Hillside Courtyard Apartments

When I move there it was really nice the manager was Sabrina very polite and friendly. They change management at the beginning she was nice then she change and was a total bitch she is not very nice. She things she is better then you she talk to you like you’re stupid. She thinks she is doing much better than Sabrina but not really if something need to get fix it take her like a month or maybe more you call here the vices mail is always full. Never call her boss cause he believes everything she say you are the liar that because they are sleeping together. Well I don’t want to give any stars I have to cause it won’t let me post but honestly I give zero because she is a living hell.

I have lived here for about a year and for the most part it’s been a nice place to live.
Residents are respectful and quiet for the most part. I had one neighbor that would blast his surround sound. And management took care of problem.
It’s nice having a parking garage with assigned spots and extra storage.
They allow pets.
No bugs
Easy access to Bart and the freeway. Pacifica is 10 minutes away. Sf is 30 minutes away with traffic. Sfo is three stops on Bart
Management keeps the building clean and maintained

I never leave reviews, and ALWAYS try to give people the benefit of the doubt, but this place was awful. My husband and I have had nothing but problems with the landlord, Lupe, as she is incredibly unprofessional and shady. Not only did we have nothing but professional problems with her and the reality company; but we’ve also had many personal problems with her as well. This review is not based on our personal ones, because that would be unfair to give someone a bad review based on someones opinion, so here were some of our professional problems. The equipment was always broken (laundry room, vending machine, garage door, etc…) the landlord is NEVER in her office and extremely hard to get a hold of, (was 45 minutes late to an appointment we had set up), there were always «fees» being added to our account that we were unaware of, the company thought we were overpaying for 9 months and didn’t bother to tell us, just let the money collect for them; and once it was discovered that were in fact were paying the correct amount in rent, it was somehow our fault and were charged for a bunch of erroneous things on top of it. So all of this on top of the manager being very rude, makes this place a crap hole. Please, please do yourself a favor and do not even waste your time with this place. Its not worth it.

$ 2,000+ a month for ROACHES.
I am writing this because my boyfriend is simply to kind to do so. On move in day 1 at approximately 5PM I spotted a roach in the kitchen. I actually did not know it was a roach until I goggled images of household insects. Then they started to appear in the kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom.
Apparently, Hillside courtyard knew about the roach problem and decided not to disclose it prior to my boyfriend moving in. They stated that the apartment had been sprayed for roaches two days prior to him moving in. Since he has continued to see roaches, exterminators are coming again.
Almost $ 3,000 as a total move in cost and yet roaches are popping in and out of the kitchen. Also, no one bothered to clean the bottom of the stove (it pulls out), it was caked with cooking grease– a food source for roaches. I sprayed «Easy off» on it and 2 hours later all of the nasty cooking grease from the previous tenant was gone.
I advised my boyfriend not to put anything in the cabinets yet as there was 1 baby roach crawling around inside.
I’ve stopped counting the amount of roaches that I’ve seen in the past day, last count was 24.
I don’t care how renovated the apartment is, none of that matters when you have a roach problem.
I’ve also spoke with 2 of his neighbors and apparently the roach problem at Hillside Courtyard is not limited to one apartment.
Hoping the roaches will be gone within a month, otherwise I believe the unit would be declared uninhabitable-​Roaches in apartments are a health code violation.
Other things: I could clearly hear the neighbor walking and talking above at night. The floor is very squeaky and loud. There is a loud siren/​horn that goes off randomly in the middle of the day.
Most of the roaches have been the same color as the «hardwood» floor, so I have accidentally stepped on 2 roaches accidentally, thank goodness I was wearing shoes. Interestingly, the carpet also blends well with Roaches. You won’t see them unless you look closely.
I will definitely update this once I stop seeing roaches in his «renovated» Hillside Courtyard apartment.

At this point, 1 Star is only by default due to the Unilocal system. Things have gone DOWNHILL, but due to limited affordable housing options, I may be stuck here for a while.

