Agave Apartments — Local services in San Antonio

I lived at the Agave for four years. I wish I could say it lives up to its billing as luxury apartment...but my honest review is mixed.

Location - The Agave has a fantastic location right between Southtown and downtown and on the Riverwalk. There is such easy access to bars, food, and entertainment. I love going on a run on the Riverwalk toward the Missions or Blue Star in the morning or going to Southtown for dinner and taking a walk through King William in the evening. The neighborhood has really been opening more new businesses ever since Covid which has been great to see the area becoming more lively.

Apartment - The apartment itself that I lived in was spacious and the finishings and appliances were good quality. I appreciate that important quality of life appliances like the stove, refrigerator, in-unit washing machine, and so on were not constantly breaking. The modern finishings like the updated quartz countertops and wood cabinetry make it so that you can decorate and make the apartment look quite nice! And if you get a unit with a garden tub, enjoy it! Now that's luxury. However, you do get what you pay for and this is not one of the cheapest options in SA.

Construction - Unfortunately for the past two years heavy construction has been in progress on Cesar Chavez on BOTH sides of the Agave, restricting traffic both by car on the main artery to the highway and tearing up the sidewalks making it hard to walk on foot. I know this is temporary, but it was a big enough problem that especially during rush hour it can increase your total drive time by up to 10 minutes. Be warned.

Pool and Rooftop - Agave has gorgeous amenities, I only wish the pool weren't so loud on the weekends. It is a very impressive pool though, and they keep it open all year. Using the grill is fun, unfortunately, often out of the three total grills 1-2 of them will be broken at any one time.

Elevator - This has gone on for so long it's a joke. One or both elevators were broken for most of two years. You better hope you don't have disabilities to live here, or have to move heavy things. I feel terrible for those who need to access upper floors, as it's no joke carrying things up eight floors in those narrow, dirty stairwells without an elevator.

Garage - Parking is a pain. Plus, they really will tow you if your parking tag expires. I have had some items stolen out of my car while in the Agave garage. Both my and my partner's locked bicycles were also stolen out of the garage's bike room. In total it was roughly $1000 worth of property crime. You also have to be careful in the garage as some people take the corners very fast. More recently Agave's been trying to squeeze more money out of us by adding new paid parking space reservations.

Public Area Cleanliness - For some mysterious reason, the front office area is always scrupulously clean. I definitely see a lady cleaning it every single morning. Yet the concrete hallways and staircases are quite unappealing, with stains and dust balls everywhere, even some trash on the stairwells. Even when they do the annual cleaning it doesn't do anything to the stains it just clears the dust. The worst part is the dead cockroaches, especially on the first floor, which just stay there for weeks or months on end.

Maintenance - The apartment maintenance team is a shining ray of sunshine in this place, Jose in particular. They are incredibly on top of their work and I've never had to wait more than 24 hours for something to be fixed. The maintenance team is so kind, helpful, professional, and capable. These people are worth their weight in gold.

Front office service - Well...there are some quite nice people and a few front office staff who seem to hate people so much I wonder why they are in a service industry job. I also don't appreciate how disingenuous management can sometimes be, taking down complaints so they can shape the narrative.

Overall the Agave has a mix of positives built in to the building, but negatives from experiences living there for...

Very responsive maintenance staff often showing up same day. Fun location for hosting out of town friends and family. Generally good build quality. Nice appliances. And great water pressure for the showers.

BUT, if you are considering leasing here, here are some things to keep in mind which might not be evident during their guided tour:

The dog run is one of the most disgusting spaces like it of any apartment I've been to. There is a sprinkler system which is meant to clean it which clearly isn't working out. Maybe they could run it more often? The adjacent garage and mail area smells like sick animals. Surely the staff is aware. I'd have suggested it if the management staff was approachable or if their maintenance request system had anywhere to put suggestions of it's kind. It is often filled with trash, presumably dropped or blown down from the garage levels or patio area above. Think cigarette butts, chipbags, and sharp plastic cups.

Disabled accessibility: There are two elevators, the 'operational' one has been broken at least once a month during the time I lived there, sometimes for multiple days. The other has been 'going to be made available within the month" according to staff for at least the last 3 months. Rough going for someone with an injured dog. I can't imagine how frustrating it must be for anyone wheelchair bound or with general movement issues. Must be a nightmare for anyone who loses the game of chance and has to move in or out while this is down.

The balcony doors were either installed poorly or of cheap quality. There are visible lines of light around the edges and the master bedroom is uncomfortably hot in summer and noticeably colder than the rest of the apartment in winter. When it is windy, better lock all the doors or they'll fly open from the draft. The response by staff was to apply an ineffective brush door sweep to the bottom.

