Bala Woods at Kingwood Apartments — Local services in Houston

DO YOURSELF A FAVOR AND DON'T EVER MOVE HERE! I have never left a review before, but if I could give this place 0 stars, I would. This is by far the worst and most poorly run apartment I have ever lived at. The management is nice but completely incompetent.

The last 5 months of living here has just been one thing after another. Management is completely disorganized, no one ever answers the phones and it goes straight to voicemail for every call, and emails go unanswered for weeks and you have to follow up constantly to get any communication.

Maintenance is a complete mess and no one ever knows what they're doing or communicates with the rest of the team. They claim it takes them 48 hours to complete requests but that's a lie. It takes at a minimum of 3-4 weeks to get something as simple a lightbulb replaced and that's only after you follow up about your request a few times. This is also an extremely old apartment, so things break all the time.

They also will show up unannounced and bang on your door and ring your doorbell multiple times even after you select the option on their app to contact you first and have told management that this is an issue because you work from home and you're on client meetings every single time, yet they still have been doing it for months now. There have been times they come to fix something and they have no idea why they're even here, so I'll have to explain what request I submitted, but most of the team can't speak English, so they'll just call the front office and hand the phone to me to translate with no explanation, so I'll have to stop my workday to figure out their job for them. There have also been times they try to convince me that what I need fixed doesn't actually need to be fixed and will then just leave and mark my maintenance request as complete.

For the first 2 months I lived here, my AC was pouring water out of the ceiling every time it shut off, smelled like an electrical fire every time it ran, and banged around and shook the whole ceiling when it would kick on and they tried to tell me that's just how it is and they weren't going to replace it. After multiple requests, they finally agreed to replace the coil months later. At that point, it had already run my electricity bill up to $360 for one month.

There are roaches, the gates break every week, the walls are paper thin and you can hear everything, the toilets never flush, there are light switches that don't work, all the water has faulty plumbing on what's hot/cold, mosquitoes will swarm in anytime you open the front door because there's permanent standing water on the grounds, you're literally on the train tracks and the train will shake the walls of your apartment even down to your pillows all hours of the day and night, and expect to pay $180-$360 every month on electricity since the unit is so old and not energy efficient.

The amenities are so poorly maintained even though you're paying luxury prices to live here. The pool area is covered with tree debris, has broken chairs, and dirty water. The gym is literally a closet that smells like mildew with no fans and the AC kept way too high with no way to adjust it.

There have been multiple issues with packages saying delivered but they're not in the mailbox and when talking to Ajee about this, he claimed he had never heard that complaint before when there have been multiple reviews of others experiencing the same issue. After talking with a neighbor, they said their packages got delivered to the office and no one ever told them and they would just show up on their porch after complaining, and sure enough, my missing packages showed up on my doorstep the day after I talked to the office about it and they claimed it was a postal service issue I would need to file separately with USPS.

Don't believe any of the positive reviews. For this place to claim they're newly renovated and luxury apartments is just a lie and it's a scam they charge as much as they do. The biggest mistake I ever made was living here, and I'll be getting out of my lease as soon...

I'm going to start with a list of cons first, so I can end the review with the good.

CONS Stupid layout - My neighbor's garage door is directly underneath my bedrooms in my "2" bedroom Juniper layout. My neighbor left ~15 times a night (NO exaggeration) for about 10-15 minutes at a time. This was a nightmare after first moving in. Luckily, as I'm sure they didn't want to raise suspicion to their activities, they started parking outside after the issue was raised. ZERO pest control! - I have had an infestation of fruit gnats pretty much since I moved in. They were not very bothersome over the winter, but come summer they have infested my apartment and garage! The apartment complex here has shifted to "valet" trash (that has been unreliable) and, in an effort to remove unsightly trash bags on the curb, provided bins to put trash in. These are so close to the "flower beds" outside that they become a feeding ground for these gnats, which then enter your apartment through the front door, through the garage door, and even into your car as you park. I've had to "bomb" my garage twice (producing hundreds of dead fruit gnats) and have had 7 fly strips hanging in my apartment just to get the issue to subside. I actually just killed one as I'm writing this review on my computer in my $1300/mo apartment. Poor facilities - I have had my air conditioning on all day trying to get to a reasonable temperature of 72°F. The air conditioner has been unable to keep up with the 98°F weather outside and actually raised 3.3 degrees through the day to ~76°F. The current air handling unit was manufactured last century and is undersized as well (according to Trane's website). In addition, there is ZERO insulation in the roof/rafters/attic of my particular apartment. The heat in the non-air conditioned closets is unreal and this is just the beginning of the summer. No actual 24/7 courtesy service - I had placed a call in to the courtesy officer around midnight one night, as someone had parked behind my guest's car, and was simply told he didn't work there any longer. No action taken against disobedient tenants - My apartment smells like weed every single day when I get home. I don't really care what other people do, and definitely don't have a problem with something that should have been legalized decades ago, but when it starts to impact the quality of living in my apartment, that sucks. I have raised this issue with MGMT on multiple occasions and had zero luck.

