My fiancee and I lived in a 3rd floor apartment at Whitewood Pond for a year and 8 months while we attended graduate school in the area. This is the first apartment that we would have considered living in for a longer period of time had we not had to move out of state after school. While there are some "cons" to Whitewood Pond, the "pros" definitely outweigh them, especially comparing this apartment complex to others in the New Haven County area. We highly recommend checking out Whitewood Pond Apartments if you are looking at renting a place in the area for any period of time. Here is a detailed review of our experience and observations while living at Whitewood Pond:

Moving in

Pros:
Office staff: The current office manager is an absolute delight to work with. After moving across the country with all of our things, she let us move in a day earlier than we had planned on which helped us out quite a bit. See further in the "cons" for comments on the "owner's" business strategy.

The apartment itself was freshly painted, had new carpeting installed & everything was professionally cleaned prior to our moving in.

Cons:
Storage space - our 3rd floor apartment had limited "enclosed" storage/closet space, so many of our boxes had to stay in the "study" part of the bedroom (in sight of visitors). Some of the other apartment options, which weren't available at the time, looked like they had more closet storage space.

There were no elevators for moving upstairs, however the layout of the complex lends itself to moving in directly to the door (no long hallways to move stuff through). Just be ready to run up and down the stairs quite a bit if you are moving onto the 3rd floor.

Rent is pretty expensive; it went from $900 to $1000 for us while we lived there for 18 months. We knew we were going to be in Connecticut for 18 months, but the "owner" would not let us extend our contract from 12 months to 18 months even though we were only 2 months in. Instead, we had to finish our 12 month @ $900, then pay the month to month rate of $1000 for the last 6 months ($50 extra each month I believe in addition to the $50 rate increase). His excuse was to snap back with "we treat everyone the same, current and future tenants." How about treat everyone the same in a GOOD WAY by giving them more incentive to stay!'!

Anyway, most good apartments in Connecticut are expensive.

Inside the apartment:

Pros:
The 3rd floor offers a beautiful 3 window pane view of the ponds outside on the living room side. Above the 3 panes are 3 skyline windows that are tinted, yet let in enough light during the day to keep the apartment well-lit and comfortable. Our friends constantly complemented us on the layout and views of the property.

The apartment has a large living room and bedroom for a 1 bedroom status in the New Haven area. Two people can be comfortable in separate parts of the apartment maintaining different activities. It is a shotgun style apartment where all the rooms are in a line from the pond view (living room side) to the back parking lot side (study/bedroom area). The entrance to the apartment is in the center, as is the bathroom, the kitchen and dining room.

The linear room alignment allows for a nice spring/summer/fall breeze to come through and air out the apartment, usually with minimal need for air conditioning.

There are TWO air conditioners (if needed); one in the living room and one in the bedroom for better energy efficiency. We only had to use our air conditioners on really hot days that got into the 90s, otherwise the windows allowed enough of a breeze to cool things off.

There is an electric heat adjuster in every room of the apartment, so you can lower your energy rates a little bit at least by only heating the room you are in.

The apartment was safe enough for us. The door has a deadbolt and the parking lot is well lit. Hopefully they will allow a second lock or chain in the future.

Maintenance staff took care of all problems we ever had within one day, even when our dish washer broke and we needed a new one! The staff was quite friendly and prompt with responses to any questions we had.

Cons:
The walls are very thin, even for an apartment. We could frequently hear snoring, music and conversations (even at a normal level you could make out some of the words). Thus, it is quite easy to be "too loud." This might be a difficult situation for people who want to entertain a semi-large group or play music without headphones. Other noises you will hear: Mondays & Fridays at around 8:00am the garbage dumpsters just outside the bedroom window are emptied with a lot of racket (not a problem for regular day-shifters who have already left for work) and there is a car wash on one side of the complex that can create quite a bit of noise on sunny summer days.

Both sides of the apartment had leaky windows with poor insulation. I would highly recommend using the plastic window liner you can get from Home Depot to keep the cold breeze out in the winter time. The windows will still leak from condensation in the winter-time, usually from storms and Nor Easters.

There was mold on the window ledges in both the living room and bedroom (most likely due to the leaky windows and heaters located directly below the windows). Both sets of windows needed constant cleaning to ensure the mold growth was kept at bay.

The apartment also had a fairly small kitchen. It is pretty much a 1 person kitchen. It really wasn t that big of a deal since the dishwasher, fridge and oven are still accessible. The kitchen also only has a single sink, so you will need an additional dish pan for washing dishes. The cabinets are also pretty old, so make sure you have cabinet liners. All of these were pretty minor inconveniences.

Some of the winter energy bills can reach into the $200s if you use your heat on a daily basis (which you pretty much have to do in the winter). Much of the heat is probably going out of the windows due to their poor insulation. The plastic insulation definitely lowered the electric bill.

Some of the light fixtures are only fixable by the maintenance staff, but since they are more than on top of things, one call and a small wait should take care of any problems.

Cigarette smoke seems to seep through the floor quite easily if a smoker lives under you.

Outside the apartment:

Pros:
The location of the complex is off the main road, fairly secluded on a hill where you will rarely hear traffic driving by on State St.

We had no issues with neighbors and everyone we met was nice and friendly.

There are 2 laundry facilities (open all day 24-7!), each equipped with 5 washers and 5 dryers. This is amazing considering the hassles we ve had in the past with other apartments. Although the price was a little high ($1.65 to wash, $1.60 to dry), we rarely ran into availability issues when we had to do laundry. The machines run on a card system, which is nice so you don t have to have quarters all the time. You can just add money to the card at the machine in the laundry room with $5, $10 or $20 bills.

Maintenance staff always seems to be working on the landscape, which is very nice. You will also notice fun holiday decorations around at different times of the year, keeping a nice quaint atmosphere. There are picnic tables located near the pond for recreation.

Parking is NOT an issue at Whitewood Pond, which is also amazing for the New Haven area. There are plenty of spaces for you and any visitors you will have. There are no garage options, which isn't too much of a concern since the weather is fairly mild (besides the occasional Nor-Easter).

Garbage dumpsters are placed in convenient locations so that one needs only to walk out of the apartment a few paces to throw away trash. Recycling is also on-site, but in the corner of the complex. This can be far if you have an apartment on the other side of the complex.

Shopping centers in Hamden are about 5 minutes away driving up Skiff St. and fitness centers are the same distance away (LA Fitness and North Haven Health and Racquet). You can walk over to Dunkin Donuts and Subway next door at the gas station. Highways 91 and 95 are minutes away, as is downtown New Haven, which takes about 10 minutes to get to. There is also a hike/bike/roller-blading trail (Farmington Canal Trail) within a couple miles of the complex if you like to exercise outdoors (as we did).

Cons:
None that we could think of

Moving Out:

Pros:
We initially were concerned about the larger than usual apartment deposit we had to pay ($1075), but we got the entire amount paid back with interest a couple of weeks after moving out. While many other rental agencies charge for minor wear and tear, the office manager told us that Whitewood Pond brings in professional cleaners after you move out anyway. Making the appointment with the office manager was easy as well. Just don t leave burn marks on the counters, holes in the walls, and other obvious things is what she told us (i.e. Don t trash the place).

We were never called to show our apartment, which was a nice stress relief from previous experiences with other apartments we've lived in.

Cons:
None that we can think of

In summary, this is a great place to live in the New Haven area. If you can live with the minor inconveniences of the standard apartment living we've mentioned above, you would do well to check out Whitewood Pond. If we would ever move back to Connecticut, we would seriously consider living here again.

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