Woodlake Oaks — Attraction in Houston

This is my full 30 day review: I got a job in Houston & only had 2 1/2 weeks to relocate from DFW, So relocating to a new city & starting a new job can already be stressful so finding the right space to live is important. Well after a ton of Google searches I narrowed it down to 2 properties that were unknowingly both owned by the same company (Richland Properties). Woodlake on the Bayou & Woodlake Oaks. Doing the online application & paying for the application fee was fairly easy. *Note my application fee was $265 each (yikes) a little pricey. However, I expected to have to pay something.

The Tour: I then drive 4 hours from Dallas -Fort Worth to Houston to tour both properties & make my final decision. I first visited this property (Woodlake Oaks) and was greeted by 2 friendly office staff (Liz & Lynette). Lynette informed me that the property that I had chosen online was not available however, she stated she found me an alternative property for the same price point and gave me a tour of the grounds & the amenities. You could tell Lynette was a former real estate agent as she was very assuring & answered all my questions. The property itself is a little dated but is relatively clean & feels like an old villa in Louisiana somewhere. 2 Pools & small gym with free weights, 2 clean laundry facilities, & a mail room where Amazon/UPS/FedEx/USPS can leave your packages in a secure pass-code system. Lynette stated that my apartment was not really ready to see however I insisted that she show me as I want to see what it looks like before I made my decision. She opened up the door & I was shockingly surprised....I was expecting the worse & it was not bad at all. The one bedroom is huge...it has a big living area w/a fire place....a nice bedroom with a huge closet (you could literally fit a small bed in there) & a private patio surrounded by a wooden gate. The bathroom was nice as it has a huge sink area & a separate door for the shower & toilet. The kitchen is nice as well...my only doing is the the cabinets are all white and the counter tops are a speckled black & white color that looks like Oreo's & cream ice cream color. However one little neat feature is this little french door that goes from the kitchen to the living room...so that you can serve your guest like a drive though or a restaurant. Also there is a lot of carpet except for the dining room, kitchen & bathroom. So although this unit didn't come with a washer & dryer connection the laundry unit is right next door. Which is fine...because I still go to the laundry mat to wash my blankets & sheets every month. So I told Lynette that I still have to tour the sister property (which was literally right next door) called Woodlake on the Bayou owned by the same company. Lynette stated 'No problem, you will be back" with a little smirk. So after touring the other property...(she was right.....it was a night & day difference in almost every way.). So I signed my paperwork & told both Lynette & Liz that I would be ordering my furniture & having them delivered to the new address & I was worried that since I wont be there to receive them that I needed them to be looked after or brought inside the unit to avoid someone stealing them or getting damaged by inclement weather. They both assured me that would not be a problem.

Moving day: They kept their word and not only were my things brought inside the apartment was cleaned & ready for me after a 4 hour drive. I was so relieved & once I got everything settled this place felt like home. It's quiet....at night it is lit up like a resort. The staff is (still friendly) & accommodating. Lastly because I already paid 2 application fees to the same company...they applied that application fee to my account as a credit. This area is really nice & feels safe. There is a park & tennis courts right next door & you are less than a 5 minute drive from all the stores on Westheimer Blvd. After starting over this is a great spot to do it . The rent is super affordable & everyone seems very nice. I would...

