Ashford Belmar

I absolutely love my apartment here! I have an awesome spot in the community with a little back yard that is fenced in and away from the street and parking lot (one of only a select few — so I’m a lucky guy). I work from home often and it’s great going out on my patio on the summer evenings, throwing some beats on my iPad, grilling a ribeye, and enjoying my own personal «yard» while I bust out some emails and other work. I live in the Broadway floor plan, and what I love most about it is that when I walk in my apartment, I don’t just get dumped into my living room or kitchen — I have an actual TILED entryway where I can kick my shoes off and hang up my coat. A foyer/​mud room! Boom! Full size washer and dryer in the same area, perfect for lazy ol me who «irons» his clothes in the dryer. :-P
I have to say, things have changed drastically over the past several months with the manager Sarah at the helm. What a difference! I just renewed my lease for a third term. Customer service is on-​point and everyone in the leasing office has been a pleasure to deal with and the maintenance crew is taking care of business. The grounds are getting cleaned up and it seems the overall operations of the community are starting to all fall in place. Take the previous reviews and stuff ‘em — things are changing for the better around here.
I will admit, parking was tough when I first moved in, and it’s still a bit of a challenge, but the leasing office is trying it’s hardest to fix it. Short of tearing down a building and constructing a parking garage, there is not much you can do. I rented a carport and it solved the problem. WELL worth the extra dollars and no scraping my windows in the winter and a nice cool truck in the summer.
The last thing I want to mention is the location and extras (fitness center, movie theater, golf simulator, pool… The list goes on). I am literally at the very edge of Belmar, but feel totally removed from the «downtown» feel of it. And the mountains are just a short drive away. It is quiet around here but everything is LITERALLY five minutes away. I get pissed when I have to drive 10 minutes up to Jose O’Sheas for their happy hour because B-​Dubs is too busy — spoiled rotten. Not to mention, the awesome lake that is behind the clubhouse. I just wanna know when they’re going to start renting out paddle boats. There is an awesome island in the middle of the lake and I would love it if they would make it available to rent. Throw a grill out there, some seating, a kegarator, and call it a place to entertain my buddies while we fish!
Overall, I have to say this is probably the best location in the Belmar area. I visited the other places and they just don’t have what this place does. Definitely getting more for my rent dollar at Ashford. Only way I will be moving out of here is when I find the house of my dreams.

We lived here for two years. Moved to the area from DC, and was able to get a great floorplan up on the third floor at a reasonable rate, especially for the area and «amenities». This was about three months before a revolving door of new owners/​managers began. At first things stayed the same, but little annoyances began to pile up. The steam room broke and was simply never fixed. Various renovations were started, half finished and remained so by the time we left. Various fees were added onto bills, bills were late to tenants, late penalties were still applied, etc. The last property manager who took over was actually somewhat responsive and reasonable, but we have still not received our deposit return check (it was a tiny amount, so not a big deal, but it is a solid indicator of the weirdness of this place). It was great to walk to Belmar, especially as we did not have a car for our first year and a half. However there were so many small things that were really annoying (cigarette butts on the ground from the mandatory valet trash pickup guys, weird standoffs with the waste management companies so the dumpsters were full for days, the hot tub never really working right, etc).
We prepared for our move out from the beginning by documenting everything and getting copies of everything we submitted. I talked to at least four different people during our moveout period and every time I got a different answer. I had to submit this move out form, and they lost it and said I did not turn it in, at which point I produced the signed copy from one of their coworkers. It was just amateur hour — one thing after another.
After a few months of reflection I am able to provide a more reasonable review. This place was once part of the other two apt complexes surrounding that «lake» — that is why the facilities are so over the top. The layout of the units is not very strategic and the construction quality is not super high, so stuff is always breaking as the whole development slowly slides downhill. I think that whoever owns this just bleeds money out, so they try to install all these BS fees (carport, etc) to make up $$ wherever they can until they can’t take it anymore and they sell it to some other sucker.
If you can get a great unit, are more interested in the gym than the «aquatics» and have a reason to live in Lakewood this is a decent midrange $ option, as long as the current managers (Radco) are there. Otherwise you are just better off renting a house and avoiding the hassles.

