Campustown, ames-ia

Beautiful apartment, but serious issues with management and transparency. The apartments themselves are lovely, but there are significant concerns worth sharing before you sign a lease. Floor plans and layouts are not available online, which makes it difficult to know what you're getting before committing. In mid-April, prior to move-in, management emailed tenants asking whether they'd prefer a room with a balcony, a reasonable touch. However, the way early move-in is handled is where things fall apart. Early move-in is offered as a paid option, but what isn't disclosed is that it operates on a "first come, first serve" basis that isn't explained to tenants. In practice, this means a tenant who pays extra to move in early can be placed in a windowless interior room and denied access to the balcony, until the tenant who originally requested the balcony room (but isn't moving in early) arrives. So while you may be paying a premium for a balcony unit, you're not actually guaranteed access to what you're paying for. When I asked to speak with a general manager to discuss this policy, my request was ignored, no callback, no follow-up communication. When I raised the issue with the on-site manager, they laughed at the request for a policy discussion. That response is simply unacceptable. The apartments have real potential, but transparency, communication, and basic accountability need serious improvement. Hoping management sees this and makes it right.

I would not recommend living in these apartments. The only benefit is the location; however, management/ownership abuses the fact that these are young college students. For example, upon move-out expect charges of at least $150 per person for "damages" that were there before and were mentioned in the form that you are required to fill out on the first day where you can mention any damages so you are supposedly not charged when you move out. I unfortunately lived there for three years which was too many chances and experienced this all 3 times. My friends that just moved out of their current one received charges for paint that was screwed up upon move in (and noted in our move-in form for damages), a couch cushion with a piece torn (in total they were charged 600 dollars for and is a cheap piece of plastic anyways) not to mention this was there upon move-in with photos as proof. The apartments are dirty when you move in (they also charge a cleaning fee when you move-out, but whoever is supposed to clean them doesn't do the job very well). Not to mention the rent prices are much too high compared to other apartments in Ames for better quality. If I had the option to go back I would have picked a different apartment complex. One other thing I will give props for is the maintenance team, they made this complex livable and were always great at their jobs. Overall, I would not recommend living here and hope some changes happen in the future because this place is a scam.

The location is really the only positive thing I can say about this apartment complex. Unfortunately, based on my experience, I would not recommend living here. The air conditioning unit in our apartment never worked properly, which made living there very uncomfortable. Maintenance was also a major issue. Requests would often take a long time to be addressed, and I frequently had to walk into the office myself just to ask when something would actually be fixed. There were also unexpected and inconsistent water and sewer charges that were added to our bills, which made it difficult to understand what we were actually being charged for. The dryer in 300 Stanton never worked properly, meaning we often had to pay twice just to dry our clothes. On top of that, we were charged excessive damage fees when moving out, despite the apartment being left in essentially the same condition as when we moved in.

Although I enjoyed my stay here for the most part, there were many occurrences that led me to be very dissatisfied with my stay in Campustown. 1. The windows there are practically cardboard as sleeping at night was very difficult, especially on weekends with how loud it would get outside. 2. The blinds didn’t make an impact at all in my room yet after my stay, my roommates and I got charged for said “blinds”. 3. I am being charged $75 for “paint” what kind of paint are you using that costs $75? Also, I would love to see proof of every single one of these charges I’m getting. My roommates and I are all very irate with these charges we didn’t see coming and would love to see proof of said damages. Thank you

Miserable landlords to have to deal with. Zero insulation in our apartment so utility bills were always absurd. Recently moved out and they are trying to bill my friends and I almost 1600 dollars for couch damage on the cheapest plastic couch money could buy.