I lived at Driftwood Apartments over the 2009 summer (05/2009 thru 08/2009). I'm a college student and was working an internship in Galveston. I hope my review helps you decide on whether to live here or not. I've also included information on how I saved money on my bills.

BILLS:
I lived in the smallest one bedroom floor plan (479 sq. ft.). Rent was $572/month which included water. My deposit was $150. Most apartments will charge a $100 upcharge to the monthly rent for short-term leases. There were a lot of vacancies in Galveston apartments so I was able to negotiate that they not charge me a $100 upcharge. I got a $100 VISA gift card from Rent.com for signing a lease with Driftwood Apartments. You have to go to Rent.com, create an account, and then view the property on their website. After viewing the property on Rent.com, you can sign a lease but you MUST specify on the lease you were referred by Rent.com (there's a spot for it on the lease). After you sign the lease, report the lease to Rent.com. They will verify the lease with the property, and then will send you the gift card. They say it will take 8-10 weeks to get the gift card. It took mine longer because the office staff was slow to confirm the lease (understandably, they had to pay $100). I called Rent.com after 10 weeks and they sent a reminder to the office. I was about to go the office myself to remind them when they finally confirmed the lease.

The utilities I was responsible for was electricity and cable/internet. For electricity, I used the Reliant PowerTracker plan, which prices the electricity off of the price of natural gas. I was very conservative with my electricity; I always turned off my A/C when I was at work or out of town. My electric bills were:

24 days - 255 kWh - $49.04
32 days - 387 kWh - $47.77
30 days - 494 kWh - $64.22
18 days - 240 kWh - $31.90

I received my cable internet through Comcast. I did not purchase cable TV. Through broadbandoffers.com I was able to get a deal where the first three months were $20/month, plus a free modem after rebate and a $100 rebate. The deal locked you in for one month, so I was able to cancel it when I moved out three months later. I had to pay Comcast $30 to come out and hook up the cable because of a poor connection, but I ended up making $10 off my internet ($100-3*$20-$30=$10) and getting a free modem.

PARKING:
There was plenty of parking. The apartments were 50% filled, so I always got a front parking place in front of my building. The large vacancy was attributed to the units damaged from Ike were being finished out and Galveston residents who moved into the apartments were moving back to their rebuilt houses. There are lights mounted on the buildings which light the parking areas. Parking is NOT gated, but I'm not aware of any cars that were broken into during my time there.

NOISE:
Most my neighbors were quiet. There were a few times in which I could here their music. The neighbor below me liked the bass. He moved in the last month I was there, so I was not pushed to the brink of complaining to management.

GROUNDS:
Grass and some bushes. They have a basic pool, which was closed for the first month or so I lived there. I'm not sure what was wrong with it. You would not swim laps or dive in it, but often saw kids playing in it once it opened.

SAFETY:
As a decent sized guy, I personally never felt threatened. But the complex neighbors are not the best. The apartments north of the complex were destroyed by Hurricane Ike and were quite rundown. The windows were broken and the area was surrounded by a chain link fence. A Super Wal-Mart is the east neighbor, which is convenient for shopping but tends to attract a rougher crowd, especially at night. But on the grounds I never encountered an issue.

CONSTRUCTION:
Build in 1982, the apartments are showing their age, but they are fixing them up.

--GENERAL
The carpet was new. The entire building lost all water pressure one evening; was back by morning. I received three notices of water being shutoff. They did it during the workday so it never affected me directly. My only issue with it was they would give notice the evening before. I would expect at least 24 hour notice except for emergencies. My A/C went out one night. I reported it to management after work. They called in maintenance after-hours and they recharged the evaporator. Couple weeks later it went out again, and they had to replace the unit.

--KITCHEN
The countertops had just been refinished. The refrigerator was good. They replaced the refrigerator right before I moved in because when I was touring the apartment it was noticed the door did close all the way. The dishwasher did not clean dishes, it needed to be replaced. I always had few dishes to wash, so I hand washed them. I wished the sink would have been a little deeper. The sink disposal leaked when I first moved in; maintenance was able to fix it. Temperature control on the oven was very poor, I had to use a thermocouple to manually watch the temperature. The hot water would run brown for a second when left off for a long time, usually when I got home from work. I would let it run clear before I used it. Figured it was corrosion in the pipes. There was no microwave; I had to go to Sam's Club and buy one.

--BATHROOM
The bathtub was recently refinished, but the added finish was peeling off. I got a call at work one day from management saying the bathtub was leaking into the unit below me. Must have been karma for my neighbors bass music. The leak never affected me; they said they were going to replace the bathtub when I moved out.

--LIGHTING
The apartment had no overhead lighting in the living room or the bedroom. The bathroom sink is located in the bedroom, so I used the lights over the mirror to light the bedroom. I could also use the closet light to help light the bedroom. The kitchen light would partially light the living room. I ended putting a standing lamp in the living room and a desk lamp in the bedroom for additional lighting. There are plenty of windows in the apartment, so there was plenty of light in the apartment during the day. It was only at night when I needed additional lighting.

MAINTENANCE:
Great maintenance staff. Only complaint is when my A/C first went out I decided I did not want to sit in my room and sweat so I went out to watch the repair. Another maintenance guy came by and shooed me off like a cat in bushes. I think he later semi-apologized when I came out to say my air was getting cooler but I still do not like the guy.

STAFF:
Very friendly and responsive. One complaint though. If you live in the apartment for less than one year they charge a "paint depreciation" fee out of your deposit. The closer to one year you live there, the less the fee is. The theory is the paint depreciates per tenant, not per time and that a portion of the monthly rent goes to this depreciation. By living there less than a year, they don't recoup enough money from your rent to cover the depreciation cost, so they charge you. I do not agree with their theory, but it is what it is. When I was signing the lease, I was told as long as I do not hang stuff on the walls or mark them up, they would be able to waive the fee. So I leave my walls blank and cleaned them up before move out. Come move out, they said no to waiving the fee and that the best they could do was charge me for a "touch-up" paint job instead of complete paint job. It was about $50. It mostly upset me because I cleaned the walls and left them looking better than they did when I moved in. So if you are planning on living there for less than a year, be aware of this. Also coming out of the deposit, you are required to pay for steam cleaning the carpet. You can not clean it yourself, and it must be done even if the carpet is pristine. It cost me about $50 for the steam cleaning; it will be more for bigger apartments. In the end, I got about $50 back from my $150 deposit. They held my deposit for two months after I moved out.

OVERALL:
Overall it was good experience. As a college student, my standard of living is not the highest. My neighbors were for the most part nice. The staff seemed to care and maintenance was quick fix problems. Definitely showing its age, but they are getting it back in shape.

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