This is a really really good apartment complex! Super helpful/​responsive management, clean building, indoor garage included, walking distance to the bart/​post office/​good sushi restaurant (oriental kitchen). This place is the best I’ve experienced when it comes to living in a building with a good amount of tenants.

I’ve been living here for almost 2 years. When I first moved in, everything was near perfect. Sabrina was very kind and understanding — and she worked with you when you have any problem. Laundry on-​site was great, and it was quite in the complex (there was an occasional noise issue here and there but it was rare). You get a car port in a gated garage. Rolando is really nice too and fixes the problems in the apartment really quick.
My problem was that my bf and I had two cars — so one of us had to park outside often. It’s hard to find parking especially during Thursdays and Friday’s during cleaning. I’ve gotten my fair share of parking tickets because times I forget (that’s my fault… haha)
The apartment complex is actually in a weird spot where it’s almost closing in to Colma. The Colma area is nice –I always walk my dogs there and there’s a doggy park. Most of the people walking that area pick up their dog poo and there also doggy bags available and trash.
The Daly City side, however, its really ran down. The streets sucks (but recently they put a new pavement in or something). I’ve seen worse as far as ghetto — but the area is not great either, especially for the price I pay for rent.
No on really picks up their dog poo in the daly city side prompting homeowners to put «no dogs allowed on grass «sign on their lawns. It’s hard b/​c where’s my dogs gonna do their business. But it’s understandable. It’s annoying too because I always pick up my dogs poo — and it gives dog owners a bad name.
As far as the actual complex, it’s really really overpriced for not that great apartment and neighborhood. I pay 1669 (including utilities and pet rent) for a SUPER SMALL JR One bedroom. There’s not ventilation anywhere — so the kitchen gets very hot and the bathroom really smelly. At one point, there was mold growing on the ceiling… but they fixed that.
Management has changed since January 2013 and everything went downhill from there. The new tenants that they’ve been signing in are really unruly. You occasionally vanadlism on the walls and someones dog has been peeing all over the walk ways and often in the elevators. They have no respect.
You can probably find somewhere else cheaper… or for the same price for some better neighborhood or apartments. Only plus, is that the BART is right across the street… but for me, I drive so that doesn’t really matter to me.
EDIT 10.28.2013:
I added one star, because after my review, the new management was more communicative as months went by — and was very helpful with the move-​out process. ALso, I got some of my deposit back, which was very very surprising considering I left the place in a no-​so-​stellar condition (sorry! price for having dogs). Still 3 stars because the tenants are still letting their dog pee all over the complex — it’s been better than the last time though — I think because they started raising the pet rent to $ 50 from $ 25. Also, the price in the laundry went up from 1.25 to 1.75 and then 2.00 something?! It was a huge price hike ~

I lived at Hillside Courtyard for a year and had an overall decent experience.
Pros:
–Gated garage
–Doors leading to the apartment entrances were locked
–Lots of closet/​storage space. Lots of cabinet space in the kitchen
–Spacious bedroom (I lived in the medium size bedroom, so I can’t speak for the junior one bedroom)
–Bathtub/​shower combo
–Microwave
–Dishwasher
–Friendly management and maintenance
–Laundry on site
–Walking distance to BART
–Close to freeway
–A 5 to 10 minute drive to all kinds of businesses (grocery, post office, banks, shopping…)
Cons:
–The fire alarm in the kitchen would go off easily when cooking even with fan on
–The kitchen was small and a little cramped when my husband and I were both trying to cook at the same time
–The apartment could get really hot (but was easily solved by the ceiling fan and opening the window)
–The loud horn that goes off occasionally throughout the day and night to call in the volunteer firefighters (but after awhile, it became comical)
–Only one laundry room (but I learned alternative days/​times to do my laundry so it wasn’t so much as a problem. Just don’t expect to do multiple loads of laundry on a Sunday)
–The BART could be heard from my bedroom
–Ocassionally I’d hear my nextdoor neighbors fighting. (But I’ve visited other apartment complexes where I could hear every word of conversation from the next apartment. Comparatively, hearing an occasional fight wasn’t so bad)
–Someone nearby my apartment had a dog who would constantly bark when his owners weren’t home (Management was notified, and I never heard the dog again after that point)
–Street parking at or after 5 or 6pm could be a challenge and occasionally I’d have to circle the block a few times to find parking. (But, I never had to walk more than 5 minutes from my car to my apartment, so that was a plus considering the challenging parking)
–Old, old elevator. It was very cramped and slow. (Similar to the fire horn for the firefighters, the elevator also became comical)
–The neighborhood looks kind of run down and sketchy, and I’ve heard reports of cars getting broken into. Neither my husband or I experienced our cars getting broken into. But, as a woman, I did feel safer calling someone and talking to them on the phone while I walked from my car to inside the complex if I got home late at night.
Granted, this was my first apartment and previously I was living on a college campus. So, my expectations may not be as high as someone who has been renting for a long time. The main decision that made my husband and I move was the steep increase in rent. Rent prices increased all over the Daly Cty area, and the price for this complex was pretty competitive with others in the same area. But, my husband and I couldn’t justify paying the higher rent for the lack of amenities offered (no swimming pool, fitness area, tennis courts, etc.)

