University Pointe at College Station — Local services in Portland

I moved to UP in 2014 after two years in PSU dorms, tempted by the call of a private bedroom, oven, and dishwasher. The trouble began before I even moved in: the UP website advertised that animals were allowed; when I signed the lease I was told otherwise.

I was forced to move in and to find an alternate place for my therapy animal to stay for several weeks. It was only after I 1) called the corporate office and 2) reminded them of their responsibilities under the Fair Housing Act was the issue resolved.

The building is constantly dirty. The stairwell, which you'll use often (the elevators break a lot - yikes), was always filthy. Trash, spills, used condoms, the list goes on. To add insult to injury, people began peeing near the stairwell exit door (right under the security camera!) It was always left to evaporate, despite being reported multiple times. Once, a broken bottle and a trail of blood appeared, and even though this HEALTH HAZARD was reported to staff, it was never cleaned up.

The hallways were also dirty, with trash, vomit, spills etc. being left for weeks at a time. Sometimes, the CAs (student workers) were made to clean up vomit. This is illegal, since they weren’t given hazmat training.

The units themselves are very cheaply constructed. The inner walls (e.g. inside a multi-bedroom unit) do not reach the ceiling. You can hear your roommates going about their lives, and at night you can see if their light is still on. You’ll need a white noise machine. The appliances were cheap and often broke despite gentle use. I could frequently hear parties above/below/around us - sometimes so loud that earplugs didn't even help.

And you can’t just report parties. Good luck finding the on-call number and getting someone to pick up, let alone do anything. The night staff were supposed to patrol the hallways and stairs at night and shut down noise problems - they didn't. Once parties were reported, they MIGHT get quieter for a bit, but that never lasted.

I was always lucky with roommates. However, I know many people who did have problems with roommates being filthy/smoking/being rude/stealing/etc. The staff claim to be powerless to help. I'm not sure if it's powerlessness, or unwillingness to do anything. Good luck getting your roommates evicted for lease violations or switching to a different unit.

The staff can be described as following: disorganized, not knowledgeable, inconsistent, and sometimes rude.

So, when I had just about had enough of my awful tenancy, I asked 4 separate staff how to break the lease. Answer: 30-days notice, submit a form, 1.5*rent lease-break fee. So I turned in my notice, form, and fee.

A week later, I got an email from a leasing assistant. Here's a direct quote: "Please note that you will be held financially responsible for your lease until a new tenant moves in. At that time we will send you a statement."

[Record scratch noises] What? Financially responsible? Nope. Not according to Oregon Statute 90.302. Go ahead, google it. A landlord can hit you with a 1.5x rent fee, OR have you pay rent until a new tenant moves in. Not both.

So I got a lawyer. And I let UP know. My lawyer had represented UP tenants numerous times before, and described UP as “predatory.”

So what are the things you should take away from this? 1) DO NOT MOVE TO UNIVERSITY POINTE if you have the choice. Live in PSU housing instead, if you want to live on campus. Same composition of residents (students), totally different experience (clean, relatively quiet, good management) - clearly the issues are because of inept UP management. 2) READ YOUR LEASE. 3) Record interactions with UP staff in writing to protect yourself. 4) Know your rights as a tenant in Oregon. 5) If you need a tenant law lawyer, contact the Oregon Bar for a referral. 6) If you have issues with UP similar to mine, let the PSU Dean of Student Life Office know. They are investigating the building.

TL;DR: No, I do not recommend...

Pros - Location. Right on the PSU campus and located along the MAX lines, so it's very convenient for PSU students. Also about the cheapest rent you can get in this area of Portland while still having your own room (Cheaper than comparable dorm rooms). Generally felt safe here. There are homeless people that hang around this area but that's just the reality of living in downtown Portland. A decent size kitchen and nice bathrooms for the rental price.

