Yugo Cincinnati Deacon — Attraction in Cincinnati

Fortunately, I have not seemed to have had as bad of an experience as some of the reviews on here. However, I do have my fair share of complaints.

Two words: FIRE ALARMS. There is nothing worse than at 2 a.m the Monday morning of finals to be awoken by the lovely sound of the building fire alarm going off for what seems like the 100th time this year. At this point, I'm convinced if it ever was a real fire, we will all die because no one will leave their apartment. On my day of move-in the fire alarm in my room was faulty and I was luckily able to get it fixed and installed correctly. However, there are apparently still rooms that go off for no reason to this day. On the fire alarm incident from last night (where it went off at 2 a.m then again at 9 a.m) we were sent an email stating how a resident pulled the alarm??? Which I find hard to believe as there is a mutual hatred for the fire alarms throughout the entire building so I do not see someone voluntarily pulling it. I feel it is just them trying to cover up the fact they were not installed correctly.

My roommate upon move-in had a leaking ceiling that stained her comforter a gross orange color and it took threatening to go to the news to report the issues for them to finally come take it seriously as they focus so much on their social appeal. She also had no ceiling fan installed and just a single hanging light.

The floor below us apparently had their ceiling light leaking due to our dishwasher that was installed incorrectly (or had a missing part, something like that). The girls came up and told us about it so we were aware of the issue but the maintenance guy that came was very creepy. He hid to the side of the door (out of view from the peep-hole) and when we finally opened the door to see if he was gone he barged right in without saying anything. Luckily, we knew about the situation because the girls came and told us but if we didn't then it would have been very scary for four girls to just have a random man barge in at midnight. The it took them 3 weeks to finally fix our dishwasher.

THE WALLS ARE PAPER THIN. I have the absolute JOY of sharing a wall with the trash chute. Every Sunday morning like clockwork I get woken up with glass bottles falling down it. As I'm trying to study, as I'm doing homework, the trash chute always makes its entrance. You can hear people running in the hallways outside the apartment from inside your room. You can hear conversations from your other roommate's rooms even with all of the doors closed. Parties a floor below you are heard loud and clear

Location of some of the apartments is terrible. You apparently have to pay extra next year to have the balcony that faces inward. However, if you look out the window to one of the elevator rooms, there are balconies that look directly at a wall. What is the point of paying extra when your view is a wall? My room is located in a corner, I have one window and it looks into other rooms so I do not feel comfortable having it open, making it virtually useless. It feels ridiculous to pay this amount of money for a view into other apartments.

Cell service is a nightmare. My family lives hours away from me and calls cut out every five minutes. If my head isn't basically touching the window, I have no service. This isn't an issue of the cell service provider, it's a building issue. Going out front doesn't even work. You to walk away from the building to regain service.

When they first installed the gate on the car garage, everyone had issues. It wouldn't let people in or out without our car being in a specific spot. I had to fully back up once and have someone else open the gate as my tag wouldn't work. This isn't but a building issue but just a forewarning: people also SUCK at driving in the parking garage, I have almost been hit five times and most of the time it's because people don't realize it's a one-way parking garage and end up going down the wrong way, almost hitting you.

On the bright side, the staff that works in the front has been nice and helpful. That's...

Upon move in day, The Deacon was unfinished. Trinitas Ventures is the company responsible. The parking garage was littered with glass, nails, garbage, and construction debris on every floor. The backdoor by University Ct had a missing glass panel - anyone could stick their hand through and unlatch the door. My studio wasn’t terribly unfinished, but I’ve seen horror stories on Google Reviews with residents posting pictures of doors covered in mud, sawdust spewed everywhere, sludge spilling onto the beds through the ceiling, and broken windows.

The courtyard is an echo chamber. The building is simply too big with too many residents, the sound has nowhere to go but bounce off each wall, until it escapes from the 12th floor. After move-in, over 30 rooms were blasting music. It was so bad, I threatened to break my lease. In the first 2 months, I filed over 30 noise complaints to the staff and Cincinnati Police.

I learned from my manager The Deacon housed 400 Freshmen. While leasing said it would be marketed towards students, I thought the high price point and chic building would entice upperclassmen, graduate, and medical students along with professionals. This was more like a dorm, complete with RA’s. I’m a 2nd year Masters student!

A “no music policy” was enforced in the courtyard. But the fire alarms would be constantly going off in the winter past midnight, either by pranks or water pipes malfunctioning. I told a Cincinnati Firemen my complaints, and he responded, “You’re preaching to the choir. Ever since this place was built, we’ve been getting sensor malfunctions. They cut so many corners when they built this place.”

