(no subject)
so, saturday i come home, turn the light on, and there is roach party 2k7 going on in my kitchen. like, at least 50 of them. at LEAST. i'm bad at math, so this is definitley on the liberal side. it could have been more like 75. but i don't know. those fuckers just sat there and looked at me and slowly started to saunter back under the cabinets from whence they came. but it gets worse. i realize that they are also in the fridge. yeah, and the freezer. the seal on the door is fucked, and hanging at the bottom. pretty sick. if an apartment could ever be described as a piece, this one would fit the script, for real.
my mom took me to home depot and lovingly purchased all manner and fashion of items to kill dem bugs and also keep the crackheads out of the apartment. i went down to the manager, who is HUGELY pregnant, so i felt bad even asking her to come look at the place. she's a nice lady, though, and said "are they really that bad?" when i told her about the roaches. yes, they are really that bad. i'm about to call the health department, because, yeah, i'm disgusted, but also because this complex is in the ghettoest of riverside ghettos and there are about 6 small children per unit. with roaches like this, it's a wonder that they don't constantly walk around with nebulizers. i'm sure they all either have or will develop asthma.
also, there's a wolf spider just chilling in between my window and the screen, and a shitload more just hanging out on the patio.
at least we don't have ants. yet.
what people say about my complex:
"My car was broken into, management did nothing. The hallway smells like urine, and if you have a nice car, someone will go out of their way to ruin it. My car was also towed, TWICE. I thought this particular action was rather peculiar, because I had a parking decal on the FRONT AND BACK of my car. Later, it was told to me that the workers of J&J Towing get paid for every car they pick up, so doing their job well, wasn't an option. The owners of this complex should rename it. Instead of it being "Chelsea on Townlake", it should be called Chelsea's Boxing Arena, because there are fights daily, and the APD is non-existent! This place totally sucks WITH A VENGEANCE!"
"There is litter everywhere on the grounds, baby's dirty diapers, beer bottles, beer cans. The hallways smell awful. People here yell a lot. My window was broken. My A/C either won't turn on or won't turn off. I've decided to eat the high electric costs and not to call maintenance, since it's in it's on-phase. My apartment is absolutely infested. I've thrown away framed pictures because bugs get into them. Bugs live in my pantry, in my cupboard, in the lining of my ancient fridge, in the dishwasher. I clean constantly, but I'm surrounded by bugs.
But, you can access 35N without going through a stop light. That's nice."
"I lived in River Apts from 1998 until they sold to Chelsea and then lived under this management company for one lease term. Boy! I couldn't get out of their fast enough once Chelsea took over!!!
Problems! Problems! If getting stared at by local residents while walking into your apt w/ groceries wasn't unnerving enough, seeing the police search through the parking lot for a "missing weapon" that was dropped by a "drive by shooter" really helped add to the ambiance! (I was new to Texas when I rented this Apartment. I was a single female UT grad student and when I got here on my first night to move in...a police officer pulled me over and asked "What is a woman like you doing in this part of town?" Aparently, the neighborhood is referred to at "The Ellis Island of Austin" Cheap, but unsafe).
When Chelsea took over they decided to re-paint the whole complex. However, they were so cheap that they didn't sand down the previous paint job. So, the paint would peel horribly!
Not to mention, they wanted to raise the rent more than 20%. I had 1bd 1bth. I started out at $450 mo/ in 1998 and then topped out at $550/mo in 2002.
The office personnel were not the best and the brightest. For instance, when I moved out, I settled with the assoicate and made sure all monies were paid in full so that I would recieve my security deposit ($180). Not only did they not ever pay me my security deposit (I had to get a lawyer to help me get it back), I get a phone call a year later saying that I still owed rent! I had kept all my financial records and it turned out that they had the check, but forgot that they put it in the safe a year before (i.e. they lost it). Nice.
The final nail in the coffin for me was when Hurricane Allyson came through in June of 2000, it rained and rained so much that building 7 was flooded. I was on the first floor. The aftermath of this was not pretty. And despite many of our complaints, the office did NOTHING to repair any of the damage in my apartment (And I believe they ignored other requests by other residents in my building as well).
