Allen House Apartments — Local services in Houston

This place is not worth the money. The location is prime, but this place is falling apart.

My ceiling fan literally fell out of my ceiling, almost crushing my cat, parts of the ceiling in the hallways would fall out as well. You would have to walk over chunks of ceiling leaving or coming home and nothing would be done about them for a few days. Also, if you don't mind leaks in your ceilings, then you may enjoy the units. All of my neighbors said they had leaks in their ceilings.

RATS GALORE. It's disgusting. Granted, in the city, critters and stuff are outside, but when they start making their way into the apartments, that's where I draw the line. Not tiny little mice either, RATS.

My apartment also gave my indoor cat horrendous fleas. She was flea free before we moved there, and then all of a sudden she has them everywhere. We cleaned everything and washed everything and sprayed and she still had them during our duration at the apartment.

When you walk in, you think the complex is cute and stuff, and it's very obvious its old. Well, it may be cute, but don't forget that it's OLD. Their A/C units are so old that they don't cool properly. (They told me they don't cool more then 20 degrees less than what it is outside.) Yes, it's hot in Houston. Your apartment isn't going to be 60 degrees during the day. I work for an HVAC company and my dad also owns one, so we have a pretty extensive amount of knowledge about how A/C units should work. After THREE times of complaining about the A/C and telling them to stop changing out the filter because that wasn't working, I got the maintenance guy to come out again and I was able to be home when he came to see what he did. He was ARGUING with me (very professional) and then his idea of fixing my A/C was closing a vent. There's an airflow problem, maintenance guys can't even get to evaporator, and the unit probably hasn't been cleaned since 1985. So after he "fixed" it, we still had to have the A/C running at 68 and 4 portable fans just to get to 75 at NIGHT. Which in return ran up our electricity bill and we were almost paying as much as a 2 story house's electricity bill. So having to go the whole summer with crappy A/C and maintenance guy who "fixed" it kind of showed me how important their tenants were to them.

The only good thing about this place is the location and the leasing staff was nice. But those reasons alone could never make up for what we went through.

This is the first review I've ever written about anything. I wasn't even going to write a review about living here and just make peace and not recommend this place to friends. But they decided to nickel and dime us though and charge us OVER our deposit for things that we shouldn't even be getting charged for. Tripling our utilities when we haven't even lived there for almost a month? Because that makes sense. Charging us for carpet removal when they didn't change out the carpet for us when we moved in. Trash removal when we took everything out of that apartment. I could understand a measly cleaning fee that I would have been happy to pay, but if they think they are getting 400 bucks more than our deposit, they must be crazy.

And for a place that is rumored to be torn down and turned into a high-rise like the one next to it, which they also own, I'm not giving them money to fix stupid things and pay for a completely new building. Things should have been fixed a long time ago.

I would not waste my time...

Other than the location of these apartments and how quiet they are, I have overall not had the best experience living here. I'm breaking my lease 10 months early after 4 months living here. Building is not up to code and I have had to call 311 to open cases on them for safety hazards, health hazards, and obstruction of tenant rights. There is a staircase right on the other side of the wall of my bedroom that is leaning and separating from the building. The fees are ridiculous. You are paying about $150 extra for fees on top of the rent and your own utilities. These fees include paying to have a dumpster on site for you to throw away your own trash, paying to have water connected to the building (this does not include your own separate water utility bill), paying for the building to have a sewer, paying for the building to have a drainage system, and a fee to have your utilities processed and connected by admin. If you have a car, you will pay for an unsecured parking spot as well and if you live in a 2 bedroom unit you will only get one parking spot. Very difficult process to sign up and start the lease. Calling the office is pointless because no one answers. The maintenance service is pretty organized and the maintenance workers are very friendly, especially when my washer and dryer needed to be replaced and when I accidentally locked myself out. That is one good thing but it is very obvious that everything is just painted and coated over very sloppily in between tenants.There is a big issue with their plumbing and sewage system. I have to "unclog" my shower drain every week for some reason and about half of the time when I turn on my sink it smells like rotting sewage. Big mold issue. I have had nonstop allergies since moving in. I didn't want to live here in the first place since all of these issues are pretty obvious when you first see the place but the roommate I had doesn't understand how apartment renting works, can't take no for an answer, and can't handle being wrong, so I was overruled. Here I am having the worst experience with not just the most inconsiderate roommate ever but also the frustrations with the very low quality of these apartments. I would say it isn't too bad of a deal to live here temporarily but the shortest lease you can do is 14 months so I just highly recommend looking else where. Better off with grumpy individual...

I’ve lived at Allen House Apartments for almost a year now so I feel like I can now provide an honest review. Built in 1974, the property is in a safe neighborhood in North Montrose/River Oaks area near the Buffalo Bayou Park and trails, only about 10 minutes from downtown. It is also close to all the shopping and eating options one could ever want. Now, because it is an older (and more affordable) property you can’t expect brand new appliances and upscale features. That being said, there are many cute built-in shelves and such inside the units, the courtyards and pools offer an abundance of cozy charm and plenty of community grills and outdoors space. The staff in the leasing office are all very considerate and responsive, always happy to help when something is needed, especially Leon and Braxton. What matters most is that when there is a maintenance emergency due to outdated fixtures and what not, someone is sent rather quickly. I had a water leak before 6 am and someone was there to assist within 15 minutes and the issue was entirely resolved by early afternoon. Israel is an expert at his trade, and I trust him in my home anytime. It is a very pet-friendly community, and the area is safe to walk the pups with many stations for poop bagging and disposal. The staff at Allen House seem to truly welcome and care for our pets, almost as much as we do!