Soco At Alpine

Honestly, I’ve really enjoyed living here. Yeah it’s a little out dated on the outside, and the in unit washer/dryer is confusing to use, but other than that this place has been wonderful. The location is awesome. Like really really awesome. Right next to Cosmic which is probably the best chill bar/food/coffee spot in Austin, and Crux climbing gym. There’s a cool cigar shop up the street for guys to go hang out and smoke and watch sports, and you’re close enough to 290 to avoid all the neighborhood traffic if you have to get to work that way. All of the tenants in the apartment (currently) are great people and most of them have really sweet pets! My cat loves it here and frankly I’m going to be sad when we move because she’s made a lot of friends roaming around. The units themselves are renovated nicely. Although not extremely spacious, they can be made to feel very homey. Management is not over-bearing and maintenance is on site and available. I’ve had no more problems with crime than anyone I know in Austin (in fact I’ve had less than most people I know). The only incident was someone ruffled through my car when I left it unlocked one night (but that’s better than my car being broken into three times in the nicer neighborhoods of Houston). If you live in one of the units closest to alpine circle, you have a nice view of a line of trees and sky that feels very natural and open, and I personally like the access to outside as opposed to being in a large hotel-like complex. Walks around the area are wonderful because of the nice neighborhoods nearby and being right on south congress. I’d recommend this place to most young people on a bit of a budget who want to be in a great spot in the heart of Austin.

The few good things: The complex is full of really sweet/friendly people and the counters in the remodeled units are pretty. For the zip code, my rate was under $1000, which was the lowest I could find at the time with an in-unit w/d. I signed a year-long lease that started right after the property was bought out by Cirrus, which was when things got really bad. Maintenance orders were never attended to and it's really hard to get a hold of whoever is the property manager (it switched 2-3 times). Even when you do, a lot of the times the responses were vague/condescending. I had a really bad roach problem since the beginning of my lease, which I didn't want to blame too much on the complex initially, since it's close to a lot of trees and I lived on the first floor. However, my requests for it often got ignored. At one point, the complex didn't even have a pest control company coming each week. I constantly had little centipedes and bugs coming up my shower drain. There was one point where I would find at least 2 roaches every day. Your luck is really based on which unit you get, as some were really not in a livable condition and others were just fine enough. My neighbor had a really bad leak problem that never got handled. My next-door neighbor's W/D didn't work, so he couldn't do his laundry for at least a month. At one point, so many people were having issues that the city inspector got involved, left her business card, and posted a notice concerned that the complex was violating basic tenant guidelines. I feel like living in an apartment comes with the likelihood of technical issues popping up, but ultimately the main priority is to attend to those issues and provide a livable, safe home. The complex has digital locks that pair with a fob. About 3 months into my lease, the battery in it died, so I couldn't lock my door for a month and a half if I wasn't home. I lived alone, so this made my safety a huge concern. Two different maintenance companies came twice to try to fix it, but when they wouldn't have any luck, they just said they'd order a new one. They never came back. I e-mailed the property so many times about my safety and that I just needed any type of lock to be installed. It wasn't until I tried to look into getting out of my lease that they finally replied and installed a manual lock and key a month and a half later. They said they would have me use it until the new lock came in. That was in September. I just sent in my final payment today (May) and the lock was never replaced. I don't think I've ever written a review for everything, but this complex did not even do the bare minimum when it came to a lot of things. I've lived in three different complexes in Austin, and this one was by far the worst.