In February of 2003, I rented a one bedroom apartment at the Decatur for $815 a month. I was given the option of renting a parking space in the complex?s cramped garage for $100/month more, which I agreed to, and was also told that my water would be metered.

Right away, I found that this complex was not immune to the sirens of a nearby hospital. They blared incessantly at all hours of the night.

In March of 2003, the drain to my shower was so clogged that I became accustomed to bathing in a foot of water. It remained that way until I moved almost a year later.

In May of 2003, my car was broken into while parked in the garaged space that cost a total of $1200 a year. Despite the presence of security cameras, I was told by management and the Seattle police that nothing could be done; no incident was ever caught by the cameras. I was never reimbursed for this expense and was held liable for the cost of the parking space the entire month of May.

In June of 2003, I came home five nights in a row to find a white van parked in my parking space. When I inquired about this, I was apologetically told that it was a maintenance van and that they would be notified not to park in my space from that day on. The next day, I once again came home to find the same van parked in my space. Two complaints later, the issue was resolved. I was again held liable for parking that entire month.

In July of 2003, I came home one night to find that the interior of one of the elevators had been vandalized, presumably by a tenant or a tenants? guest.

In August of 2003, I came home to find that both my garage door and front door opener did not work. Apparently, signs had been posted (on the inside of the building, which were of course inaccessible to me) that both openers needed to be reprogrammed. I paged maintenance for entry to my apartment; they have not called me back to date. That night was spent at a my boyfriend?s apartment on the East Side.

In September of 2003, I received a water bill for over $50 for a single month. I called the water company and was informed that, unbeknownst to me, my water was no longer being metered. Although I showered most nights at the gym, I was now responsible for the collective cost of the entire building.

In October of 2003, my front and garage door opener once again did not work when I returned home from work. One more ineffectual page to maintenance later, I wound up spending another night on the East Side.

In November of 2003, when winter hint, I discovered that my bedroom insulation was so bad that I could turn the heat completely up and still not be able to stand the temperature in my bedroom. I spent most of the month sleeping either at my boyfriend?s or on a couch in the living room.

In December of 2003, I all but stopped sleeping at this apartment, returning home only to pick up clothes and trek back to the East Side.

By January of 2004, I had found another apartment.

On the up side, the cost of these apartments is reasonable compared to the rest of Seattle. The staff at the Decatur is genuinely kind-hearted and interested in helping, but the complex's resources are simply insufficient to accommodate the number of tenants who live there.

Personally, my bad experiences here pretty dramatically outnumbered the good, although it?s possible that I?m the exception. After living in both Seattle and on the East Side, I frankly have no clue why anyone would pay to live in the city when you can get a much better cost 20 minutes east.

That?s my advice to apartment hunters. Good luck!

User Responses
From: luvdecatur	Date: 09/19/2005
you should have been smarter and moved out sooner....your fault for going through the "torture" of it all. I will be looking for your next review from the east side
From: mamala	Date: 02/05/2006
or you know, maybe the decatur staff should have been better about reimbursing this person for the time the maintenance van was in their spot, fixed the person's shower, given notice to them before their bills were going to significantly change and maybe put some film in their apparently useless video surveillance cameras. From these posts I'm starting to wonder if the camera's are even real.

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