Crystal Towers Apartments — Attraction in Washington

🚨 AMAZON HQ2 EMPLOYEES, DO NOT LIVE HERE UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. 🚨

My roommate and I lived here during the course of our internships at Amazon HQ2. The horrors of this apartment were truly never ending and we experienced immense disgust and discomfort right up until our final day of living here. Our first apartment (that's right, we had to MOVE apartments within the first month) was absolutely infested with cockroaches. There were cockroaches crawling the floors and walls in our bedrooms, bathrooms, kitchen, and living room, and we also found cockroach eggs (even inside the utensil drawers). We had JUST moved into the apartment, meaning the infestation was pre-existing (despite what the leasing office tried to suggest). We saw at least 40 roaches in our barely four weeks in this unit, and when we tried to reach out to the staff to help us, they offered to have pest control spray once a week or to have us completely move units. We were reluctant to move units since we had very heavy furniture that was very difficult to move, and the staff made it perfectly clear that they would be absolutely no help in the moving process. After four weeks of suffering through an indescribable amount of cockroach sightings, despite being "guaranteed" that the problem would go away within two weeks (a direct quote from the staff at the front desk), it was clear that the situation would not improve. We had to move apartments with absolutely ZERO help or support from the staff. I had incredibly heavy furniture that I had to move entirely by myself from the North tower to the South tower. Yet, we tried to put it past us and attempt to enjoy the rest of our internships, which were down to only 8 weeks remaining at this point. Upon moving into our new apartment, we noticed large gaps beneath the patio door that gave plenty of room for insects to enter, and indicated so in our move-in form. There was a "nest" (for lack of a better word) of dead mosquitoes in the corner of the living room and flies, mosquitoes, and spiders around constantly, but we still tried to make the most of it. About one week into living in the new apartment, my roommate screamed at the sight of MICE running behind our oven. There were at least 3 mice behind our oven WHILE we were cooking. In shock and desperation, we tried to call the "24/7 service", and were met with the response from the staff that "it was not an emergency" so could not be dealt with at the time. We had to find alternate housing for the night because we simply could not live in our apartment knowing mice were there, which was of course not compensated by Crystal Towers. The maintenance technician who came to discover the source of the mice identified a THREE FOOT HOLE behind our oven. THREE FEET of room for mice to enter from. He himself was in shock, apologizing on behalf of the building for such a grave error. The amount of time we devoted to speaking to the entire staff is truly insane. We collectively spent numerous hours trying to convey the seriousness of the situation, yet were constantly met with attitude and reluctance from the staff. When we insisted on some form of compensation, they offered to compensate us $250, which was in no way, shape, or form a satisfactory amount for all of the emotional stress and trauma, but we accepted anyways since we knew that was the most they would do. At this point we REALLY hoped that it was all over. On the last week of our lease, I walked into my kitchen and, in complete and utter shock, discovered yet another mouse. The pest and rodent problem in this apartment complex cannot be overstated. We struggled MUCH more in this apartment than in any place we have ever collectively lived in BY FAR. Do not under any circumstance rent a unit in this apartment.

Crystal Towers, I am not interested in speaking with any representatives so please do not respond to this with a comment suggesting that. The amount of time I have already spent speaking with the staff is truly unacceptable.

tl;dr Cockroach infestation, moved apartments, mice and insects in...

I moved into Crystal Towers in June 2017 and will be moving out in the next couple of weeks. I wanted to take some time and provide an honest review of the community based on my experiences over the past two years. Overall, Crystal Towers has been a great place to live, especially for young professionals working in Northern Virginia or Washington DC. I will list out some of the pros and cons of Crystal Towers below:

Pros:

Location - Crystal Towers is a 3 minute walk to the Crystal Towers Metro Station and is only two stops away from L’Enfant Plaza. If you time it right, you can get to Nationals Park within 20 minutes. The Crystal City/Pentagon City neighborhood has numerous restaurants, grocery stores, shopping centers, etc. There is always something near by to satisfy your needs.

Apartment Size/Value - Considering Crystal Towers is an older building (built in the mid 1960’s), the apartments are very large compared to modern apartments in the area. In my two years, I lived in a spacious studio and a massive one bedroom apartment. Rooms and closets are very large and walls/floors/ceilings are very thick so noise from neighbors is always minimal. My current one bedroom apartment is around 1000 square feet with a massive balcony. I could see paying 2-3 times more for this floor plan in a new building or in DC.

Staff - Literally every member of the staff is extremely friendly, from custodial staff to maintenance staff, to the concierges and the leasing office. I want to give a special shout-out to Luana in the Leasing Office and Arben at the Concierge Desk.

