We were residents at La Entrada Phase I for one year. Over the course of the year we had various problems with the unit and the grounds. The biggest reason we are no longer residents and are most frustrated with this management company and complex is the on-site staff, particularly Stephanie. She was not working there when we signed the lease, and we wouldn't have signed if she were to have been the leasing agent. She made the time there unbearable. We have been yelled out of the office for things they later admitted were their fault, snapped at continually, and most recently, had paper and documents thrown in our faces. We have taken the steps (in two separate incidences) to make the management company, Northstar, aware of her behavior and the way she treats residents, to which they all agreed (most recently, someone said, "Oh, are you talking about Stephanie? She's so rude"). It's very unclear why her behavior is tolerated and why she hasn't been reprimanded.
As many other reviews of the property have noted, their attention to maintenance on the property and in the units is woefully insufficient and bordering on dangerous. They have only two maintenance people to service the entire property, and while those people are very kind, it is clear they are overworked and not given sufficient resources. Any small things that went wrong were fixed in the slightest possible ways. But, we had three major problems: our stove, washer/dryer, and a/c unit. All the appliances are outdated (80s) and work questionably well, but the stove became a real problem as burners stopped working all together one by one. They would always do small fixes that would last about a day and this process went on for about a month. Finally, it took a small fire while the oven was not even in use to convince them to fix it. We rented a washer dryer from the property and it came with ink all over the dryer. When we reported it immediately after it was installed, we were accused of the spills. Our a/c unit broke in the middle of summer and temps in the apartment climbed quickly above 90 degrees. They continued their minimal fix/minimal investment attitude, and while some of their small fixes worked for a short period of time, they ultimately caved to replacing the unit, only after the apartment rose to unbearable temperatures with my dog inside. Each time I would bring any problem to their attention, I was met with rude attempts to blame me for each problem.
Finally, at the closing of our lease term, after receiving our security deposit, it had two deductions, one for never paying one of the refundable security deposits and the other for never paying pet rent. Both of these claims were false, instead they had in fact never charged us the correct amount of rent for the entire term, and in the second month of our lease had told us the incorrect prorated rent amount and applied our deposit to our rent. When we went in to contest the claims that we had never paid two different charges, Stephanie, once again, was out of line in her behavior and offered three different scenarios for how the money had been used in ways that blamed us for its mismanagement (all while keeping a hold of the ledger instead of providing a copy). This is the incident that lead to her escalating the situation (yet again) and throwing papers in our faces, saying, "well you signed this!" After going into the Northstar office, an accountant was able to clear up the reason for the accounting error, and finally admitted that it was on the fault of the person who had originally set up our lease, and subsequently apologized for Stephanie's behavior, but continued to maintain the credibility of the management of our account (a practice which is illegal in several states).
We do not recommend this property. For the cost, there are simply more updated and higher quality apartments and houses in the area that do not involve weekly to monthly berating and mean spirited attacks. read more