The Icon & Lofts at the Icon, houston-tx

I hate we didn't check out the reviews prior to my son signing his lease, extremely disappointed to say the least. I will definitely be doing my research for next year. You'd think they would've acted on past year's complaints, but reading recent reviews it doesn't look like it.

Dear God, where do I even begin? My room itself was nice, as I kept it relatively clean, I cannot say the same AT ALL for the hallways and elevators and other common areas. There was constantly dog poop and pee in the elevators, hallways and staircase. There have been multiple times where people have left their unfinished food just laying on the floor of the hallways or stairwell. Security is useless and has never done anything to keep us safe despite multiple fights and dangerous situations occurring. In addition to their partnership with greedy towing companies that charge $300-$400 to get your car back from the lot, there are numerous unexpected and hidden fees. For example, on our move out date, they unexpectedly charged residents an extra month of rent if keys were turned in after 10am, despite the office opening at 10am (they said they were open at 7am, but this is not true), and us already paying the rent for the month of July (we were supposed to be out by July 28, but we would still be paying the next months rent before it even started). I was told that there was an email sent regarding this, but after checking my inbox 3 times, I never received it. I was then told by fellow residents that the time to turn in keys was now 12pm. These inconsistencies indicate to me that they are just trying to intimidate us to make more money off of college students that are just starting off in getting life experience. Do not move here unless you are masochistic and like being taken advantage of.

Move in day was a nightmare. Someone had a bright idea to move in an entire building in one day. Which was complete chaos resulting in a car wreck in the parking garage that caused an over 6 hours power outage. On top of that once checked in, the sanitation seal was already broken on the door and the lock was dead so couldn’t get in. Maintenance had to come and replace the batteries. When the power went out only half of my apartment when out, the AC was running but not cooling. I went to the front desk to tell them the AC was not working they said someone would be stopping by before they closed at 6pm. NOPE!!! Apparently almost 80 degree apartment in the summer time isn’t a priority. The front office then said it would have to be take care of the following day. Not sure how they think someone can sleep in this heat. The management should be fired for the entire check in to the maintenance of this building. The elevator lights are dim which pose a safety risk and might I say disgustingly dirty. The 6th floor smelled like dog urine. This was a horrible first day. Update to original post: On move-in day my daughter purchased a reserve spot, later to find someone parked in that spot with last year’s sticker. When notifying the leasing office, they called the former resident in which they said they had renewed their parking pass the day prior to move in day. So essentially they sold us a spot what wasn’t even available. Not only that but the office doesn’t have a map of reserved spots for each floor nor can they tell you what is available. They want you to go back upstairs and take note of which spots you may want and then come back down, wait in line to see if it’s available. This process is highly inefficient and lacks any air of good customer service. The trash rooms where tenants are supposed to throw their trash are disgusting. All large trash is removed still leaving a ton of trash to step on just to throw things in the trash chute. (6th floor chute doesn’t even close) there is no place to put large trash items regularly as the chute is fairly small. The apartment markets that each floor has a study room….there’s a room. However, it has one chair to the four desks, one tuft, and a built-in bench seat. There is no conference table for group work. And the 6th floor AC doesn’t work. If security of items is a problem I would suggest putting a keypad or locking system much like resident doors and allowing residents to sign up to use the rooms online with time slots. The staff could do a much better job at welcoming new residents. They tend to piece meal all information. While getting the parking situation resolved we found out resident get a garage gate clicker. The new residents aren’t even given a map of the facilities to know where everything is at. The apartment itself is nice and spacious. I think management needs to be replaced, looks like all young college kids that don’t care much about quality.

PLEASE READ THIS IF YOU'RE THINKING OF MOVING TO THE ICON!! I recommend no student or parent allow their child to live there if you care for their well-being. While living there from 2023 to 2024, I had multiple issues at the complex (safety, cleanliness, health, etc.), which I brought to the management but was never fixed. I have also included some pictures of what I will be talking about. I paid over $1,400 a month to live where anyone could get in since the key fob locks were broken; there was one security guard who was always on his phone, and is part of the reason why people's cars get broken into; there was urine (picture 11) and fecal matter (picture 7 and 10) riddled throughout the hallways and stairways, along with vomit (picture 9) and other bodily fluids ; and shootings did often happen around there. I saw police and/or fire department there close to weekly. PLEASE DON'T BE FOOLED BY THE 5-STAR REVIEWS. While there, they'd post on their Instagram giveaways, and to be considered, you had to leave a review on the complex. That's why you'd randomly see 5-star reviews on the Icon. My personal experience there: 1. I was initially supposed to be in a three-bedroom with two other female roommates, and they had somehow accidentally assigned me to live with two other male roommates. When they tried to fix the situation and move me to another three-bedroom, they said they sold out of three-bedrooms, and I had no option but to go to a two-bedroom where I paid $300 more than I expected to live there. 2. When I moved in, I was by myself, but when the roommate moved in, the office didn't notify me; she had just shown up at the unit. 3. The roommate was dirty, had a nasty attitude, and was loud. She never cleaned after herself when she'd made a mess. She'd have a nasty attitude when I confronted her about it multiple times (making excuses like "I'm too busy"). I also did have an issue with her regarding her boyfriend being over for days, and at one point, the boyfriend was in the apartment without her. 4. When I had enough of being mentally and academically affected, I talked to Yashmine Hernandez. She was supposed to help with roommate conflict but was useless. She couldn't enforce a thing and seemed to care less about what I was going through. Moving past that fact, when moving into a unit with roommates, they had guidelines for where they had to do mediation, but they couldn't force the roommate(s) to partake in the mediation. I was unaware of that because they don't tell you before moving in, and usually, whoever brings the issue up to the management will likely move out. 5. The roommate didn't want mediation; I had to go out of my way to make a document of pictures, recounting conversations, and all the nasty stuff she did/left around the apartment and blatant lease violations—still, no response from management on the issue. 6. Mind y'all, the pictures I sent management featured food she left on the stove for a week, which grew a film on it; she left her false nail that had part of her real nail on it right next to the dining table and hair in the living room; left dishes in the sink 24/7; and left stains on the couch and dirtied the common room floor...and then had the audacity to have an ugly Christmas tree up on top of being nasty...However, management still didn't believe that what she was doing was enough to go further on the issue, leaving me hopeless when it came to living with the roommate. 7. Escalated the issue further to Russell Best, and my mother was involved, too, since they only take students seriously once their parents are involved. Multiple emails were sent about the issue, and numerous calls were made. I got the short end of the stick because they couldn't remove the resident from the unit unless I were in danger. I ended up moving out of the unit and had to go up in rent for $1,360 for a studio. Overall, parents of students and students should go anywhere else but here. Management is terrible and greedy, rent is too expensive, and this place isn't worth risking your safety.

If you don’t have $1,000 to break your lease, you might as well look somewhere else because you’ll want to! It seems like everyday it’s always something. Maintenance don’t know what their doing at all. People’s had problems and put in request for months and maintenance still hasn’t come. The water was getting shut off alot and all management had to say was that it was a city problem, but when residents contacted the owners of the apartment, they said it’s not and that the water should still be on. The tow company sucks, I’ve seen them drop someone’s car and they’ll even tow residents that are registered. Management never knows anything, so of course RA’s don’t either which causes a lot of tension between residents, as this place isn’t worth the money at all! You’d be better off and happier living an a non affiliated TSU apartment!