Genesis of the Discord
How Utilities Over-Billing Led to the Creation of a the 880+ member proof of concept
Written by Annie Chen
In the summer of 2022, I moved into a 900 unit brand new “luxury” building. I had high hopes for my new life in LA in this new building. Over time it was clear the building was riddled with problems - broken promises, false fire alarms, car break-ins, and amenities that were not-so-luxurious. What takes the cake was when my utilities bill for October spiked by $250. The utilities bill made no sense - I wasn't even in town the whole time. Some of my neighbors in 2 bedroom units were impacted +$500.
My neighbors and I tried to escalate the issue multiple times with the resident services. After 2 weeks of the issue not being resolved, my mom encouraged me that I needed strength in numbers so I made a little poster with the QR code to a Discord I created. I would put the little poster up in the elevators after business hours.
I picked the username Dasanni because my name is Annie and I thought it was a cute play on Awkwafina the actress and Aquafina the water bottle. I had so much fun riding sarcastic posts under the persona of a disgruntled water bottle. For example, our awesome luxury gym was closed for over a month because it had a black mold problem in a new building and so I joked that people can bench 48 packs of Dasani instead.
Even after we successfully got our utilities over-billing refunded in January 2023, it was clear the community still needed a way for residents to be able to talk to each other without it being moderated by Greystar or any other property management company. The Discord would pop off every time there was some issue that affected everyone in the building - like a false fire alarm during sleeping hours.
Aside from complaints and safety related alerts, it was lovely to see a lot of positive community building happening on channels for #intros, #animal-fostering, and #meetups. The biggest success story is: one resident abandoned his dog, and then later other residence, through the Discord, learned of the situation and adopted the dog.
At the time of the writing on April 5, 2025 the Discord is at 880 members and counting. I met my cofounder Jeremy at LA Tech week last October and we have been working on this App since the beginning of March 2025. We look forward to bringing to the market soon and helping other people have a way of chatting with their neighbors anonymously.
