Review History for anonymous

A Fair Analysis

My experience has not been as bad as some of the other reviews, but I can see how others might have had bad experiences, and I don't doubt the truth of the other reviews I've read. That said, I can only account for what I've experienced. First with the good: You do get a lot of space for what you pay. Right now I'm paying $771 for 850 square feet. When the new management came in and raised everybody's rates, their argument was that the old management was going out of business because they were offering unsustainable rates. Whether that is true or not, I cannot say, but it makes sense. If you look at the apartments accross the street (which my husband and I did when confronted with the rate increase) you will find that you get a lot less space for more money. Now, do I think I am getting a huge deal because Brompton is cheaper? Not necessarily. The apartments accross the street are much newer, with newer appliances, they don't charge for laundry, etc. We just decided space was a more important factor for us. Brompton is an older facility with less amenities, so it is appropriate that they are less expensive. I can understand the need for rate increases, but the new management was totally unapologetic and unsympathetic, and raised rates unreasonably. Before the increase, we were paying $650. They wanted to raise it to over $850. We obviously complained, at which point they reduced it to our current $771, but why couldn't they have just given us a fair rate in the first place? Also, the longest lease they offered us was 12 months (we were interested in doing up to 24 months, which the old management had offered) so that obviously means they're going to try and increase it again at renewal time, but we'll deal with that when it comes. Also, they've just begun a new free trash-pickup service, where they come and collect your trash each night if you leave it out in the hallway, so that's pretty cool. Before that, you would have to schlep it out to the dumpster yourself. The lighting on the grounds is not the best, but I have never personally had an issue with crime. Our apartment is on the second floor, and I have always felt that the apartments on the first floor or the ones facing out to the street were less safe. The front gate stays open for several minutes after you swipe your key, and cars routinely get in behind you. In fact, it is common practice for cars without keys to sit and wait for someone with a key to show up, and then they shadow them in. I don't know if these keyless people are just irresponsible residents who forgot their own keys, or if they are random people that don't live there. Some people have even followed my car through the gate on foot. I know that a certain percentage of these people must be non-residents, because it is also very common to arrive home after work and find several different brocheurs from local companies stuck in your door. I never hear of anyone getting held up or broken into...obviously that doesn't mean it isn't happening, it just means it isn't reported. Apparently there is a security guard on the grounds, although I have never seen anyone patrolling, and there is no emergency security number you can call or anything like that. I think there should be. The building is older, and there are issues related to that. Aside from water mains breaking now and then, there have been issues within our individual apartment. The appliances and light fixtures are old (and there are no light fixtures in the living room. If you don't have a lamp, you'll be in the dark). The air conditioning units are old, and are located in the ceiling of the closet. Every 3 to 4 months, it starts to leak and gets dirty water on our clothes. I try to watch it so I can get my clothes out of the way in time, but the last two times it occurred either during the workday or in the middle of the night. When it happened in the middle of the night, we called emergency maintenece to have them come out, and the guy asked us if it was really an emergency, and if we couldn't just wait until morning. This really pissed me off, because no, I cannot wait until morning when I have water dripping from the ceiling in my closet and all of the clothes are piled on my bed, preventing me from sleeping. The guy finally came out and emptied the "tank" or whatever they do. We asked Brompton if they would send someone to empty the tank preventatively, instead of waiting until it leaks in the middle of the night, and they refused. On a slightly better note, they did reimburse us $50 for a white shirt that was stained. Another story: The mirror in our bathroom when we first moved in was in bad disrepair. Parts of the glass frame started falling off, and I'd find shattered bits on the floor when I got home at night. One day when I was cleaning it, it came unstuck from the wall and fell on me (I swear I was just rubbing it down with some windex for god's sake!). Not only did it leave a knot on my head (its a big, heavy thing) but it got badly scratched on the faucet. I lugged it into the hallway, and submitted a request to have the old mirror taken away, and a new one installed. I was not happy, but I felt like if they just fixed it promptly, I would be satisfied. Several days later, someone finally came while I was at work...and hung the old mirror that was scratched and cracking back up on the wall! When I got home and saw that I was furious! I wrote them several angry letters (they don't answer their phone). The next day one of them called my husband (even though I had left MY number as the call-back number. Maybe they just didn't want to talk to me) saying that they had to order a new mirror, and it would take a few weeks. Over a month later, and with zero communication from maintenance, the mirror had still not been replaced. More angry letters. Finally, about 3 months after the initial incident (keeping in mind that we had been living with a broken mirror for this entire time) I came home to find that a new mirror had been put up. They scratched it during the installation process, and left industrial adhesive all over the sink (which I still haven't been able to completely remove) but at that point I was exhausted, and just happy to finally have a new mirror. Brompton allows large dogs, which is fine with us because we have a lab. The problem is that people are really bad about cleaning up after their dogs. This is not so much a Brompton problem as it is a disgusting resident problem. Brompton actually does a good job of making special trashcans with poop bags available all around the complex. That said, it is still common to see a pile of dog poop RIGHT NEXT TO one of these trashcans. I guess some people are just too good to pick up poop. What they fail to realize is that dog poop spreads disease, not to mention being incredibly unsanitary in other ways. Its just disgusting. On another note, Brompton's grounds appear to be infested with fleas. As in, your dog will get fleas if you bring it here. We pick them off our dog all the time, and she is on very regular flea medication. I don't think they live on her, because her medication should kill them when they try to bite her, but they do live in the grass, so when we take her out to go to the bathroom, they jump on her and get carried into the house, at which point they could potentially infest the carpet. We have had to bomb the apartment in the past because one summer it got out of hand. We clean and vaccuum regularly, and are not dirty people! Our dog never had issues with fleas before we came here. We are planning to talk to Brompton about this, and see if they'll do something to treat their grounds. Not holding my breath on that one, but it's all we can do. Okay, one final thing. The bookeeping for the new management is atrocious. I think its getting better, but in the beginning they would constantly be losing people's checks (or just saying they didn't pay even if the check was already deposited by Brompton). One time we were out of town for the holidays, and had forgotton to leave a check at the office before we left, so we called and gave them our account number for a one-time auto payment. They charged TWICE our rent, and then said they couldn't refund the cash, they could only give us a statement credit for next month's bill! Another time we had a note left on our door saying we were being charged a $60 late fee for some unspecified reason, and that we needed to pay the late fee immediately. We went to the office to try and figure out what the heck was going on, and they said our account was totally up to date, and they had no notes saying we owed a late fee, or that anything had even been late! In closing, you get a lot of space for your money. Its an older building, and as with any old building there will be issues associated with that. We've had some minor issues and headaches, but they have always worked with us to make sure we're reimbursed (even if only via statement credit!). As for some of the more major issues...no apartment complex is perfect, so just keep that in mind. Its not like we're getting pissed off every day. Some of the maintence people are really nice and hardworking. I don't care much for the salespeople in the office, but them again I don't care much for salespeople in general. The community is laid back, there's no noise. All in all, I would recommend it...unless they try to raise our rates again, of course!!