My lease contains a clause that states that I have to give 60 days notice if I'm going to move out, even at the end of my lease. (I believe this is a pretty standard clause.) However, I didn't notice it until I was within the 60 days, and I received a notice from the management company telling me that unless I signed a new 1-year lease (at a reasonably increased rent), I would be put on a 2-month to 2-month lease (at an exorbitantly increased rent--about 25%). The notice went on to state that I had to give notice at least 60 days prior to my departure, so basically, they trapped me into having to either stay on for another year or having to pay significantly more for another month so I could give 60 days notice. I don't know if they are usually better about sending out notices on time, but yesterday I received another notice telling me that I needed to sign a new lease by two days ago in order to avoid the 2-month rates. (They apparently didn't notice that I had already filed my intent to vacate a month ago.) I don't know if they are intentionally sending out notices late to trap people into paying more or signing new 1-year leases. It's possible they're just incompetent. Either way, if you decide to live at Hillwood and want to leave, don't wait for them to provide you with notice that your lease will be expiring--be proactive and notify them with more than 60 days before your lease is up.

Otherwise, the complex is okay. Not great. The water heater in my building has broken four times in the year I have lived there. Management is generally prompt about sending someone out to fix it.

The shuttle service to and from the Metro leaves a lot to be desired. The regular drivers are good, but the company that runs the shuttle apparently thinks nothing of the inconvenience to the riders if a driver can't make it to work one day, and they don't bother to notify people if a shuttle isn't running one day. If you needed that shuttle to get to work or home form work, you're pretty much out of luck and will have to take a bus. They also sometimes swap out the regular size shuttle for a half-size one. The shuttle is often really crowded anyway, with people crowded in and standing in the aisles, but it's infinitely worse with the half-size one. It can be so full that people at the later stops simply can't fit on the bus and are left for the next one, 20 minutes later.

User Responses
From: shani20	Date: 06/21/2007
60 days is standard. any common person would know. I didn't get a letter because they sent to the wrong building, but I knew I had to find out about the deadline to sign the new lease - the deadline is 2 weeks before your lease expires. so there is no excuse. But yes they may be incompenent sometime, they billed me for storage usage while i am done ith them a year ago. they apologized and asked me to discard the letter. We were almost evicted just because I have a hearing guide dog and they didn't check the files before writing us a eviction letter. When we are going to buy a house, they said we have to pay 5500 in peantly 2 months rents with 60 days notice AND two month penatly. I fought and fought because i have been here for 2 and half and they always made a mistake with our lease. so we didn't get the house, but we were angry about it. As for mainteance, we didn't have any problem at all other than overflowing tiolet which i blame my husband :) As for shuttle, i didn't have problem ith it mainly because i catch it at 6 40 am and catching 4 45 pm before a rush of people using them at 5. But yes, a new bus company sucks.. My husband were late twice or thrice just because there were only one drive rand he had to drive the car to work and shell out 15 dollars for parking!
From: mydogthinksimcool	Date: 07/19/2007
The same thing happened to me! They tried to charge us more...but their determination to get people notifications about ANYTHING is non-existent! I would never recommend this place to anybody. And I don't know about the shuttles Ive never tried them but the rental office is full of dumbstruck and empty headed morons. Thats my opinion at least

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