This is the worst place I have ever lived, and I have lived in 9 rentals over 3 continents so that is saying a lot. I was so eager to get away from this place that I moved a month and a half before lease end. I am not an angry person, but at my wits end.
Problems:
They never fixed my heat properly so I never knew if the heat would be on when I got home or woke up. My apartment would regularly go down to the 50s while out/​sleeping, blowing out natural gas and an exploding heating bill all the while.
I alerted them in May that my A/​C wasn’t working properly either, called in at least twice per month until they finally resolved it at the end of August. My place was nearly 90 degrees with the A/​C running 24/​7, again with explosive cooling bills.
There is a maintenance building on the same side as my balcony and this fall there was an alarm that would go on for days, really loud so I couldn’t open my windows or enjoy balcony. Again, I let them know as soon as it started going off and it would take up to a week for them to shut it off. This went on until I moved out.
Now that I moved out I set the heat low, and just can back to clean… To find someone has come in an turned the heat up to 70. An Empty 900 square foot apartment kept warmer than the 2200 square foot house I live in now, and the utility bill 300 dollars more in the apartment than the new house???
I asked for compensation for both instances, not one penny offered. I asked for meetings with maintenance and management, no one ever got back to me. The on site staff were instructed not to discuss maintenance issues, so residents’ only recourse was to call an 888 number of an independent company who could only send a message to maintenance. Heat and cooling issue problems I reported were regularly closed within a day or two, no explanation, and nothing noticeable done.
I don’t know anyone else in Denver metro area who had such a strict and inefficient parking policy.
It took them 6 months to figure out how to give residents their bills.
Every time I went into the leasing office I felt like a piece of crap, their attitude: I am lucky to be living in such a place. This has changed in the past few months, the staff is really nice now, but the service is still the worst I have ever seen.
UPDATE– I moved out mid January and was promised a full refund. It’s may 9^th and after several phone calls to them and going by the office in person… STILL NO CHECK. NEARLY FOUR MONTHS.

Almost a year later and we just resigned our lease! This place gets some bad reviews, but we have very few complaints. The staff and the amenities keep us here, and when we have problems they are addressed immediately. The amminities are awesome! 2 pools, fitness center, dog wash, and they regularly have food and events for the residents. They just repaved the parking lots and everyone we have met has been very friendly. Come in for a visit and say Loren and Cassie sent you.

We signed a contract and put down a deposit on an apartment here months ago. Two weeks until we’re due to move in, they emailed us saying the current tenant changed their mind and we couldn’t have the apartment. When we emailed them back upset, they became incredibly rude and said they «weren’t going to have this conversation any more.» Literally worst customer service I’ve ever had anywhere.

I have been a resident here for 6yrs and every since the company got new owners this place is going downhill and it just keeps going deeper and deeper and kinda hard to see it going higher I’ve had so many issues with parking that the it has gone way out of control with people just parking wherever and even blocking garages to where some residents can’t get out because of it and the company says they have a towing company if we an issue with anything and every time I call they say the apartment has put a hold on the towing company and Ashford has announced that they are going thru another company and when I call once again cause of the same issue the towing company tells me that Ashford has put them hold also so we play the waiting game for the idiots to move their vehicle so we can get on with our day I complain to the people in the office but the people in there are total loss cause they act like working is too hard and that they’d rather just sit behind a desk and just get paid to just sit there but the asst mgr Jessica doesn’t know what’s going on till I let her know then she has to deal with the problem and she does great on resolving the problem hopefully once our lease is up I can find a better place than this day care called Ashford Belmar!

Great community and great amenities! I absolutely love living here. The staff has gotten significantly better and a huge reason I re-​signed my lease.