So, overall I think I had a horrible experience at Chelsea on Town Lake. I didn't mind putting up with the unsafe surroundings with living at The River Apartments because the people in the office were great. However, once Chelsea moved in, I couldn't get out of there fast enough."
"Car was towed for no reason at all. even tho we had a sticker and we lived at the apartment complex, it stinks very badly, maintence sucks bad and nothing is ever done about the pest control, the area is very bad, fights all the time, the front office people are never on your side for anything at all!! I REGRET LIVING HERE AND HOPE NO ONE ELSE DOES!!"
"I have lived at Chelsea on Town Lake for 2 years. The area needs improvement however for my budget it works. I have a one bedroom 650 sq.ft for $469. Maintenance is friendly, bust sometimes the reponse time is 72 hours. The office staff are always friendly but the office is always busy so you might have to wait."
"This is now called Chelsea on Town Lake. I am a grad student at UT. I hadn't been to texas before, and rented this "blind" without having seen it. My wife and I rented a one-bedroom here for 9 months. We are moving out this weekend.
For students: the LS shuttle comes and stops right out front. It is about a 15 minute wait and a 15 minute ride to campus most of the time. Coming back takes longer, and you probably will spend about an hour and fifteen minutes travelling waiting total to go to campus and come back.
The good:
The apartment itself is nice. 650 square feet for $493/mo. The deposit was only $99 and that was the application fee too. We are on the second floor and there are spacious decks with nice windows. The decks are made of wood and are splintering and so forth, but are really quite nice. The living room and bedroom feel large, due to the extraordinarily small kitchen. This is certainly nice when you're in the living room, and not nice when you're in the kitchen. We have occasionally seen some very small ants, but there is really no problem with bugs or anything. The unit has central air and it works nicely. We only ever wanted to run the heater a couple of times, and it coughed out a lot of dust and smelled horrid. We instead have just used our $20 space heater and it has been just fine as an alternative. It's generally a very quiet building (with a few exceptions noted below), and you don't hear your neighbors much. The parking lot is more than adequate, no space crunch like up near campus. However, I've only rated it a 3 because of the security issues.
Town Lake is practically across the street, and you can go running along the trail and whatever. There is a nice view of downtown from over there.
Maintenance requests are usually answered within two or three days.
The bad:
The management is truly a mess. When I got here there was a security gate for the parking. It has been broken for 6 months. I've repeatedly asked the management what they are doing, and their answer is always that "they are working on it," or are going to get to it next week. Next week comes and nothing happens. There are also fences between the parking lots and the buildings, which used to have locks. The locks have since been removed. I've asked about this and the same thing happens. About five months. Our buildings also had locks on the outside doors. These are no longer present. This has been the case for about 7 months. Nothing is done to fix the situation.
When you go to pay your rent or talk to them, there is a "we'll be back in 30 minutes" sign on the door of the office, and it's often a lie. There is no drop box to leave off your rent while they are away. They lost one of our packages and refused to do anything to replace it, denying that they ever had it.
Beyond your own apartments, the building is terrible. The stairs are shoddy and the carpet in the hallways is filthy. The doors have paint chipped and peeling. But like I said, inside the apartment is nice.
The ugly:
This isn't the best part of town. Our car was broken into and the vandals tried to take the stereo. Fortunately they were foiled by apparently a lack of a screwdriver, so all they did was bust up the dash board. We reported this, still no action on the security gate. If you go over to the gas station on Tinin Ford (the first cross street on Lakeshore) it wreaks of marajuana and there are constantly vagrants wandering around on riverside. Some of our neighbors are obviously drug users, and you can smell pot coming from their places.
You.. often see shopping carts that people have stolen lying around. My wife has had bad experiences going to the local HEB on her own, and so we go together now or I go. I would strongly advise single females against living here. The HEB has a full time rent-a-cop and tags your grocerites. The neighborhood is very poor, and few people here speak english. I can remember police coming a couple of times for domestic disturbances, but I've lived here a long time so that doesn't seem very often. I have had people come to my door and beg for money. A very drunk woman was also trying to score a few dollars in the parking lot awhile back.
On monday mornings, the trash trucks come at 6 am. You should get up and leave. I swear they pick up the dumpsters over and over again and bang them against the concrete just to annoy people. Absolutely impossible to sleep through. I hate them something fierce, but my wife doesn't seem to mind them too much, so I guess it's probably not as horrible as I think.
