For most class members the answer is that no action is needed. Doing nothing keeps you in the class, and the check follows if the court grants final approval and the settlement becomes effective.The official settlement website is Apartment Fees Class Action.com, which hosts the complaint, the amended complaint, the settlement agreement, the class notice and the preliminary approval order, and which the agreement requires the administrator to update with the status of the approval process — including when the hearing is scheduled, when final judgment is entered, and when payments are expected to be mailed. Use that site rather than a link that arrives out of the blue: a legitimate administrator does not charge a fee to release a settlement payment and does not ask for a bank password.
If you want out of the settlement, or you want to object to it, both are done in writing by the September 8, 2026 postmark deadline as described above. The exclusion request goes to the administrator at the address printed in your notice; the objection is filed with the court.
What Happens Next?
The next milestone is the October 21, 2026 final approval hearing, where the court will consider whether the settlement is fair, reasonable and adequate, will hear any timely objections, and will rule on the requests for attorneys' fees, costs and the service award.Approval alone does not release money. Under the agreement, the Effective Date arrives only after a final approval order is entered and either no objection was filed, or the time to appeal has run out with no appeal, or an appeal has been resolved with no possibility of further review. The defendants then deposit the fund within seven days of the Effective Date, and the administrator mails a single check to each class member within fourteen days of receiving it. Checks stay negotiable for ninety days.
Two terms shape what happens after that. If enough money is left from uncashed checks to give every remaining class member at least fifteen dollars, the administrator runs a second pro rata distribution limited to class members who cashed a check the first time. Whatever remains after that, or if a second distribution is not feasible, goes to the cy pres recipient named in the agreement, Housing Opportunities Made Equal. The agreement also lets the defendants terminate the settlement if 5 percent or more of the class validly opts out, which is a standard term but a real one.
We will update this page when the court rules or a payment schedule is announced.
Sources and Verification
- Class Notice authorized by the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, in its final mailed form with the September 8, 2026 deadlines and the October 21, 2026 hearing date filled in.
- Settlement Agreement and Release in Turnage v. AION Management LLC, et al., No. 3:25-cv-840-REP-MRC (E.D. Va.), filed May 22, 2026, together with Exhibit A (Class Notice), Exhibit B (proposed Preliminary Approval Order) and Exhibit C (proposed Final Approval Order).
- Official settlement website — Apartment Fees Class Action.com, which the agreement designates as the repository for the case documents and approval-status updates.
Fee cases against apartment operators tend to arrive in clusters, and this one sits next to several others OCA tracks: the RealPage rent-setting antitrust settlement covers the software landlords used to price units, while the Belvedere and NRDE rental fees settlement is the closest analog to this one — another automatic-payment resolution of charges added on top of rent.
Questions
I moved out of my AION apartment. Will the check still reach me?
The mailing list comes from AION's own records, so it uses the last address the company had for you. Before notice went out, the settlement administrator was required to run those addresses through the U.S. Postal Service National Change of Address system. For up to forty-five days after the first mailing, any notice returned as undeliverable is re-mailed if the administrator receives a forwarding address from the Postal Service or can locate a current one by other reasonable means. That process is not guaranteed to find everyone, so if you have moved since your lease ended, use the official settlement website for instructions on giving the administrator your current address well before checks are issued.
What do I give up if I stay in the settlement?
Class members who do not opt out release claims arising between October 10, 2023 and November 1, 2025 under the Virginia Consumer Protection Act and the Virginia Residential Landlord Tenant Act that relate to the four disputed fees or to any other fee that could have been alleged as a junk fee. The release runs to AION Management LLC and a defined group of related parties, including the owners and landlords of the six Virginia properties. It is tied to those statutes and those fees, and it applies even to class members who never received the mailed notice. Claims outside that description are not covered by the release.
Does the settlement stop AION from charging these fees again?
In part. Under the agreement, the defendants will not include the pest control, trash removal, community amenity or administrative billing fees in any new lease or lease renewal at the six AION-managed Virginia properties for five years from the Effective Date, and the proposed final approval order would make that an injunction. The commitment is limited to those fees, those properties and that five-year window. It does not address rent itself, other charges, or properties outside Virginia.
Why is the total settlement figure larger than the $776,628 fund?
The fund is only the part that goes to class members. Under the agreement the defendants separately pay up to $388,314 in attorneys' fees and costs, $25,000 in notice and administration costs, and a service award of up to $7,500, all subject to court approval and all outside the fund. Adding those to the $776,628 fund gives a total commitment of $1,197,442. The structure matters for class members because it means fees, costs and the service award do not come out of the money being distributed, so the per-person figure is not reduced if the court approves them.
What happens if I do not cash my settlement check in time?
Each check is negotiable for ninety days from the date it is issued, and the notice accompanying it says the check is not valid after that. A class member who asks the administrator can have a check reissued, and a reissued check is negotiable for forty-five days. If uncashed checks leave enough money to give every remaining class member at least fifteen dollars, the administrator makes a second pro rata distribution to the people who cashed a check the first time. Anything left after that, or if a second distribution is not possible, goes to the cy pres recipient named in the agreement, Housing Opportunities Made Equal.