No way to 'buzz people in'. Having friends over? They can get out of their car, walk to a keypad, and call your phone which you can dial a code into to open the gate, they then drive around in circles until they reach the top two floors, park, get into the elevator down to whichever floor you live on, where you will need to walk to to meet them. Probably fine for those who live in the apartments near the elevator, but that isn't most of them. Must be super frustrating for anyone trying to deliver food.

No clear method for recycling, or cardboard box disposal. The trash chute makes the entire elevator area smell like wet garbage and isn't even accessible on the first floor. The 'valet trash service' means that you have to store their ugly branded and cheap quality trash cans somewhere to use for setting out the trash. If you fail to use said branded trash can, you will be told that you may be fined and or blamed for mystery stains on the cement in the hallways which were there before you moved in. (which I am genuinely worried will actually happen when they see this review)

The pool area is in shade by 5pm during the height of summer, a bummer if you want to relax in the sun by the pool after a day in the office. And the ground around the pool is painted dark gray, the kind of dark color that spends all day heating up to a foot blistering temperature in the Texas sun. Really odd design decisions.

The freezer in the apartment opens up into a counter, meaning that removing or returning anything to it becomes a frustrating game of Tetris.

No cameras in the garage means that if one of the giant pickup trucks some residents think are necessary for downtown living, or if any of the construction vehicles clips your parked car, you're pretty much SOL finding who did it. Building management won't offer assistance

Management staff give off a perception that you are irrelevant as soon as you are a resident.

All in all it is honestly a nice place to live, but for the price you are paying to live here and the fact the place is so new, I'd just...

I had a tour on Saturday Feb. 24th around 4:00pm. I wanted to tour these apartments because of the great location and the $1,600-$1,800 two bedroom options I saw online. My boyfriend is relocating and I toured so I toured with my family. We started off with her (Lana) very grumpily asking for our IDs, which I have no problem with! I made sure everyone brought theirs and it is standard with all complex's. She then started quoting 2 bedrooms $2,100+. I am a pretty shy person and at this point I was nervous to ask questions because everyone in my family could tell she has some problem with us. Every time she spoke she didn't look at us and just said things in a mean way. My dad spoke up and asked about the cheaper options online. She had told us the one in the $1,600s was an ADA unit and moved on. So again he asked about the $1,700s option and she rolled her eyes and turned the screen around again and said "oh yeah well its this one." She turned it back towards he obviously annoyed with us at this point and asked very sassy "what exactly are you trying to get out of this"... to preface I told her that we were ready to move in two weeks and we both have great jobs and are over qualified, we also are asking very good questions like we are very interested, but she's treating us like we are wasting her time. At this point I'm like I just want to see the amenities and a few units to make my decision. She rolls her eyes again and asks what units, I'm frustrated so I say I don't care just please show me something. She gets up tells and tells us to go to the club house and wait for her while she gets keys.

We start the tour and she just walks us through the club house making minimal remarks. We get to the pool and she asks "do you want to go look?" yes.... we stand outside the gym and she asks "do you need to look in the gym?" like yes.... back in the hallway she asks if we want to look at the dog park finally I say no because I don't have a dog lol but afterwards online I found out that's where the river access is! She takes us to the broken elevator then asks us to walk the stairs to the 3rd floor which isn't a problem were all fit. We walk the stairs and wait in the trash room for her to get there too. She shows us a 1x1 and just stands at the door and only says something if we ask. Then she walks us to the 2x2 (the largest one out of our price range, my fault for not pushing for the one I wanted to see) again stands at the door. She's pretty much silent on our walks and in the unit so my mom keeps trying to make conversation with her and mentions my sister came because she is looking to move in August, she makes a remark about how fun it must be to go on tours just for fun. My sister will sign anywhere I do so her rude remark and being rude to my family the whole tour was not helping her. Finally we start heading back to the office or so I thought. She walks us down some stairs finally conversing about a restaurant we both like in the area and then we pop out in the front parking lot. I tell her were making a decision within the week and she tells me I can keep looking at pricing online and to call if I have questions and then just said BYE in the parking lot.

I am a real estate agent and I have a prior 2 year background in luxury rentals. If you want to look at condos and avoid the rude apartment sales agents look me up!

Edit: I spoke with Nicole the manager here and she was great. She understood my perception of the situation and discussed with the Lana. I hope someone else has a great experience here in the future the apartments were nice especially for the price. I will leave my experience up but I am willing to upgrade my...