I am currently looking for a new apartment in Baltimore, and the more I look, the more I appreciate that Oakwood was pretty safe, rat-free (that I know of), and you are generally allowed to live without much interference from staff. However, Oakwood is definately not perfect (sometimes not even adequate), and I wouldn't recommend it to others.

Let's start with some lies. When my roommate and I came in to look at apartments, they quoted us a price $400 over what was advertised in the apartment guide. I pointed this out, and only then did they give us the advertised price. They said that they pay for your gas and water. Nothing in the apartment uses gas, and they don't pay for your water. Also, when you go to look at the property, they are very friendly and seemingly competent. After you move in, most are extremely abrasive and incompetent (there are about 2 staff members who remain friendly). They also told us that we were only allowed 1 parking space per apartment and we would have to pay extra to park another car. Once we moved in, we found out that there was no limit to the number of cars. In fact, most tenants had 2-3 cars, and none of them were asked to pay extra.

In terms of the grounds and quality of living, there are two areas to the apartment community: the one you see on your tour, and the one you don't. The part you see on your tour is bright, beautifully landscaped, etc. The part that you will most likely live in is dark, has shrubs overgrowing the sidewalks, broken cement, etc. In addition, they NEVER put salt on the pathways that are not on the tour, and their shoveling is unsatisfactory at best. Basically, you need to wear cleats to walk through the snow and ice in the winter. Also, the roofs all leak over the stairwells, so when it rains outside, you need an umbrella to walk through the breezeways!

Our actual apartment was okay--nothing special. The appliances are old and very loud; the tile in the bathrooms and kitchen is disgusting (and no amount of ammonia, bleach, or scrubbing helps that). We also had a spider/ant/silverfish problem for the first 4 months (even though the exterminator came twice, and I used 2 cans of Raid). In addition, even though our neighbors are quiet, it always sounds like they are moving furniture during the middle of the night. We have been accused of it by our downstairs neighbor, and my friends in another building have been accused of it as well, so noise is a bit of an issue. However, the size is good (very nice closets).

Overall, it's got a number of problems, it's very expensive for what you actually get, and I wouldn't choose to do it over again. However, when you compare it to the rat-infested apartments in Baltimore, I guess it's not so bad.

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