Carlyle Apartments — Local services in Irvine

I normally don't leave comments. In my whole life this is only the second time I have felt compelled to leave a comment so that anyone thinking of moving here understands what they are getting into. When I first came here, they had a great staff who was attentive and met all my needs. They seem to have replaced these employees as I never see them anymore. All that is great and dandy, however, these employees do everything possible to avoid doing anything for you. I have called the leasing office almost every day at different times and NO ONE answers. I have actually gone down to the leasing office on several occasions where I knocked on the door and no one answered, even though I can hear them in the office laughing and talking. Then there is the time where my roof leaked a ton of water from the pipes above. It was at night and I actually slipped in the huge puddle on the floor. Do you think anyone called to ask if I was alright? I tried calling the emergency line and it did not take messages. I had to go through the online residential portal to report it and they didn't even come until the next morning. I understand that I moved here right when COVID hit so I have not been able to enjoy ANY of the amenities that come with paying this much rent. But to not offer any of the tenants SOME kind of discount is not right. Now having said that, things are slowly opening up. However, you have a two hour limit in the pool, no guests and you have to make an appointment. And the gym, which I really wanted to use has opened through appointments and the hours are 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Now I don't know about you, but I work those hours. They can at least keep it open until 9:00 pm so people who work can have the opportunity to work out. Also, the shortest lease they have is 14 months. The moment it is up I will move to somewhere where they care about their tenants. I moved here for all the things I DID NOT GET. The worst is customer service. I am a reasonable person. I get a lot of things are out of their control due to certain circumstances. But on the other hand, there is A LOT they have control of that they have chosen to neglect. RENTER BEWARE. There are a lot of places to choose from in Irvine if that is what you are looking for. Choose wisely. I am not surprised that I have seen person after person moving out. ALL have said that they raise the rent EVERY year. Their occupancy is so low now that they are offering referral fees. Please make sure before you choose to move here that you call them during the day to see if you get a live person. Be sure to call them after hours to see if you are able to get someone in case of an emergency. And please note that they shower is near your master closet - no windows and steam constantly builds up. I am constantly putting damp rid or something like that so my clothes do not get damp and moldy. Normally people say "you get what you pay for." In this case I got...

I must provide an update due to the recent issues I've incurred.

Part 1: In the beginning, while browsing everything was going well. The staff was courteous and was able to answer our questions as potential tenants. Once we got the ball rolling the lack of training and management guidance was immediately apparent. During the income verification process, I had informed the staff that my wife would have access to her pay stubs in 3 days/after the weekend on Monday. In the interim, I sent my pay stubs along with 6 months of bank statements. Fast forward to Sunday I was contacted by the leasing office requesting/inquiring about my wife's pay stubs. I felt pressured as I was speaking to a leasing rep who made me feel as though I would not pass the income verification process when I was more than qualified. That was strike 1, however, I calmly brushed it off after I was reassured that I would be approved, and they simply needed my wife's income verification.

Part 2: Then we noticed that they made an error with our leasing documents that was remedied well, however, there was some confusion, and this is where the lack of experience came in, unfortunately. To sum it up I was overtly told that because of the error THEY made when our lease renewal date came we would incur a $700 rent increase. When I immediately questioned the leasing agent on this it was disclosed that this was an arbitrary number.

Part 3: Fast forward to the day before move-in. We had a pre-inspection meeting, and our leasing agent was not in the office even though we had scheduled an appointment. Once we did meet with someone, they had no clue why we were there and looked bewildered. Then on move-in day no one was at the office to hand us our keys at the designated time. The leasing agent was 30 minutes late, clearly sick, did not have a mask on, and did not apologize for being late. Lastly, they had the audacity to ask my wife why we came in the day before.

Overall, this is an unacceptable moving experience. I attribute this to a lack of management guidance and training. I've lived at Greystar communities in the past and have never dealt with such unprofessionalism. Lastly, we do love our apartment and the vibe. It's just that management seems to take more pride in posting certification certificates on their desks rather than implementing what they've learned in training to make the future tenant experience...

We have very recently moved into our new spacious home from a beautiful large pool home and can honestly say that so far the transition has been beyond our expectations. The team they have here from the front office to maintenence has been superb! They’ve made us feel so welcomed and have been accommodating and efficient with all our requests so far. The location is absolutely perfect and we’ve been so happy with our choice of moving here after much research in not only Irvine but many surrounding areas such as Newport Beach, Costa Mesa and Aliso Viejo. We are very pleased with the room that we have including our large patio even though we don’t have a garage. We have a storage unit that’s conveniently located on the property as well and feel very safe with the security they have here. It feels so nice to sleep with our windows open and get the surrounding breezes. It’s not a huge community so it has a calming intimate environment and so far everyone we’ve met has been very friendly, kind and professional. There’s not a ton of amenities here but they are very nice, convenient and clean. My husband went from commuting 2 hrs each way and sometimes even 3 hrs or more to now 5-7 minutes. The rent for luxury living was the best that we could find for what we were looking for and although we are in the Central/Financial District of Irvine, for being in “city living” its very quiet in the evenings and weekends here and we are amazed by the little traffic we’ve experienced which was our whole goal in moving back south for a better...