My husband and I were in the process of purchasing a house when the financing fell through. We had only two weeks to find somewhere to live and without much research, we chose Wellesley Park. When we were shown the property, we were impressed. The apartment was clean and exactly what we were looking for, even though the outside appearance and neighborhood left a lot to be desired.

On the day we moved in, they had forgotten that we were supposed to move in and so we had a long wait. When we got to our apartment, it was a different apartment with a different floorplan than what we had been told we would have. The tiles on the floor were coming up, the walls were not finished and there was black mold in our closet and bathroom. Looking through the cabinets and at the walls, they had not cleaned prior to our move-in but had spray painted over the dirt and dust and everything. It was disgusting. In one spot in my closet they had spray painted over black mold. My back door never opened all the way. Our window locks were broken. In this neighborhood, trust me, you don't want your window locks to be broken.

We learned quickly that the neighborhood was dangerous. There is a lot of crime and a lot of noise. The parking lot has huge holes that have ruined our previously nice vehicles. The children in the complex roam around with no supervision and we were burgled by children several times. There are two pools and neither of them work. At my last check, one was filed with grass and the other was filled with trash. The laundry facilities cost $1.00 to wash and another $1.00 to dry. Most of the dryers don't work and some of the washers fill up with water and don't drain. Several times, maintenance dumped nails into the grass in front of my house and when nobody else would pick them up, I would. Tons of nails, not ten or twenty. The walls are paper thin and you can hear everything that your neighbors are doing. Our upstairs neighbors had a problem with their shower for months that was never fixed and resulted in my apartment flooding twice. At least three of my neighbors were admitted druggies and two were known drug dealers. While walking my son to and from school, a known rapist that lives either in the complex or around the complex followed me twice and has loitered outside my apartment.

In the fall of 2006, Wellesley Park was sold to a new owner and they gave WP new management. Nobody in the front office speaks English and the new owner is a penny pincher. One maintenance man told me he couldn't fix anything at the complex because they wouldn't buy him the parts or the tools. This past January when we had the really bad weather with icy streets, snow and sleet, our heater wasn't working and neither the management or the owner would fix it. We have two children, one of whom has serious health concerns and the other is an infant. We were very cold. At this same time, there was no hot water, so we had no relief. For most of our time at the apartment, neither our heat or air worked but we didn't complain, we just requested that they be fixed. The new owner, whenever I would contact her with concerns (like no heat or hot water in an ice storm) was rude and abrupt. Starting in August 2006 there were multiple problems with the boiler that provides hot water to the complex and we often went a week or more with no hot water. This had not stopped when we moved out in March 2007.

Every time it rained, my upstairs neighbors got flooded. There was a huge hole in the ceiling in their living room and management's solution was to nail a piece of plywood over it. The hole was huge, about the size of a coffee table.

The nearby elementary school was convenient and the staff and teachers were very friendly. However, about two months before we moved we received a letter saying that the school had not done well academically and that because of that, students had the option to transfer

Electricity is paid through the apartment. This is an absolute scam. I was paying around $210 a month there for electricity. The year before, I lived in a spacious two story house with four bedrooms and two living areas and paid less for electricity there.

Our lease was up at the end of March but we moved out at the beginning of the month. We paid for the whole month and they told us that they had someone moving in the week after we left, so we asked them for a partial refund, according to state law. Our former neighbors said that someone moved in two days after we left. When we called to inquire about a partial refund, they lied to us about someone else living in the apartment and when we told them we had proof, they said that they didn't charge the new tenant for the month so that they wouldn't have to pay us. The person in the office is very nice but doesn't speak much English, so this is as much of the conversation as I could gather.

The maintenance people are hard workers and are very friendly and nice. The woman in the office is very friendly and is a hard worker. She could really use someone in there to assist her with English speaking residents though. These are the two best assets of Wellesley Park and the owner would be silly to hire anyone in their place. The problem is the new owner and her inability to manage properly and spend when necessary, and also the apartments themselves. They are dangerous and dirty. I would never move back here even if they offered free rent. The risk with the black mold and the discomfort of no heat, air or hot water combined with the attitude of ownership wouldn't make it worth it.

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