Pros Nice attached garage layout - This provides the ability to pull into your garage on a rainy day and get inside without getting rained on. The garage size is nice and the washer/dryer is in the garage, so if there are any issues, it doesn't impact the apartment proper. Sense of community - Tenants here definitely have a sense of community, helping each other out, and are very friendly. On multiple occasions we had to band together to make MGMT take us seriously when real issues came up with neighbors, activities, or things that occurred, so it's definitely a plus when you have a few people in your area that look out for you. Actually decent staff - Although the staff sometimes seems to coddle and possibly dismiss your genuine issues, I believe they have good intentions. They may count on their maintenance staff and third parties for pest control and trash, but things rarely get taken care of to completion. The staff seems to put the general community first, cracking down on parking violations and trying to keep poor behavior from spreading in the community, so I'll definitely give them that. Parking - Take a look at IMT Kingwood because that is the worst community I have ever lived in. There are cars on the street, aggressive towing, and general shadiness from IMT Kingwood. At Bala Woods, that just doesn't happen.

I wish I could give this community a higher rating. Although the community is strong, the dedication to providing an excellent living experience to this resident inside my residence...

Resident since 2019. CAF Management took over this property in February of 2022.

My final overall assessment of Bala Woods is 2 star. Rocky start when new management first took over but the vibe just isn't the same. Many of the issues I originally addressed have been resolved (thus they've been removed along with the photos). The office staff is nice for the most part but much credit for the professionalism I have ALWAYS received from the HARD WORKING maintenance team (Alejandro and the team gets 4 stars).

Prior to CAF, Bala Woods felt like HOME and a community, it never felt like we were living in apartments. It was that sense of community that had us choose this place because honestly if we based it on apples to apples comparison, the surrounding apartments are newer and superior. Sadly once CAF took over there was a mass exodus of some really good people that had lived there for years and that vibe was just gone. The cheap "revamp" of the homes were meant to give it a more modern vibe but really it just killed the character of our hidden lil garden community. They removed EVERYTHING that set Bala Woods apart, they threw away the very reasons we selected to live there. Maybe new tenants will find it appealing, if they can keep them because since mid 2022 it's been a literal revolving door of people moving in and out of there. You see a moving truck weekly. Majority of the good reviews on here were solicited by Andrea the property manager or they're for the maintenance team. I'm not telling you NOT to move there but what I am saying is that if you're going to pay luxury price for luxury amenities I would recommend any of the other apartments within 5 miles radius our rent a house for a less than what they are charging. Ultimately this is all my personal opinion and honest assessment from MY POV. Best of luck to you.

**UPDATED AS OF 07/18/2023 CONS: -Mail is left on top of mailboxes by residents BUT... it has improved somewhat. -Treadmill and Bench Press cable in the gym have been OOS since SEPTEMBER 2022. TODAY IS NOW AUGUST 31ST 2023 STILL OOS. -The updated lights are so offensively bright that many of us had to put coverings over the windows above our door if not, this EXTREMELY BRIGHT WHITE light blasts into your living room. It is what it is I suppose.

UPDATED 01/12/24: *as of 11/19/23 OOS gym equipment still hadn't been replaced. *We moved out on 11/20/23, of course there's all these goofy bs charges we get hit with. Like trying to charge us to replace a carpet that was over 5 years old, the padding was worn as hell. Our final water bill was DOUBLE any water bill we've ever had living there with no explanation. I expected this from...