Overall it's fairly cheap and nice once you're home. But the neighborhood sucks, the management sucks, the location sucks (for going to UT), and we're really looking forward to moving."
my mom took me to home depot and lovingly purchased all manner and fashion of items to kill dem bugs and also keep the crackheads out of the apartment. i went down to the manager, who is HUGELY pregnant, so i felt bad even asking her to come look at the place. she's a nice lady, though, and said "are they really that bad?" when i told her about the roaches. yes, they are really that bad. i'm about to call the health department, because, yeah, i'm disgusted, but also because this complex is in the ghettoest of riverside ghettos and there are about 6 small children per unit. with roaches like this, it's a wonder that they don't constantly walk around with nebulizers. i'm sure they all either have or will develop asthma.
also, there's a wolf spider just chilling in between my window and the screen, and a shitload more just hanging out on the patio.
at least we don't have ants. yet.
what people say about my complex:
"My car was broken into, management did nothing. The hallway smells like urine, and if you have a nice car, someone will go out of their way to ruin it. My car was also towed, TWICE. I thought this particular action was rather peculiar, because I had a parking decal on the FRONT AND BACK of my car. Later, it was told to me that the workers of J&J Towing get paid for every car they pick up, so doing their job well, wasn't an option. The owners of this complex should rename it. Instead of it being "Chelsea on Townlake", it should be called Chelsea's Boxing Arena, because there are fights daily, and the APD is non-existent! This place totally sucks WITH A VENGEANCE!"
"There is litter everywhere on the grounds, baby's dirty diapers, beer bottles, beer cans. The hallways smell awful. People here yell a lot. My window was broken. My A/C either won't turn on or won't turn off. I've decided to eat the high electric costs and not to call maintenance, since it's in it's on-phase. My apartment is absolutely infested. I've thrown away framed pictures because bugs get into them. Bugs live in my pantry, in my cupboard, in the lining of my ancient fridge, in the dishwasher. I clean constantly, but I'm surrounded by bugs.
But, you can access 35N without going through a stop light. That's nice."
"I lived in River Apts from 1998 until they sold to Chelsea and then lived under this management company for one lease term. Boy! I couldn't get out of their fast enough once Chelsea took over!!!
Problems! Problems! If getting stared at by local residents while walking into your apt w/ groceries wasn't unnerving enough, seeing the police search through the parking lot for a "missing weapon" that was dropped by a "drive by shooter" really helped add to the ambiance! (I was new to Texas when I rented this Apartment. I was a single female UT grad student and when I got here on my first night to move in...a police officer pulled me over and asked "What is a woman like you doing in this part of town?" Aparently, the neighborhood is referred to at "The Ellis Island of Austin" Cheap, but unsafe).
When Chelsea took over they decided to re-paint the whole complex. However, they were so cheap that they didn't sand down the previous paint job. So, the paint would peel horribly!
Not to mention, they wanted to raise the rent more than 20%. I had 1bd 1bth. I started out at $450 mo/ in 1998 and then topped out at $550/mo in 2002.
The office personnel were not the best and the brightest. For instance, when I moved out, I settled with the assoicate and made sure all monies were paid in full so that I would recieve my security deposit ($180). Not only did they not ever pay me my security deposit (I had to get a lawyer to help me get it back), I get a phone call a year later saying that I still owed rent! I had kept all my financial records and it turned out that they had the check, but forgot that they put it in the safe a year before (i.e. they lost it). Nice.
The final nail in the coffin for me was when Hurricane Allyson came through in June of 2000, it rained and rained so much that building 7 was flooded. I was on the first floor. The aftermath of this was not pretty. And despite many of our complaints, the office did NOTHING to repair any of the damage in my apartment (And I believe they ignored other requests by other residents in my building as well).
So, overall I think I had a horrible experience at Chelsea on Town Lake. I didn't mind putting up with the unsafe surroundings with living at The River Apartments because the people in the office were great. However, once Chelsea moved in, I couldn't get out of there fast enough."