I’ve only been here for a few months with my boyfriend and if we had more than 2wks to look for a place… WE WOULD’VE DONE MUCH BETTER THAN THIS.
1) my rent is 1815 for no ammenities such as gym, pool, or a damn decent elevator
2) elevators are ancient. very slow and can only tend to one party at a time
3) the washers in the laundry room are filled with soap scum and ppl tend to touch your clothes.
well, im outta here in november 2013 and we’ve new management so i hope they make these changes asap. we’d love for our experience to change
UPDATE 2÷25÷2013
great…the price for laundry raised to about $ 1.50.what for? idk but they should expect anarchy. that aint right. to raise the price before renewing the elevators. bitches.

This guys are super unprofessional!
Me and my husband use to live there for 13 months and to tell you honestly we are super disappointed.
Firs we didn’t have any animals and they gave us an apartment where the whole floor in the closet was soaked with cat’s pee!!! We lived there for over a month until they find us another apartment. And they didn’t payed for our moving expenses, but gave us like $ 100 discount from the next month rent, OK but after all we was paying really high rent, so it was like nothing. Any way Sabrina was really nice and kind, so we decided just to move as soon is possible and to enjoy life as a normal people and happy young couple.
Anyway, the new apartment was extremely dirty, in the bathroom the whole wall on the side to the toilet was yellow, guess what was that? The bath tube and the tiles was dirty, like never cleaned after the previous tenant. That was disgusting!
The kitchen was not cleaned professional, there was dried oil and black spots on the oven and counter. Sabrina called a cleaning team to come and clean, but why this was happening guys, why you didn’t do your job before we moved in? And on top of everything when we moved out they wanted to charge us for broken door over $ 300. My husband went to Cools and bought it for $ 19, set it and paint it for 2 hours.
Not to tell you that the maintenance was super unkind and unprofessional too. When he came to fix our locked bath-​tube, he left all the dirt there and he made super mess in the bathroom, and by the way he came twice– the 1-​rst time he didn’t unlocked it.
Now they gave us to a collector company for over $ 400. When we moved out we spoke with Sabrina to leave the key on 1-​st of June, but it was Sunday and no one was there. So my husband called her on the next day in the morning in the time the office opens and she wasn’t there, but a man he spoke with told him not to worry, but to bring the key on the next day. So now we have to pay $ 435 because we didn’t gave them the key on Monday morning.
Me and my husband fell resent and disappointed of that. We left the apartment more clean then we find it and we wasn’t making big deals from the issues they provided to us.
Dear Sabrina, nothing personal, I really like you, but I guess you wasn’t looking at the whole picture of our experience in the building. Please consider your decision to charge us additional and please whoever you leave in your office, be sure that they consider their decisions with you, because the man allowed my husband to keep the key. Thank you!
Sofi