Still a joke of an apartment complex. Has been since the new owners took it over about a year ago.

I understand that these apartments are now under a new management company. Thank goodness for that! But I still MUST leave a review here, as I’m not confident that everything has or will turn around. If I had just read the reviews for it prior to signing a lease, I never would have moved in. This was the absolute WORST experience I’ve ever had with a place I’ve lived, and I have lived in MANY different homes, apartments, cities, and countries. Issues I had:
1.) The day I moved in, there were no blinds up! I had to figure out who to contact (because no one gave me any basic info on maintenance etc.)and ask they bring me some. The back door to the garage was also broken and wouldn’t shut or lock. We had to battle maintenance and movers at the same time.
2.) Shortly after, I had an issue with the light fixtures and laundry room door, which were normal issues and nothing to raise hell about. The bigger issue though was that I put in a request for maintenance, and never received any help. Five days after I place the request, I call back and they said that they had fixed the issue and the work order was closed. Really? Because I still can’t shut the door or change the light bulbs.
3.) Shortly after that, the dryer stopped working properly. I had to run it 2 – 3 times per load just to dry normal loads. I also put in a work order request and never received help. Good thing my brother is handy because he helped me figure out a make shift solution.
4) They NEVER returned phone calls EVER! I mean not once did I ever receive a call back after leaving a message. And sometimes I would call during normal business hours and it would just ring and ring.
5.) PARKING. Not enough can be written about how horrific it is. Firstly, there just aren’t enough spots. If you don’t have a garage or pay extra for a spot, you will not find a spot if you come home after 7 – 8 pm. It’s like a feeding frenzy there, with people just following pedestrians around, hoping to take their spots. It’s enough to make you not want to leave the house in the evenings. Speaking of paying for a spot, I TRIED! I went in the first month I was there to figure it out. The lady in charge of that told me that she doesn’t keep a waitlist for the spots because, and I quote «it’s too hard to keep track of post its. I will lose them and people will get lost. So it’s better if you just email me every couple of weeks to see if any open up.» I wish I was kidding. So I have to email you every two weeks for 7 months because you can’t come up with a better system for a waitlist than post it notes? Also, visitors cannot park in your apartment complex unless you get them a parking pass each day. THEY WILL GET TOWED. There are a handful of visitor spots up by the leasing office, but my apartment was nowhere near them. So forget about people dropping by after work. If you can’t make it to the leasing office before they close, your visitor can’t park at your apartment. There was one wonderful week where someone was staying with me for a few days, and I had to get off work early each day to run home to get into the leasing office each day to get them a parking pass. And forget about dinner parties. You will not be getting 5+ parking passes from that office.
6.) Let’s hope you don’t live there during the winter. Because it can take anywhere from 2 – 4 days for them to clear the ice from the sidewalks and stairs. I think once or twice I saw them shoveling very early in the morning of a storm which was nice, but an hour later there was a ton more snow, and they didn’t re-​shovel for 3 days.
7.) There were also terrible potholes by some of the round-​abouts in the parking areas. That’s normal. What is not normal is leaving them unattended for months, so that every time you try to park, you feel like you’re on the Indiana Jones ride. They finally «fixed» them after a couple months, but all they did was put rocks in them. They couldn’t be bothered to pave them.
Now this apartment does have great amenities, at least that’s what I hear. I wouldn’t know because the gym and swimming pool were closed nearly the entire time I lived there, being renovated. It’s great they upgraded them, but my outrageous rental price included grand amenities I could never use, which is frustrating. I also haven’t lived there in 2 months. There are many things that could’ve been fixed by now. My limited interaction with the new management company tells me that they will be better, and I really hope they turn things around. The best experience of my 7 months there was the very last week when I went in for help. The new front desk guy was extremely friendly and helpful, and hopefully a good sign of what’s to come. It just seems very unlucky that the 7 months I lived here just happened to be in the 10 month or so period that the terrible management company was running the show.

