Apartment Review for Villa Piedra Apartments - Los Angeles, CA

My Parents lived in Villa Piedra Apartments for 2 years and the experience was horrible. My parents experience in this building was so bad that it made me wonder if the owners of the buildings had any experience at all in running an apartment complex. Here are some of my main gripes: 1) Security: Front door lock is impossible to open. This is a senior citizen building and it is a major problem with the tenants cannot open the front door to the building. Imagine being an 80 year-old person struggling to get into your building at night. This is a huge safety problem. After contacting corporate several times about the problem, it never got fixed. My guess is they did not want to pay the money to have the lock changed out and issue new keys to all the tenants. 2) Unethical practices by management: The lease has a clause that states you cannot move out during the months of November, December, and January. They put this clause in nice small print and do not notify you of this, they assume you’ll have the patience to read the lease. So basically if you sign a 1-year lease in November, you are essentially signing a 15-month lease. This is just more evidence of the unprofessional and unethical business practices of the owners of this building. 3) Lack of Safety: There are also many safety issues that go ignored. Remember this is a senior citizen apartment so safety is a major concern. Many fire doors are broken and warped and do not close. There is a huge pigeon problem with bird feces scattered through out the building. The elevators break at least once a week and if your not lucky you might find your self stuck in one for 30 minutes. 4) Low Standard of Living: Then there are the annoying things. The fire alarm goes off at least 3 times a month, usually at night. It is unacceptable to have a fire alarm go off at 3 a.m. several times a month and have nothing done about it. 5) Unacceptable conditions: My parents apartment as well as other apartments had mold and water damage from poor plumbing and drainage issues that never got fixed. My parents apartment smelled like sewage and nothing was ever done about it. 6) Poor craftsmanship: Overall the craftsmanship of the apartment is poor. The kitchen cabinets fall apart, molding breaks easily, dishwashers barely operate, and toilets that don’t flush. This was the condition of the apartment upon moving in, getting any thing fixed was near impossible. Then they try to charge you for things like blinds even though they were falling apart upon move in. In summary, stay away from this place, the rent is extremely high and it is nowhere near what a suitable apartment for a elderly love one should be.