I lived here for a little over 2 years, and it was a pretty decent complex. The complex is locked, so you don’t have any weirdos walking around the courtyard. It also has garage parking, (if you want to pay extra a month, but street parking sucks, so what can you do?).
The property has laundry on-​site, though the six washers seem to always be taken up on Sundays, so you have to fight to get it done or just do it another day. Sometimes other tenants steal the laundry carts for whatever reason, but eventually it finds its way back to the room.
Sabrina was a really good manager. She’s very attentive to concerns and issues that need to be addressed. She also is pretty good with being understanding with problems that may arise.
Though I would say the property is semi-​safe, my roommate and some of our neighbors did experience some theft, including my roommate’s bike tire, (stolen twice out of the gated garage), and my neighbor’s car that he parked on the street always ended up missing a license plate or two. Another neighbor’s car was broken into, (her window busted out), in the garage. We did get a few letters on our door about theft and being safe, but I mean for the most part it wasn’t the property’s fault. If you have a bicycle that’s worth anything, make sure you keep it in your apartment, (or at least take the front wheel off, because someone WILL steal it out of the garage).
The apartments themselves are nice, but it depends on what unit you get. The one I had was spacious and had a nice layout, though I had been in others that were awkward and felt cramped. The negatives are that the plumbing gets clogged often because the piping is old, (the management takes care of it quickly, though), and the kitchen has poor ventilation, so if you cook anything with steam or that gets hot, your smoke detector will go off unless you open the front window up a little bit.
The bathroom was my least favorite, because the neighbors below us used to smoke in their bathroom and the smell would leak up into ours. You can also smell what everyone else is making for dinner, and the walls are pretty thin so if your neighbors are having a fight, you’ll know every detail.
Most people in the complex are quiet, aside from their weird fights that occasionally happen, (someone was arrested below us on Thanksgiving night for being drunk and going off on their boyfriend or something…). We did have a really yappy dog for awhile next to us until they moved out. We did notify management about it, and they did speak to them about it but nothing really happened until the tenant moved out.
Although I like this complex, the rent increases are TERRIBLE. When I started renting this place, it was $ 1200 + $ 125 (I think) for utilities. By the time I was moving out, rent was almost $ 2000. They blame it on the market in the area and how the surrounding complexes are priced, but I think it sucks that they don’t really care about people who could be a resident for a long period of time. The location is ideal if you’re taking BART into the city frequently, but honestly I think the increases are ridiculous.

screwwww sabrina and all the up tight jerks that live there, it is a dog friendly community supposedly but the first chance they get, they evict my dog. i had three days to have him removed and since i had just moved there from thousand oaks i didnt know anyone he could stay with until we could move. witch we had to do and it ended up costing us over $ 4,000. The next day i had to drive 7 hours back home alone to drop him off and turn right around to be back in time for work. NOT to mention the fact that when we moved in to the time we moved out our carpets in the apartment were covered in pee and cat hair. i never owned a cat and one had never been in my place, my dog never wet the floor… and when we approached he on the matter she said there was never any record of a cat living there so she dismissed us right away and refused to even look at it. look im allergic to cats very badly, ill tell you i wheezed and sneezed until they day i left i was sick all the time from just baking in it. It was one of the wost experiences i have ever had. given this was my first time moving out i was so scared of the world. Plus there is mold, in pretty much all the bathrooms, and if u cant see it, you can smell it. All the cocking in the bathrooms are falling apart. Gets very hot inside and there is no air conditioning. THE WALLS ARE PAPER THIN!!! you can hear their conversations crystal clear, god forbid you all want to watch t.v. at the same time. the elevators only fit two people about my size, and im a very small girl. they smell terribly there is usually dog pee in them. The fuses for the only 2 lights in the whole damn place dont work, they go threw bulbs like crazy. all the appliances dont work, over over heats, microwave is banged up and bleached and so is over so when u cook it smells like bleach and over will brown in spots. i am over this place tho moved to a better location down the street wayyyyy better so if you are looking to live here, dont go to La Terrazza at colma station. same price, wayyyyy better, closer to bart, wayyy bettter, they have 2 gyms, 2 offices, 2 doggy parks, 2 basketball courts just amazing so much bigger and just a happier setting. good luck