Amenities - In the past two years, Crystal Towers has invested a lot in terms of updating the community’s amenities. There is now a beautiful gym, an AstroTurfed dog run, and wonderful club room.

Cons:

General - The hallways in the community could use some updating. The carpets and walls leading to individual units are very tired and in many cases stained or scuffed.

Pool - While the pool yard is beautiful, I have been very disappointed by how short the pool season is. The pool is only open between Memorial Day and Labor Day. There have been several days in the upper 80’s and 90’s since the pool closed this season. Management could easily extend the pool season by another month. Also, the company contracted to provide lifeguard services has been very hit or miss. There have been seasons where the lifeguards have enforced rules that are directly contradictory to posted signs in the pool yard and in our lease terms. There have been some lifeguards that are very friendly and some that clearly don’t want to be there. Every day I enjoyed the pool while living here there had been some sort of verbal altercation between the lifeguards and tenants. One other thing that I find very strange is the pool remains uncovered, filled, and heated year round. I feel that it is very wasteful for the community to pay for the heating of the pool throughout the winter instead of having the pool winterized and fully closed.

Parking - There are a number of very affordable parking options ranging from surface parking, to garage parking in an adjacent (but connected) property, and in Crystal Towers’ garage. The garage doors are constantly broken and cars have been vandalized. When the doors are broken anyone can freely enter or leave the garage. It has become a frequent target for wheel thefts.

Overall I find that the pros far outweigh the cons. It saddens me to be leaving the community that has been my home for the past two years but it is time for me to move on to a location in DC. I would rate the property 4/5 stars and highly recommend the property to all of my friends who are interested in moving...

FAIR AND HONEST REVIEW:

What you get is a large apartment and a nice lobby. Thats where it ends. The units are filled with roaches and the garbage stench is pretty bad most days. Carpet in the hallways is filthy and they keep saying they will replace it next year. It never happens.

Dont be fooled by the lobby, while it is always nice smelling and temperature controlled the units don't have the option of air conditioning on many hot days. The lobby also doubles as an outdoor gym when school is out as children race through and shout. The building is not committed to any standard whatsoever, they do the minimum,, show you a nice lobby and that's where it ends.

There are constant hidden fees and you are not allowed to get packages here, you have to go through a third party FETCH and pay for it which means your packages get delayed sometimes for day, or lost forever on occasion. We even get preachy letters saying FETCH IS NOT OPTIONAL,

BY far the worst though is the new manager and her abusive front desk staff. The front desk staff yells and abuses residents to the point that they are afraid to ask for anything except by email. When lined up everyone can be heard saying things like wish me luck and I hope she's not in one of her moods. I didnt know this when I signed the lease but management is obviously happy with this abuse because it costs them less in repairs and maintenance when people are afraid to voice concerns. An elderly woman left in tears the other day. She doesnt use email and didnt know how to get help but the front desk just kept yelling at her saying it's not my problem. Awful, Everyone is afraid to help the elderly woman for fear they will be retaliated against too. Hard to believe in such a large building but this woman is clearly protected by someone. She must know really bad things that they cant fire her.

Pot and cigarette smoking from every balcony and every stairwell is also a problem. If you complain they demand proof. And residents smoke pot in their units all day which goes into other units. The front desk staff protects smokers despite it being a non smoking building. They laugh when you tell them or worse shout-"what you want me to do about it?" It's sometimes wonder if they hired an ex con to run the desk. It would make sense.

The building is close to the metro but there are homeless at all hours of the day and its no longer safe to take metro. The Marriot now locks their access to outsiders after dark so you really only have the option of taking uber or walking under a dark and scary bridge with homeless sleeping and defacating right in front of you.

The store in the basement is well stocked and the dog park is very nice but the pool is closed 10 months out of the year. They just keep the chairs out to trick new residents.

There are about 20 signs on the front desk telling people what to do...dont lean, dont talk, dont touch, and oh...some snide remark about being nice. Can you believe it? Don't touch the desk? These fascist signs didnt exist before the new manager.

Cars are towed in seconds so delivery people dont want to come here anymore resulting in delays and Im sure the front desk is told to facilitate more towings and more fees. The new front desk manager is truly awful. She shouts at everyone and holds court that suits her. She must have some dirt on the owners that they dont fire her.

Dweck owns many of the buildings here so they probably don't feel they have to improve. And management obviously is being told to minimise costs any way they can.

It is close to Costco and Whole Foods but the surrounding buildings have blocked our access so you have to walk around.

Good if you have a big dog and...