Circa LA Apartments — Local services in Los Angeles

We lived at Circa for about 5 years across 3 different units. While the apartment and the amenities look great, we experienced a ton of problems during our time in the building.

For one, the building has constant water issues. This is because it was built cheaply and quickly, so they used PVC pipe instead of copper pipes in the building. We experienced issues with this twice:

1.) The pipe in the unit above us disconnected at a joint and caused our floor to flood. We needed to leave our unit for a period of time during the repairs.

2.) The pipes between units connect in the kitchen, so our neighbor put something down the disposal while we were out of town and the water from their dishwasher backed up into our unit.

There are also electrical problems. In our second unit, a connector in the wall that was not properly installed caused a surge that knocked out half of our power and fried my computer. The electrician attributed this again to the hasty build.

The building has ongoing mail theft issues. We constantly had packages that were marked as delivered that went missing. During our time in the building we had hundreds of dollars in packages get stolen. If the item was not valuable, it would come back to us open a few days later. We raised this concern with the building on several occasions.

Theft in the area is also an issue. I went down to my car a few times to find someone trying to steal my license plate.

Parking at the building is a pain and this is not the place for you if you are expecting to have guests over. They have adjusted the parking validation system three times in the last five years. Every time it changed, it reduced the amount the resident got and made it more complicated for the guest. Management was also not transparent about the changes or how they affected residents. At the time we left, the process was as follows:

You get $50 in validations per month. You could only use it in $10 increments. Parking could be upwards of $50 on certain days, so your guest would pay $40+ (assuming there aren’t any issues with the system). In many instances the price for residents was actually higher than the posted rate outside.

When your guest arrives, they will go to a gate and, logically, they will think to pull a ticket. What they probably don’t realize is there is a sign that has a phone number they need to call. That phone number will send them a text with a payment link. The resident will need to then find a QR code and have their guest scan that before leaving. They will then need to input their debit card info and pay before leaving. If you put in your debit card info to pay for your guest, it will automatically save your info and charge you again when they park in the building (even if they go to an event and are not there to see you, so don’t do this).

Getting to the building is also hard because events are constantly happening, so, if you commute, expect it to take you longer to get home.

The amenities are nice, but they are overrun a lot of the time. This ranges from large family events on the 8th floor to waiting for equipment in the gym while you listen to someone else’s music blaring off a portable speaker.

Dogs are wonderful, but dog urine is a problem in the building.

Fireworks will regularly go off between 12am and 4am, so don’t expect regular sleep. Cars will also regularly do donuts in front of Crypto, which also creates a lot of noise and the smell of burning rubber in the unit.

Management is one of the largest concerns. We got our unit at a great price during COVID. Towards the end of our stay we were harassed by the building (mostly likely to get us out so they could increase the rent). Amongst other things, we had security pounding on our door at 4am to intimidate us and forcing me to get my partner out of bed so they could “see her.”

There is so much more I could go into when it comes to this building, but this should cover it for now. Ultimately, I would suggest looking elsewhere. Trust me, the apartment...