This place gets no stars but I had to to post how crappy this place is to live. worst place to live ever. They make you pay 25 $ a month for valet trash and if u do not put the trash out is the designated trash can they fine you 50 $. Make sure u know exactly what ur rent is bc if u don’t and u can’t get into the office within their time from they charge u a 75 $ late fee. They also charge you 40 $ a month to park ur car in a covered spot and provide limited guest parking. I had to buy an additional pass for guests that’s another 15 $ a month. One good thing was when their washing machine ate my clothes they did give half the difference of the damaged items. This place nickel and dimes You like crazy. I will be moving out as soon as my lease is up. Worst place to live ever. Also the ppl in the leasing office are not friendly at all and won’t budge a bit when it comes to money. Do not live here!

Be careful. They let you in with a 250 $ security deposit, and then make you give a 60 day notice. It ends up costing you an extra months rent while you are trying to move to your new spot. It’s bullshit. Then they tell you they reserve the right to rent your place out even if you can’t find a new place or something goes wrong. Plus there is dog shit everywhere. Stay away people

This place deserves No stars. I was late on my rent I understand that I’m going to acquire late charges paid everything in full. Jessica called us Friday saying we owe 144.95 by Tuesday which was 5÷12÷15 so we did. Today is Friday 5÷15÷15 and got another notice saying I owe 210.00. WTF. Called and talk to Jessica and she states that they didn’t reseve the Money Order. I feel like we’re getting fucked. I never get a monthly statement on what we owe and when when you pay what you think you owe you have to pay more. Can I file a complaint of some sort? Please don’t rent here.

Dealing with the property management company that has bought this complex is one of the most frustrating things I’ve experienced aside from dealing with Comcast. Any requests for things done are always pushed back with low priority. My car has gotten towed twice. If you want a carport, you have to pay for it until your lease is up no matter what. I was told differently.
I have a number of friends now living here and everyone is just as unhappy as myself. I have had slumlords in my life, but I have never had to pay 1500 dollars, actually they’re increasing it to $ 1600 without amenities. i forewarn anyone looking to live in Belmar not to rent from Ashford Belmar. I joined Unilocal just to write this review because I am so unhappy. Save yourself time money and frustration. Live somewhere else…

BEWARE. Ashford Belmar is very nice and is in a great location. However, there are a couple of issues you need to be aware of and one MAJOR problem with the property management you NEED to know.
First, parking is chaos. If you get a garage space, you may want to test your car if you have anything bigger than a sedan. We couldn’t fit our Minivan, and even my Mini Cooper was tricky to park. It’s not very wide.
Covered parking is a bit narrow as well. Try to get a spot on the edge.
Regular parking was a nightmare. Except for the area near the leasing office, parking is a battle in the evening and night. Spots fill up quick and you should avoid leaving your spot at night otherwise you may have to park far away and walk it.
Also, we had some ant problems during the summer.
However, the BIG PROBLEM is that, 6 months after we left, I am now being shaken down for $ 1,600 because I didn’t give «60 day notice» I was leaving. I had a 3-​month lease agreement! I was never notified that I had to give intent to leave and my wife, who forgets nothing, had no idea. When we checked out, they went through our file and found nothing at issue. Suddenly, 6 months later we’ve got a debt collector on us and we’re considering legal action.
Clearly, they have a communication problem to work on.
if you live there now, make sure you talk to them MONTHS in advance. If you give notice even 59 days before you leave, they have the right to fine you. I’ve never had an apartment complex have the stipulation. An absolute shakedown.
BEWARE.