The front door always broke, but the cheap repairs would only hold up for about 2 weeks. Instead of replacing it with a secure system, it was left unlocked late at night. Don’t live here? No worries, you sloppy street chumps! You can just stroll in like it ain’t no thing! Security? Management let them go in the Spring because they were “unnecessary.” Cameras are completely absent on multiple floors, aside from the one facing the parking garage. Even after I wrote multiple times to the general manager, they were never installed. Residents would also be leaving their doors unlocked, and letting people in without key cards. A plethora of break-ins resulted - people literally kicking down doors and stealing electronics. The stories on google reviews again, are horrifying.

The front door was eventually replaced, but it took the work of tenants threatening Trinitas with a union meeting. Still, security cameras are missing and the fire alarms continued.

A common response from management here is, “We’re doing our best and your safety is our top priority!” What angers me is that management can’t do anything because their hands are tied by Trinitas Ventures and their CEO, Loren King. Trinitas is responsible for the safety of their tenants, but they choose to do nothing. Top class, this Loren King! Top class! If “your safety is our top priority,” then why hasn’t this been fixed?

Now for the positives. Of all my apartments, this studio was easily THE nicest. My previous studios placed everything in an open room. But here, mine has a wall separating the “bedroom” from the kitchen. They’re chic, hardwood floor apartment rooms. Though the paint scratches easily on the wall. My kitchen was on the small side, especially with a lack of counter space and no silverware drawer. But this is fixable with a kitchen cart on wheels. The lighting and TV are excellent, and the view from my balcony was nice.

The best part is proximity to the campus. It made getting back and forth to CCM so quick, it only takes 5-7 minutes to walk. You can’t complain about the lack of amenities, like the gym with every piece of equipment you need, or the 2 practice rooms.

As much as I want to rate The Deacon 4 stars, the terrible opening combined with Trinitas cutting corners on safety brings this review down to 3 stars. For anyone experiencing firealarms and poor security, I would directly email Trinitas at...

Do not live here. One thing we quickly realized is the Deacon cares about their social appeal, not about their residents. I have a solid list of reasons this place is not worth any money, much less $800+ per month. I left in December and still am not completely out since 2 months after moving out, they tried to slip a fee in claiming I never turned my keys in, which was luckily disproved by a confirmation email we forced them to draw up. Move-in process. The Deacon was not near living standards when they opened the doors. Dust and construction debris caked the hallways, some rooms didn't even have appliances installed for weeks, and pipes were leaking in multiple locations. A few hours after moving in, I came back to find my comforter and sheets completely stained orange, with an metallic smelling substance leaking from the exposed pipe above my bed. Also, there was no ceiling fan in my room, just a single lightbulb with no fixture. Maintenance. Going off the issues with my room, I immediately went to the front desk and reported the pipes obviously being damaged. The worker first told me to file a report on the app and when I tried, it was obvious the app didn't work. Instead, he wrote my emergency issue on a post-it note and told me it would be taken care of. After waiting all day, I went back down and asked a different worker. To no surprise, they had no record of my report. Finally, after I had put in no less than 4 reports over a span of 3 days, my mother had to threaten the Deacon with John Matarese from the news, who wanted to run a story immediately. Once their social reputation was threatened, I immediately got attention (still no ceiling fan for 2 weeks). Safety. It's no secret that Clifton has its' fair share of crime, just like any college campus. One of the reasons I was drawn to the Deacon and okay with forking out the high rent was because of the safety features they offered, such as security cameras, secure entrances and guards. Read any of the reviews below and you will see how well the cameras have helped residents who get robbed. As for secure entrances, they don't exist. Honestly, the clubhouse and study areas are pretty luxe, if you can even get to them through the people who don't even live there just walking in. When it comes to guards, they can't help with anything while their sleeping and aloof on the clock. Admin. To be fair, everyone at the front desk does a great job at running their social media, telling everyone what they want to hear, and leaving fraudulent 5-star reviews on their own company. I can't overestimate the amount of times a front desk employee told me one thing while the next told me the opposite. There were some people in the administration that were helpful along the way, and like clockwork, the next time I would go to them for help, they'd have quit unexpectedly. "Subleasing". UC has a giant co-op program. CEAS, Lindner, DAAP, and some CECH students filter in and out of campus every other semester, creating a huge demand for a subleasing option. Every other place on campus accommodates this, but no matter what the Deacon promises you, this is not the case. Sure enough, once we start the process of finding someone to fill our spots, we are hit with claims that subleasing was never in the talks, and definitely not an option for the future. When I met with a then-higher up of the company (Eli), he promised me that come spring when I left for co-op, they would have a solution figured out. Once again, I went to meet with him, and he had quit the company. Instead of subleasing, the Deacon makes you completely transfer your lease to another person, pay a $500 fee, and then when you come back, re-pay all of the application and redecorating fees. This would be fine if it's what I went into the situation expecting, but when Eli promised me one thing, then quits, and Diane King in the office writes it off as a "miscommunication", it says a lot about how they run behind the scenes. Morgan in the office has been the only helpful one throughout...