DO NOT EVEN LOOK INTO THIS BUILDING I was contacted by someone in the leasing office named Linna Yi. After briefly speaking with her about the floorplans I was interested in, I was directed to go online and fill out an application. Towards the end of the online process, and much to my surprise, I noticed a $750 deposit fee in addition to the customary application fee of $50. Never have I seen such a large fee charged merely in the application process when showing interest in an apartment. I was stunned by this amount and contacted Linna for an explanation. She told me that the “holding deposit was to block the unit off the market.” This explanation seems unjust for two reasons. First of all, even a brief review of the building’s inventory online will show that there is a plethora of units available throughout both towers, including floor plans identical or similar to the 2-bedroom option I am applying for (#W2912). Secondly, given the nature of this pandemic, I highly doubt that that there is an influx of applicants looking to spend $6-7,000 per month on rent, which would cause such a “block” for this unit to seem reasonable. This presumption is supported by my first point, the high number of available units. In any event, I responded with my disbelief in my text back to Linna and asked for some clarification as to whether the $750 fee was refundable. Her response was “Sorry there is nothing I can do about the holding deposit since it is a Greystar policy.” Not only did Linna NOT answer my question about whether this fee was refundable, but she deflected my concerns with a cursory and impersonable explanation pointing to “policy”. My other issue was why this fee wasn’t communicated to me when Linna directed me to go online and fill out the application. It does not seem to be a proper business practice for a property agent to neglect informing you about requisite fees that you will face when applying for a unit. That alone was a huge cause for concern and made me feel as though I was blind-sided by the fee once I came across it in the application process. Leasing agents are prohibited from actively concealing or omitting material information to interested tenants. Nonetheless, I reluctantly paid the fee. Later in that same day, I was attempting to create the online profile for my guarantor, however, I continued to face error messages when attempting to complete his profile. I received an email from Linna at 9:21pm where she notified me that Joe’s application was not in yet. She then proceeded to inform me that “the quote is only valid until the end of the day tomorrow. Or the application will expire.” I was blown away by this “race against the clock” sales tactic that she decided to employ. It was not necessary for her to apply pressure in hopes of rapidly closing a sale for her own benefits. This was wholly improper. Is this the sort of sales tactics that Greystar and Circa teach their leasing agents? I responded to this incredulous email by telling her that the website was glitching and to please stop putting pressure on us to complete the process. I told her that its been a lot of work and that the system is making it impossible and finished by stating that I would like someone on their end to figure it out from here. She responded with the utmost patronizing response I’ve ever received from a salesperson when she said “I would like to help but I didn’t design the system and also, I am not IT. I will see what I can do on Sunday since I am not supposed to work on my time off…” Not only was this patronizing, condescending, and disrespectful but additionally, she relegated her duties as an after-thought by stating “I’ll see what I can do on Sunday”. Yet, she was so persistent to make sure that I acted with haste when she needed me to complete my guarantor’s profile. The experience that I’ve had with Linna Yi should thwart anyone away from considering this property as a...

Let me start by saying that my experience leasing with Circa LA was unprecedented, unprofessional, misleading and just outwardly discriminatory. A little bit about me -- I am not a review writer (in fact, this might be my first one), I am gainfully employed, make a great living and have lived in, and have been successfully approved for many luxury apartment buildings in my lifetime. I am in good standing on all leases, past and present, and (prior to this) had never had an incident where I felt stereotyped or discriminated against. As I look back on this experience, I’ve caught myself still giving Circa the benefit of the doubt, but the facts are just too obvious.

In short, I applied on 10/18, received an application approval for residency on 10/22, but then the leasing agent strung me along for two weeks with little communication--rarely returned my phone calls (was either busy, in a meeting, or had left early for the day.) and would go silent for days on email. He asked me to provide verification for an additional month of income than the standard process required, accused me of having “suspicious” paperwork and asked me to psychically log in to my bank accounts from his computer to prove that I had been truthful; he stereotyped me to be a hair dresser and tried to call bluff on my employment; then, after 14 days after receiving an approval decision, chasing down the leasing agent for a move in date and back and forth of proving my income added up, my bank accounts were real and that I might actually have worked where I said I did, he overturned my application approval decision and told me that I had been “accidentally” approved based on a partial rental history report, when the screening company directly confirmed that only one, fully completed report remained on file. This is not a fabrication.

It seemed that every time that I was able to legitimize myself in one way, I would be asked to provide more, do more, or wait longer than the norm; seemingly, I think, as a ploy set to get me to withdraw my application from the process. I can't imagine that every applicant at Circa is put through this same exhaustive experience (in fact, I know this is not the case) -- and I wonder if Circa considers my screening process to have been timely, equitable, fair or consistent with operating standards -- that I believe, is debate-able.

I am still waiting to hear back from the agent on the number to their corporate office (he told me I could find it in my realpage email; that is a lie) and on an ETA on when I can expect my deposit back. Crickets…Crickets for the last 4 days, unfortunately. But I am...