We are in the middle of a lawsuit with them. Moved out in November, got our moveout statement in the mail a week later saying we were getting our full security deposit back. Awesome news, except that we never saw that check…
We called them 26 times over the next month to ask when we could expect to see the check. If anyone answered the phone, we were told the manager (Natalia) was in a «meeting» and would call us RIGHT back. She never did. Sometimes we were told «I’m going to stand outside of this meeting room and as soon as she walks out I’m gonna hand her the phone to call you back.» HA! When she insisted the check had been mailed, we asked her to please cancel that check and send a new one, as it had obviously not been delivered. After 60 days of no checks, we sent a 7 day demand letter informing them that we’d file suit in small claims court if our security deposit wasn’t returned to us within the 7 days. We hand delivered this letter to the office. (They are required by law to return it to you within 60 days, or are liable for treble damages and court costs).
After 7 days with not a peep from them, we went ahead and filed a suit in small claims court. We finally got a check, only AFTER they were served with a summons to appear in court. Funny how that got their attention. We’re going through with the suit anyway, namely because of all the time and energy we have wasted dealing with this over the last 4 months, and the obviously negligence with which they run their business, according to these reviews and those on Maps and BBB.
As an aside, everything all the other reviewers are mentioning (except the one mysteriously GLOWING review, HA!) is 100% accurate. The parking, towing, garbage, dirty conditions, no dog bags, all of it is true. The next time I want to do a good deed, I’m going to park myself in front of their leasing office to warn potential renters. Like some kind of modern-​day Mother Theresa.

This place is garbage! This is the most unresponsive group of property management that I have ever been involved with!
My most recent complaint demonstrates the unresponsiveness of the property management! My lease was up mid-​month so I finally was moving out of this place! Given that my lease was up in the middle of the month, logically I should only have to pay ½ months rent. My rent was dropped off at my door showing I owed full rent so I immediately called to get the adjusted balance so I could pay the correct amount of my rent on-​time and of course didn’t get through so I left a message. I would call around 3 to 5 times per day (leaving messages every time) but never got through and never had a call returned. Finally I got through the day after my rent was due and spoke to the property manager, Natalya whom told me my rent was late and I would have to pay a $ 65 late charge! I told her that this was never an issue when this place was managed by Parc Belmar and she literally said, «OH YOUR LEASE IS WITH PARC BELMAR, YOU ACTUALLY OWE $ 75 THEN!!» ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!! I did everything possible so I could pay the correct amount and I am being charged a late fee? I left message, called, and even went in to talk to them one day after work (around 6:00) but was told that I’d have to deal with management who leaves strictly at 5:00!!! Natalya doesn’t care, she told me that I should have paid the full amount and then they would have refunded me? Who in their right mind would pay an extra $ 600 for something that’s not your fault in the hopes of being refunded in the future? So that day I got off work early so I could catch a manager and explained my situation to Leilani who eventually adjusted my rent amount. Great I thought! We moved out and then one month later I receive a notice that I have a late charge of $ 75 that I need to pay! I again called and left messages but didn’t have my call returned. I went in and was told that I“d have to dispute the charge with someone else… end of story… I HATE THIS PLACE!
First, with one week notice, they made a new policy that they’d only accept one rent check from each apartment, no exceptions and if you dropped off two, they mail the checks back and your apartment would be required to pay the total amount in one check + a late fee + daily late charges. Supposedly, they did this because they were getting some bounced checks and instead of making a policy for those individuals that couldn’t manage their account, they’d change the policy for all their units! (I was told that one month, they had to process 50+ bounce checks which caused them to change their policy throughout their entire property.) They EXPECT roommates to transfer money between accounts and have one person pay over $ 1000 each month because they didn’t want to deal with 5% of their occupants bounced checks. When confronted about this possible issue this could cause, their response was «it is in your lease». Never have I heard of such laziness from property managers!
Second, one day when I came home, I found a note on my door where Ashford Belmar was going to institute a «trash service» where they’d pick up the trash at your door each night. At first, I thought this sounded good but I really didn’t mind walking down to the dumpster once a week to drop off my garbage. And then I found out that this service would charge us $ 25 a month and there was no way to opt out of it because supposedly, «it was in our lease» that we originally signed two years ago with Parc Belmar…
Third, I have never had one message that I had left with Ashford Belmar returned to me. Their response always is, «we are soo busy in here»…Well then here’s some advice… HIRE MORE STAFF TO RETURN PHONE CALLS!!! They expect tenants to come in and talk to them whenever they have a question.
Forth, parking is a mess and they can’t figure it out. Parking was never an issue with Parc Belmar but ever since Ashford took over, it has been difficult to find parking if you come home too late. I have spoken to people that use to live here but left because they were fed up with the new ownership and various policies that were taking place but they said a monthly parking fee would be instituted for each covered parking spot. Now, I can’t verify that this is accurate because I DID NOT renew my lease but would not doubt the individuals I was speaking with. I also don’t understand how charging people for their covered parking would fix the non-​covered parking situation but apparently management thinks it will!
They aren’t responsive to anything and all their excuses for everything they do revolve around «it’s in your lease.» They don’t care about their tenants because their attitude is «if you move out, someone else will move in.» There are so many places around the Belmar area that you can check out before coming here so either they change their attitude about everything or just put up with it… Don’t fall in-​love with the gym/​pool.

