Active Property Management

I have lived in my apartment managed by Active Property Management for over a year and a half now. They are easy to work with with payments, they give their tenants plenty of notice if renewal rates go up, and do an excellent job of communicating with their residents. I have reached out to them on several different occasions regarding maintenance, community concerns, and questions about my lease. They have always been willing to talk to me and offer me any assistance they can. When I first moved in maintenance could be a little slow to respond but that has since resolved and will respond back to an email request in a timely manner. I’ve tried calling the number on two different occasions for maintenance concerns and never hard back… seems like email must be the preferred communication. My unit was in excellent condition on my move in day and I have had little to no maintenance issues (no more than general wear and tear you’d have anywhere you live) the entire time I have been here. I have had a good enough experience that when my lease came time to renew I renewed again for an additional year. Plus, my fur baby is welcomed here! And if Fido is happy, everyone is happy!

Started out okay when we moved here to Austin. Finally, during the last couple of months of our rent lease we’ve had issue after issue. Most notably with our roof. It was leaky during the rains when everything was flooding, we had discoloring and bubbling in or ceiling that we reported but nobody seemed to care. Then during this summer they started to do work on the roof, 7 am daily for a month or so. Then it rained good and hard. Our ceiling leaked like a sieve. It filled up one of our light fixtures, we had an ice chest catching water that we had to dump out 10 times, blah, blah, blah, during the rains was frickin terrible. I got in touch with Active, got in touch with their specific property manager, and they told me they would be out to check on it. They didn’t show up that day. They next morning, at 848 am, a good portion of our ceiling collapsed. Just fell right on in. Luckily we weren’t up at the time otherwise it likely would have fallen right on one of us. The hole it left was approximately 3 feet by 4 feet. again I called the property manager and they said someone would be there right away because they were already working on the property. Fifteen minutes later a dude came to our place, looked in side, said «Oh my god.» then left. That was all that was done for the next 3 hours. I finally texted our property manager and she said she was aware of the problem and that some one would come fix it… When we got home that evening (Who wants to hang out it a studio apartment in such a condition) The sheet rock was taken off of the ceiling (Roughly 9 foot by 3 foot) leaving the insulation exposed. I talked to the property manager, she said that no one was coming out till after the weekend to do anything. I talked to Active and told them that I was uncomfortable living in a home were I could see the moldy underbelly of our roof, they told me to call the property manager. I got in touch with the property manager again and she had the construction company call me…
In the end we lived in a building that was exposed to mold and fungus for a weekend. The fixed the hole after that, didn’t replace the light fixture were live wires are hanging down. And now they are hammering directly above my studio apartment at 7 am.
Active property management should be avoided at all costs. They don’t care about the health, safety, comfort or livability of their properties or the people in them. they just want to penalize their renters and get all the money they can out of them.

I can not think of a single thing redeemable about the way this company handles renting a house from them. They have been completely unresponsive and downright irresponsible at every step of the way with us.
Our house is newer construction, 2007, but still has lots of problems with heating/​AC/​appliances/​utilities, ill-​fitting doors and seemingly no insulation, as well as large holes in the laundry room leading to the outside (not just like vents — just, holes, so birds like to nest in our house)…not here to complain about the house. It sucks. We’re 3 dudes in our 20’s paying at the upper range of our capabilities, $ 1500/​mo for a small house with lots of problems. Whatever. We were desperate for a roof — not complaining about that.
The worst so far has been that they started showing our house after we have lived here for 2 months. For a year in advance? Really? I mean, I guess people are planning ahead, but come on. So after a handful of last-​minute showings from numerous different realty companies — who knows who all these people are? I can’t even remember — and after some personal possessions went mysteriously missing after one of these «showings» when none of us were even present in the household — we talked to one of these people that came by the house who apparently represents Active, and asked that we be given at least 24 hour notice before a potential showing.
Doesn’t that benefit everyone? We can clean up our messy rooms, make sure things look pretty, and make sure one of us is at home so we can answer questions and stuff (and, well, make sure nothing gets stolen– something I can’t believe I have to worry about)? That was about two months ago — **literally every day this week** we have received a call from a realtor from a different realty company informing — not asking — us that they’ll be showing our house in an hour or so, or even better just not providing a time. We all work 5 days a week at various times. I work on electronics and build my own musical instruments/​equipment in my spare time. I have plenty of sensitive and expensive components sitting out on a regular basis. My roommate is a bartender. He has literal piles of cash sitting around after a busy night at work. There’s a thing such as reasonable expectation of privacy. That’s not okay. We have EIGHT MONTHS left on our lease and they’ve attempted to shuttle some unsuspecting college students through our house every single day for a week. We’ve had to call the realtors individually and tell them to please schedule «at least a day in advance, for christ’s sake». I’m sure it’s not their fault.
Also, these realtors have recently only tried to call me and left a voicemail, not informed my roommates at all, almost always during the day when I’m at work, 8 – 5: what if they just showed up and unlocked the door while one of my roommates was at home in the shower or with their girlfriend or something? I have no way of communicating this to them. That’s poor form, y’all.
But yeah, there’s no communication at all with this company. That’s the theme. We’ve all sent emails, talked on the phone, and even talked face-​to-​face with someone who supposedly represents Active about these and other issues and either have just been ignored or placated with remarks that proved to be empty promises.
Our garage has sat empty for the entire time we’ve lived here. They won’t provide us or the other people in the unit with the remote or keys to it despite repeated inquiries.
All maintenance and yardwork has been done by us — they say they absolutely don’t handle anything in the lease and will charge you exorbitant fees if you even think about contacting them about any problems, no matter if they were (almost surely) pre-​existing or known, like non-​functioning outlets — and our carpets and walls were in bad shape when we moved in. We took careful notation of this and hope to not be screwed out of our deposit. We’ll see. I lack faith. It’s just dumb that we’re spending this much money to live in a house that isn’t ours — but that we have to do all the stuff to make it livable/​useful.
I could go on. This is a novel. Just take this away from my rant: please, please, exercise every other possible course of action before you decide to make the mistake of renting from this company. They don’t care. They’re not professional. Their properties are low quality, or at best, inconsistent.
Their contact page on their website (at least from last year until this writing) says, please email us or call if you have any concerns — and they don’t list an email address (either general or personal for any of the «staff») anywhere on the website. That about sums it up.