0/10 There is Black mold inside the buildings vents. Foundations collapsing into the bayou. Tracy will laugh in your face when you bring her legit issues and outright deny provable facts like employees taking reserved payed for parking spots. The manager Trevor feigns ignorance and never follows up on anything. Please check out the photos attached to this review for undeniable proof of all these claims. The valet trash service that they don’t let you opt out of is literally where you pay for people to come at any time of the night to pick up and drag trash all over your building and leave it. I wish I was joking but we have multiple videos of this from our Ring camera. One time they came at 3:30 am (they are supposed to come between 7-9 pm) and the woman screamed right outside our bedroom window because of a cockroach on the trash. Waking our dogs and us in the middle of the night. Then she dragged and left open trash and half full bags all over the building. This is the third time this month they have left trash everywhere, right in front of our door, all down the stairs, on every floor, there is literal open and rotting trash. When we call the office to say “hey there’s trash all over our building again. Can someone please pick it up?” they say “someone will get to it today and I’m so sorry about that” and yet maintenance just left for the day and we still have trash all over the building. It’s impossible to walk around and attracts so many roaches and raccoons right up to your front door for a tasty snack of garbage meat sitting and baking in the 100+ degree TX sun all day. More roaches have been coming inside the building because of the trash service. Our building is also literally leaning into the bayou as we watch the grass slowly fall in week after week and the hole get closer to the buildings foundation. I truly wouldn’t be surprised if a building collapses. We also have had a hole maintenance cut into our wall to “resolve” some water leaking in the building. The hole remains unpatched since January. Even I know how to patch and spackle a wall. The “maintenance” employee with the red truck likes to park in multiple payed for reserved spots. It seems he got away with this until we moved here and got really pissy after we insisted a spot we pay for stays empty. Mind you when the same employee came in our unit to do maintenance, we were very nice to him and even gave him some imported cookies we had very few of. After months of going back and forth and not being able to use our payed for spot (and constantly resisting the urge to call a tow truck and actively trying not to make an enemy of the employees) we went to the new manager Trevor. We showed him the photos from months of this truck taking our spot and the adjacent one. After a supposed talking to from Trevor the maintenance guy finally stopped parking his personal vehicle there. But the problem is not resolved at all because they still park their little golf karts in reserved & payed for spots and directly adjacent to them in the small walkway between the covered payed for spots. Obviously this makes the spot totally unusable for the people literally being charged monthly for it. Maintenance are rude even after we tried for months to nicely get them to stop taking our payed spot the guy stares at us to the point that my little brother (who is a minor) said he was creeped out by it. A literal teenage boy immediately saw and commented on how creepy this guy is. The maintenance also on numerous occasions has used a saw right in front of the path and they leave broken glass & metal shavings all over the cement in front where lots of dogs walk everyday. I would not recommend this place to anyone especially because of the “trash service” and bad attitude of maintenance employees to park their vehicles wherever they want and refuse a simple patch and spackle job for months. Update 07/10 the 3 maintenance guys still park the golf carts blocking...

**9/12/2019

Update: Brand new management staff(Karen and Bianca are the only ones I've actually met) have been so on top of things. Still some room for improvement on notifying tenants when strangers are going to be entering their home, to avoid people thinking they're being burglarized and the danger that can lead too. But other than that, tremendous improvements on the property. They immediately got to work on simple things like making sure the lighting was working, as before large portions of the complex was in the dark at night.. .a criminals playground. I have not seen the front gate stuck open in a long time and if it ever was, they fixed it immediately. Before, it would malfunction and be left stuck open for weeks. I haven't noticed the pedestrian gate behind my bldg(which was an easy entrance/exit point for people sneaking into the apt complex) being propped open or the handle manipulated in a while. This same time last year, my apartment was being burglarized while I was at work. This year I dont think we've had any incidents. I don't think the criminals got tired, I think they see more steps are being taken to deter them and make it harder for them. I feel much safer than I did last year, even renewed my lease. Keep up the good work Ladies and all of those empty apartments will start to fill back up.

9/26/2018

Crime has greatly increased over the last 6 months. Neither Woodlakes Oaks Apts, or their corporate entity Richdale Apts, has made any reasonable effort to deter this escalating activity, other than turning on the lights in the front guard shack to give the illusion of security on site(when in fact there is no security presence whatsoever) and parking a security car by the gate that is moved around in the parking lot to appear someone is using it. There has been attempted homicides, repeated robberies/home invasions, assaults with deadly weapons, gang signs sprayed all over the property, etc. Last week, while at work, my apt was burglarized during broad daylight while the leasing office was open and with maintenance crews driving all around the property. Criminals have become so emboldened by the lack of response to their crime sprees, that they are now coming in during the day. A few months ago, over 30 cars were broken into in one night, with them having time to go from car to car, as there was/is no security walking the premises. In July, there was a home invasion where the tenant was shot in the chest. Despite the continuous, and obviously escalating criminal actions here, Richdale Apts corporate office states they have no plans for additional security measures to deter this activity. A few weeks before my break-in, I complained to the front office of suspicious people loitering around the pool area in front of my bldg(they were obviously casing the grounds and knew when I was leaving for work everyday), but received no response, despite the property manager acknowledging receiving the complaint. She also stated kicking these same people out of the complex just a few days before my break-in, for loitering at the leasing office's pool and breaking into the gym at night to sleep. No trespassing report was filed, that would have at least alerted HPD to be on the look out. I believe these same people broke into my apt. They've been living in the complex and are probably the same people who have been continuously breaking into tenants apts and cars for months. They've had all the time in the world to case the complex, observe the lack of response to their crime sprees, and will most likely continue said activities as they see how easy it is to do. This is a very serious matter affecting the safety of the tenants, that is not being taken seriously and which I fear is going to lead to someone losing their life.

I have yet to hear back from anyone at Richdale Apts Corporate Offices, despite emailing them and making a complaint...