Cons - Not transparent about the fact that they don't rent exclusively to college students. Technically anyone can live here, and there are people who are much older and using it as a low-income housing option. You have to sign the lease before being assigned roommates, which is okay if they're guaranteed to be other college students, but my roommate was a much older, (cold, unfriendly) person who wasn't a student. They need to disclose that to students and their parents who are thinking about renting here. It's kind of weird to see men who appear in their forties or fifties hanging out in the lounge of what's supposed to be a student housing building.

Noise - The walls in the apartments don't go up the ceiling. There's about a 1/2 inch gap. You can hear literally everything in the next room. Also the MAX stops on three sides of the building, and runs until 1 or 2 am, so you hear screeching on the tracks and announcements well into the night. If you're sensitive to noise, this building isn't for you.

Interior - The apartments are pretty barebones and not as nice as they look in the pictures. The ceilings and some of the walls are cement. Exposed pipes in the ceiling. Just kind of a cold atmosphere.

Cleanliness - lots of people have pets in the building even though the lease says no pets allowed. Some people were letting their dogs pee and poop in the hallways and in the stairwell. Complained about it a few times to the front desk kids but they didn't/couldn't do anything about it. The piss and poop in the stairwell just kept accumulating and no one cleaned it up for about two months. The stairwell became totally unusable because of the stench and the dog poop everywhere. The puddles of piss literally started eating away at the cement because it sat there for so long.

Moving in - You have to pay full rent for September even though you move in at the very end of the month. Move in procedure is ridiculous - they make the entire building move in on the same day. The building has no parking. You just have to hope that you get lucky and find street parking relatively close by. Enormous lines of people waiting for the elevators. They don't even offer bins to move your stuff between your car and the elevators, the way the dorms do.

Business Center - Don't plan on using it to print anything. Printer was literally always broken or out of paper, and no one bothered refilling it. Just use the printers at the library.

Other issues - just the general issues that come with living in a large building full of college students. Hallways smell like weed. People occasionally have loud parties. Someone stole my Nike leggings out of the...

I'll be honest, I'm not sure about signing this lease. The manager won't take my calls, she rather, slightly rude I might add, email me about my concerns. I admit I am not much experienced with apartment hunting but the lack of customer service in this place concerns me. I'm a prospective student transferring from Washington State over to Portland. Don't get me wrong, I loved the atmosphere of this apartments. Yes, most that I saw of residents living there were in my age demographic of 18 years to 21 years. Not a problem. But if these apartments are tending to the PSU students and you are receiving students attending other institutions around the area, shouldn't you have a leniency to assist other students as well with flexible move in dates? I guess if they have the power to wrap you around the finger, they definitely use it to there full extent. Currently I might be homeless for two weeks, heck maybe even three. Sure I could rent a studio or a hotel for two to three weeks until I can move in to there set date. However, seriously?! School starts September 2nd not September 26th, I even said that I'm willing to pay extra fees. Yet I either have to sign on to an old lease as close as July, Which I would like keep my job until I necessarily have to move.

What bothers me even more about this place is that though the leasing agreement is September 26th, they require in the leasing agreement to pay September 1st and October 1st the full rental fee. I inquired about this concern and what they state,

"In perspective, the rent is an installment payment, not a full monthly rent payment. Like buying a car, if you buy it in the middle of the month or at the end of the month your payment is still the same because it is a payment towards a larger sum that you owe. The larger sum you would owe is on the front of your lease and based on the daily rate Like in a 4 bedroom you will pay 22.34 per day and live here for 346 days. If you multiple 22.34 by the number of days in a month your rent would be much higher than 644."

As reasonable as it could be for some, I firmly believe that attending only 4 days of that month, this "installment"should be prorated. Especially if I can't move in before my school starts!

So all in all, I think anyone who is reading this should take into heart if they are willing to make certain sacrifices for the convenience of living. Please read your reviews of your prospective living space and you have to put in effort if you want a great quality of living. My year might suck or it might actually work out. But I wrote this complaint as a means of effectively expressing what could make or break someone from making a decision for this apartment.

PS you have to have a guarantor and they will send your rent over dues to the collection agency. TAKE THIS SERIOUSLY! I hope some are wiser than me in making this...