OK, so I still rent from Uptown, whose properties are managed by Active, but I figured I’d write a review before I move out to help students make a decision for pre-​lease season. Active and Uptown are basically the same entity.
Their buildings are old and they have lots of problems. This is just the nature of old units. For example, the tiles in my unit are peeling off the floor, there is poor insulation, and everything is kind of ugly. But that’s why I’m not paying $ 1000 rent.
First day moving in, we ran the window unit for about 6 hours and the apartment was still 100 degrees. We called them, and they sent the maintenance guy out the next day. The maintenance guy (Demecio is his name) is the BEST DUDE. Here’s why. When he came to look at the window unit he knew right away it was broken and needed to be replaced. He called his boss in front of me and you could tell from hearing his own side of the conversation that they were trying to convince him to try to repair it and see what happens. He was saying that was unacceptable and after about 15 minutes back-​and-​forth, he won. We had a new, functional window unit two hours later. The maintenance guy is ALWAYS prompt and is on the side of the tenants. The dude deserves a raise.
People say Active ignores the tenants and doesn’t care that the units are falling apart. This has not been my experience. They just overlook emails. Seriously. It’s a stupid and simple mistake, one that shouldn’t be made, but it’s happened multiple times. Everytime I can actually make contact with someone, maintenance is here fixing the problem the next day.
On another occasion my car was towed from the parking lot even though I had the parking pass. I called the towing company and they said I’m shit out of luck. I then called Holly and told her what happened, she called the towing place and 10 minutes later called me back telling me I can go pick up my car without paying for it.
So I don’t know obviously if I will get my deposit back. But my friend who lived here for 3 years who just recently moved out received his whole deposit and pet deposit. They didn’t try to nickel and dime him.
all these other reviewers ranting about how their units are falling apart… I have to imagine they never complained, and just expected Active to know that things were wrong. It sometimes takes a while to make contact with them, but once you do, they are out here resolving the issue. The lesson to take is if you rent with Active, and you have an issue, FOLLOW THROUGH until you receive a response. They seem to overlook a lot of emails.
I still have 6 months with them so I will update this review upon moving out

Dang y’all, I read these reviews before deciding to lease with Active Property Management, but was moving here sight-​unseen and went for it.
MISTAKE’O’CLOCK! Don’t do it for real. I’ve been living with rats in my walls, a door that won’t lock, screens that don’t screen, and toilets that run for 4 months now. As I’m not a college student with low housing standards, I fully expect the people I give money to on a monthly basis to maintain my home do that. This group is unable to fulfill their obligations.
I first reported the rats 2 months ago. They sent out an exterminator and verified that yes, there was a serious infestation in my walls. From that point on, I got radio silence. They did not respond to my emails, nor phone calls. Finally I looked into how to exercise my tenant rights and started the letter writing process.
This got the rats dealt with, but nothing on the front door. They’ve further retaliated by sending a lease renewal form (FOR NEXT AUGUST) with a response deadline of 1 day. Obviously, I do not plan to renew my lease here. If I could leave now, I would. In addition to the lease renewal, I’ve now got «for rent» signs posted all over my front yard. FOR NEXT AUGUST.
Don’t be lured in by a good location, these people will take your money and refuse to hold up their end of the bargain. I’m fairly certain they’re planning to try and keep my deposit (based on the other reviews I’ve seen, minus that one crazy person who seems to like this group. She probably works for Active.), but I guess I’ll deal with that battle when it gets here. I’ll update then, because I’ll be damned if they’re keeping my deposit for this rat-​infested shithole. It’ll take more than my deposit to repair what years of neglect has done to this property.
Just, respect yourself and never, ever, ever rent from Active Property Management.