My girlfriend and I have lived here for the last 6 months and we are really enjoying it. Sabrina is the manager of the apartments, and she does an amazing job of running this place. Anytime I have needed anything fixed, it was done within hours.. Paying rent is easy, as they have a drop box located in the front office. Hillside also has an on site laundry room with a debit card system installed, so you will never have to deal with getting quarters. And the best part for my girlfriend and i is that pets are allowed, so we don’t have to hide our wiener dog bruiser :).
Reasons why it lost a star in my book:
1. As mentioned by others, the kitchen gets REALLY hot when you are cooking, as the ventilation is not the best
2.Our next door neighbors play music pretty loud sometimes and the walls are thin. However we talked to Sabrina and the music hasn’t been so bad recently.
3. I can hear the people walking around above me (the ceiling is very squeaky) and i pray they don’t eventually come through.
Other than that, this place has been an awesome place to live, and i recommend it to anyone looking for a new place to live.

I don’t need to go into full detail. this place is terrible and I’m talking about the management to the dirty laundry rooms. and how they like to raise your rent every chance they can get. people break into cars there would not rent from this place its a blessing that i moved when i can. trust me people don’t waste your time here.

My partner and I have lived at Hillside Courtyard for a little over 6 months now. We love the community, the fact that the garage parking is free and secure behind a gate, and the awesome courtyard. I think it’s the best value you could find in the area because of the included parking, units that are very well maintained and up to date, and management that is friendly and easy to work with. I can’t reiterate enough how friendly, helpful, and professional Sabrina is, it makes all the difference.
Riverstone allows you to upgrade apartments mid-​lease and that was a huge selling point for us as we had limited funds when we first moved in here. We just moved into a 1 bedroom apartment from a studio and couldn’t be happier. All of the units have about the same size galley kitchens which may be small by some standards but are definitely workable. All of the units have dishwashers and all of the 1 bedroom units have gas stoves. Our new unit has an extra breakfast nook attached to the kitchen which definitely makes the kitchen seem larger.
As for the fog horn, it was somewhat surpriing and annoying when we lived in a unit facing El Camino but we got used to it over time and now it’s just kind of comical. FYI, it’s the volunteer fire department calling the volunteer firemen for duty which I would think in day and age mught be replaced with text messaging or something.
It’s an older building and I’ll agree with Veronica on the floors being thin and creeky but we rarely hear our neighbors.
We have recently added a 4-​legged friend to our family and have found that this is an awesome place to have dogs. There are lots of dog people here and everyone gets along great.
Overall, I’ll happily give it 5 stars and hope you will consider becoming our neighbor.

We have been here for almost 4 months and have been quite happy. Sabrina, the manager, is so sweet and they are very good about fixing issues in the apartment. The rent is cheap and of course we can have our dog. The elevators may be slow, but at least they have them. Paying rent is easy as there is a rent drop box at the front office. The building and the neighborhood seem safe. Of course the parking spot in the garage is very convenient. Lots of closet space in the apartment and the two of us fit well.
Things that make it loose a star:
The kitchen is small and gets REALLY hot.
The floors are thin and the floorboards creek. We can hear our upstairs neighbors walk and talk when we are in bed.
The near by fire department uses a fog horn for something. It goes off a few times a day and is quite loud. That of course has nothing to do with the apartment, but is something to think about before you move in.

It seems like a good place from the outside. After living there, I can say that it’s not worth your money. Apartments are small, and in light of today’s rent prices, expensive. Kitchens have NO VENTILATION (cooking smoke is sucked in from the stove and blown back in your face), the neighbors keep their windows and doors open 24/​7, so you can enjoy the smell of third world country cooking. Roaches do find their way into your kitchen sometimes. There is a dump on the right side of the building which is concealed from outside view. SSSSSSSSSSSLLLLLLLLLLLOOOOOOOOOOOwwwwW elevators. You do get 1 slot in the garage, but anything outside of that is street parking — which is hard to come by. But worst of all is the SHADY management. I mean, these guys have no heart!
To be fair — management DOES address complaints. But that does not, again, DOES NOT solve the major issues this place has.

Terrible.