$80/month that becomes $120/month and then $200/month within a year or two, and they mail you a postcard to tell you about it. I guess that's another nice perk of the business.

This literally just happened to me for a storage unit we got to store a bunch of baby stuff while deciding if we’re going to have another kid.

Started at $87/month for a 5x10 unit. Plenty of space, and I added a six-foot-tall shelving unit ($50 from Home Depot) to keep it organized and access stuff when needed.

We’ve had it for maybe 18 months now, and I just realized it’s $204/month for the last 6 months.

It’s at the top of my list to eliminate this storage unit within the next few months.

We also had a 12 month personal limit on how long we’d keep it, but life happens.

The other perk is they charge “mandatory” insurance fees. It is easy to opt out if you prove you have insurance but at least the facility I am using makes it seem like it is hard.

They will also "accidentally" re-add the insurance fees. I had a storage unit for about a year while sorting through my brother's estate, and without fail every 3 months the insurance fee would get added back on. I was so glad when I was able to cancel that lease, it was maddening to have to keep calling about the same issue.

My son's college did the same thing. Every term, the billing for tuition and fees would include (a very expensive) fee for heath insurance. I would have to declare again that he was covered on my plan as a dependent and he didn't need the school's plan.

I'm convinced they do this because the kids using student loans aren't paying attention.