Well, I just got my whole deposit back minus $ 25 for a kitchen bulb (fair), including my pet deposit, so I’m pretty happy with Active.
Holley was the administrator for Active while I lived in an apartment off Duval, and she was great. They didn’t lose my rent and the one thing I needed fixed was done timely.
FYI — I was the only person on my lease and lived in a one bedroom in a small complex. I’ve had horrific experiences with other university property managers, so I am pretty pleased that I got my deposit back.

God. Awful.
Is this Uptown Realty? Is it Active Property Management? Uptown routes calls to this number.
Holley, who was managing my lease throughout the signing process, has mysteriously disappeared now that I have signed the lease and paid money. Someone informed me that she is no longer with the company… how about setting up a forwarding system for her emails or having someone monitor her inbox? I have been trying to get into contact with someone for over a week.

do not do business with them! just stay away!

HORRIBLE! Never have I ever encountered so much unprofessionalism in my entire life. First of all, the property manager we were dealing with communicated the incorrect amount to be paid for first month’s rent to our realtor. After promptly paying the (seemingly) correct amount, we received an email directly from the property manager weeks later asking for even more money. Confused, we consulted our realtor. He was infuriated that she had not only screwed up, costing us about 1,000 more dollars, but that she had gone behind his back making it seem like it was his error. After emailing them regarding the situation, demanding that we not have to pay the extra 1,000 dollars the company simply ceased to return any of his emails. We really wanted the house so we all begrudgingly accepted the mishap and paid the remaining balance through their rent portal. However, three out of the six payments «did not go through.» Our realtor noticed these discrepancies and contacted the manager himself and was met with a reply saying that «everything is fine! There is nothing to worry about.» A few weeks later my roommates and I received an email stating that it actually wasn’t fine. Mind you, the notification of this came three months after the initial payments had been made and was followed by hollow threats of not being able to finalize our lease. After investigation, two of the three payments had, in fact, gone through. The company’s platform just didn’t record them to have been processed. My payment was the one that appeared to actually not have gone through, but upon my attempts to re-​pay through spark rent, my account had been deleted. I emailed the property manager asking how to remedy this and was met with no response. One of my roommates ended up taking out a money order and paying them AGAIN (unbeknownst to her at the time, her payment had actually gone through three months ago). After learning that her payment had been made the first time around, she demanded that she get her money back. Initially the property manager said that she could possibly write a check to my roommate, but that she had to come back some time later. The next day when she returned to the office she was met with complete indifference about the situation. They told her that they would not write her a check, placed the blame on spark rent, and told her that she had to directly contact the government, send them numerous forms, and wait a few weeks before only *possibly* getting her money order returned. They placed the blame on spark rent though the money order was made out to Active Property Management. Ridiculous. I WILL NEVER USE THIS COMPANY AGAIN. The lack of professionalism and timelyness was unfathomable.

STAY AWAY! We moved into a house that was infested with bedbugs (the previous tenants were evicted for non-​payment of rent, or so we were told). The place was a sty when we looked at it and we were assured that by move in, the place would be clean. Not only was this false, but besides the cockroach infestation (small cockroaches, large infestation), the carpets that they promised to replace (and didn’t) were infested with bed bugs. NOTE: bedbug bites take up to two weeks to show up. They’re also the most excruciatingly taxing and painful experience, physically, mentally, and emotionally. I noticed mine after the first week and immediately let them know. They claimed no responsibility and said since we didn’t include it on the initial house move-​in condition form, they’re not responsible — and took no action. We had to call in a health inspector for them to take care of it. Being forced to take care of it, they chose the cheapest method (from our research, the ineffectual method, spraying) instead of the overwhelming successful heat treatment method. Needless to say, this got rid of a lot of them, but did not eradicate them. They came and sprayed a few more times and each time we told them that it was not effective. Never resolved. So we lived in a house for 4+ mos. with an infestation that they never took care of. Besides taking our security deposit, they charged us an additional $ 3500 to replace the carpets and pay for a bedbug treatment upon move-​out.
These are the sleaziest of the sleaze in Austin. Don’t expect to have a situation resolved or even addressed if something pops up. If there’s a way they can cheat you out of money though, plan for it!