"Car was towed for no reason at all. even tho we had a sticker and we lived at the apartment complex, it stinks very badly, maintence sucks bad and nothing is ever done about the pest control, the area is very bad, fights all the time, the front office people are never on your side for anything at all!! I REGRET LIVING HERE AND HOPE NO ONE ELSE DOES!!"
"I have lived at Chelsea on Town Lake for 2 years. The area needs improvement however for my budget it works. I have a one bedroom 650 sq.ft for $469. Maintenance is friendly, bust sometimes the reponse time is 72 hours. The office staff are always friendly but the office is always busy so you might have to wait."
"This is now called Chelsea on Town Lake. I am a grad student at UT. I hadn't been to texas before, and rented this "blind" without having seen it. My wife and I rented a one-bedroom here for 9 months. We are moving out this weekend.
For students: the LS shuttle comes and stops right out front. It is about a 15 minute wait and a 15 minute ride to campus most of the time. Coming back takes longer, and you probably will spend about an hour and fifteen minutes travelling waiting total to go to campus and come back.
The good:
The apartment itself is nice. 650 square feet for $493/mo. The deposit was only $99 and that was the application fee too. We are on the second floor and there are spacious decks with nice windows. The decks are made of wood and are splintering and so forth, but are really quite nice. The living room and bedroom feel large, due to the extraordinarily small kitchen. This is certainly nice when you're in the living room, and not nice when you're in the kitchen. We have occasionally seen some very small ants, but there is really no problem with bugs or anything. The unit has central air and it works nicely. We only ever wanted to run the heater a couple of times, and it coughed out a lot of dust and smelled horrid. We instead have just used our $20 space heater and it has been just fine as an alternative. It's generally a very quiet building (with a few exceptions noted below), and you don't hear your neighbors much. The parking lot is more than adequate, no space crunch like up near campus. However, I've only rated it a 3 because of the security issues.
Town Lake is practically across the street, and you can go running along the trail and whatever. There is a nice view of downtown from over there.
Maintenance requests are usually answered within two or three days.
The bad:
The management is truly a mess. When I got here there was a security gate for the parking. It has been broken for 6 months. I've repeatedly asked the management what they are doing, and their answer is always that "they are working on it," or are going to get to it next week. Next week comes and nothing happens. There are also fences between the parking lots and the buildings, which used to have locks. The locks have since been removed. I've asked about this and the same thing happens. About five months. Our buildings also had locks on the outside doors. These are no longer present. This has been the case for about 7 months. Nothing is done to fix the situation.
When you go to pay your rent or talk to them, there is a "we'll be back in 30 minutes" sign on the door of the office, and it's often a lie. There is no drop box to leave off your rent while they are away. They lost one of our packages and refused to do anything to replace it, denying that they ever had it.
Beyond your own apartments, the building is terrible. The stairs are shoddy and the carpet in the hallways is filthy. The doors have paint chipped and peeling. But like I said, inside the apartment is nice.
The ugly:
This isn't the best part of town. Our car was broken into and the vandals tried to take the stereo. Fortunately they were foiled by apparently a lack of a screwdriver, so all they did was bust up the dash board. We reported this, still no action on the security gate. If you go over to the gas station on Tinin Ford (the first cross street on Lakeshore) it wreaks of marajuana and there are constantly vagrants wandering around on riverside. Some of our neighbors are obviously drug users, and you can smell pot coming from their places.
You.. often see shopping carts that people have stolen lying around. My wife has had bad experiences going to the local HEB on her own, and so we go together now or I go. I would strongly advise single females against living here. The HEB has a full time rent-a-cop and tags your grocerites. The neighborhood is very poor, and few people here speak english. I can remember police coming a couple of times for domestic disturbances, but I've lived here a long time so that doesn't seem very often. I have had people come to my door and beg for money. A very drunk woman was also trying to score a few dollars in the parking lot awhile back.
On monday mornings, the trash trucks come at 6 am. You should get up and leave. I swear they pick up the dumpsters over and over again and bang them against the concrete just to annoy people. Absolutely impossible to sleep through. I hate them something fierce, but my wife doesn't seem to mind them too much, so I guess it's probably not as horrible as I think.
Overall it's fairly cheap and nice once you're home. But the neighborhood sucks, the management sucks, the location sucks (for going to UT), and we're really looking forward to moving."