A nice place to live
From:
rwkillia
Date posted:
1/20/2008
Years at this apartment:
2006
-
2006
I have lived here since July 2006. I have read many reviews during my moving process and it always seems that the long detailed explanations are always very negative. The short reviews are always positive, but due to their length, you get no real details on what the person really liked about their apartment.
Here are the good and the bad regarding Kaiser Park.
Good:
The apartment staff are typical apartment staff. They do not have to be happy to do their jobs. When we have had a problem, we reported it either on the phone or in person. They had the maintenance personnel there in a timely manner based upon the nature of what we needed.
The maintenance person, I forget his name, is actually pretty good. I have had a very low opinion of maintenance staff before coming here. This guy actually takes the time to make sure the job is done correctly. (We had a cabinet door that need new laminate, and we cannot tell the difference between his repair work and another brand new door - Outstanding)
Parking - There may be some areas that have more congestion than others, but I have the same parking spot every day. It is well lit in all of the areas of the parking, and the parking areas are directly in front of the townhomes. Since you can only have 2 cars parked in the lot per townhome or apartment, we have enough room for a temporary guest or two. If you have more than 2 cars, you can park your extra car on the roadway outside of the apartments. This roadway is not used by many people other than the Kaiser Park and adjoining complexes townhome owners. (The next complex is for townhome owners, Kaiser Park is for townhome renters and apartments) The last thing that I heard was a problem for parking is that you cannot have certain vehicles parked on the premises. No trailers, campers, boats, jetskis or vehicles over a certain weight. This means that if you own a BIG vehicle, such as a work truck, you cannot have it parked here. There are parking stickers for your cars, and there are no guest spots, but there is no active towing that I can determine. The managment has stated that it is ok to have a guest park here if it is for less than 1 day, but if it is going to be for longer, you will need to come by and get a temporary parking sticker.
Landscaping - Outstanding. Very nice grass, trees, shrubs and sidewalks. Very Pretty.
House - External - Very pretty. Fake rockface for the first floor in the front of the townhomes, siding on the other floors. The basement is a walkin style with a rear door.
House - internal - Very nice. Spacious storage, living room, kitchen and dining room. The bedrooms are kind of small for my taste. The smallest room I would call a large closet. It is big enough for a twin bed and a large dresser and that is all. That room is perfect for a younger child or a small office.
Bathrooms - The master bath is about the same size as the second upstairs bath except that it has a large window. All of the bathrooms have a nice exhaust that does not recirculate.
Master Bedroom - Has a walk in closet that is fairly good in size. The bedroom also has the ability to put in a ceiling fan. It has 2 large windows as well.
Closests - Plenty of them. The bedrooms each have one that is proportional to the size of the room. There are 3 closets on the second floor. One is a small pantry, one is just as you enter the second floor and we use it as a second pantry, and the last is a large closet that is just at the end of the living room. Great for all of the games and an extended closet for one of the bedrooms. There is another large closet in the basement that is perfect for the cold weather gear, shoes, boots and umbrellas for the inclement weather.
Washer Dryer - provided. They are actually pretty large, brand new usually and fairly nice. They work well.
Hot water heater - Gas water heater that we have NOT been able to get cold, even with 2 showers at the same time.
Gas Heat - We have not used it yet.
A/C - Works well, but is expensive with the new rate increases. You can call BGE and find the electric and gas cost of the unit you are looking at renting.
Appliances - The kitchen actually has a nice stove, microwave and dishwasher. I am impressed. The oven is self cleaning also. The sink has a double basin, but there is no sprayer. The connection for the sprayer is used for the dishwasher, so you cannot add a sprayer. I did ask the maintenance man if he would install a new faucet so I could have a sprayer and he said that it was ok.
Carpet - Clean and comfortable. Not a cheap carpet.
Other floors - The linoleum in the kitchen and bathrooms is pretty standard. It gets dirty easily and is hard to clean. I think a previous tenant used wax, so mine is a real pain to keep clean.
Walls - smooth and blemish free.
Ceiling - textured with what looks like a sponge.
Stairwells - both of them are the same. They are tight for moving furniture, but not too steep. Moving in or out is hard, but once you are in, it is ok.
Neighborhood - Has a lot of kids. They are pretty nice and they do not run wild. The parents keep track of them pretty well. THe HighSchool is Mt. Hebron, which is one of the best ones around.
Location - Close to 40, 29, 70. Good restaurants nearby including Ellicott City downtown areas. Traffic is not that bad as long as you plan when to go places.
BAD:
Adjoining areas - The Kaiser Park complex is behind a SuperFresh grocery store and another non used grocery store. It looks a bit bad when you first trun in, but once you get used to it there is no problem. I looked around for a long time because I wanted a better view. Good luck! I chose Kaiser Park because the places that were not near a supermarket were near a major highway and there was a lot of noise that you could easily hear. Kaiser had very little noise.
Crime - There have been a few instances of breakins in the neighborhood. It is due to several factors, but one is a neighboring low rent facility that is on the side opposite the superfresh. The traffic between the 2 areas allows for a lot of crimes of opportunity. For what it is worth, the breakins I have heard of have been only minor thefts and no assaults. In all of the cases the windows have been left open or the doors unlocked.
Overall Summery: This is a good place to live. I actually drove through and asked people how they liked the place before I decided. You can do a lot of planning before you decide. I hope this helps you choose the right place for you.
2008 Update:
The unused store has now become a CARMAX store. We were worried about the lights being too bright, but they took that into account and it is not too bad at night. The only problem we now have is that due to some of the construction, they removed many trees that were blocking the light from the Honda dealership down the road. So the Honda dealership now has lights that are too bright.
The ground behind our townhome has had a lot of kids playing on it and the grass is all dead. That is the newest update for you.
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