So — I have lived here since November 2014 and I wrote a review back in January with a ONE star.
Since about two — three months ago (when Sarah started as the Manager) they have REALLY shaped up. They are doing everything they can to accommodate their residents and I am throughly impressed with the turnaround. Sarah and her team care about customer service, with a positive/​caring attitude and genuinely are trying to make your living situation the best — which you canNOT say for many residential areas. Jessica, in accounting, really has stepped up as the lead go-​to person for accounting issues and I always know it’ll get done if it’s in her hands.
Ashford is really becoming a classy place to live. I’m signing on longer because I’m happy here.

Worst complex I’ve lived in.
Had my car towed, and my friends have been 3 times. They hire a predatory towing company, and to get your car out its 240 $
Complex is filthy, there was a terrible stench next to my building for WEEKS! Come to find out it was a dead animal.
Arrogantly lied to about my apartment. I came from Utah to look at a model. Loved it. Came back to move, and my apartment has not been refurbished. Everything but appliances is from fucking decades ago.
My roommate bailed on me, and I was forced to cover their share of the rent. I was about a week late when I received a notice on my door saying I will owe 400 $ in lawyer fees of rent wasn’t payed by the next day. Thankfully they gave me 2 extra days to pay rent, but they strictly said they will only help you once. Which is atleast a little reasonable.
Costs atleast 3000 $ to break this joke of a lease.
Please for your well being and stress free living, go down the block to Belmar ONE or any other complex. Don’t think you could do worse.
Have never seen the locker room cleaned.
FUNGUS in the men’s tanning bed. Never have I seen towels or cleaning supplies in the locker room, only one time there was toilet paper.
You have no parking spots unless you want to pay a fee and then pay every month for shitty covered parking or maybe a garage if you want to sell a limb.
Pros: Location

Pros–
1. Close to Belmar Shopping Center which has some good bars, restaurants, Whole Foods and movie theater.
2. Allows pets
Cons–
1. Poor management that is slow to respond to basic request that are covered under your lease. Emails and phone calls go unreturned.
2. High concentration of crime, generally unsafe. They claim to have a security service but about the only thing security does is tell your neighbors to be quite if they get to loud. Security service does not have a full time presence. They do the occasional drive through at night. I’ve never seen one get out of the car and actually walk through the complex. You can look at crime rates at the Lakewood Police Departments web site.
3. Loud neighbors, people leaving their dogs unsupervised on their porch to bark non-​stop. Requires numerous phone calls to get any noticeable action to remedy the problem. Security is on call only until 6am. If you have noisy neighbors from 6am-​9am (yes I have heard people up this late partying on their porch) you are out of luck until the office opens at 9am.
4. Dirty. Their is dog crap and trash every where. I see one poor old man who is responsible for picking up the trash and dog crap. He is fighting a losing battle
5. Cheap carpet and appliances. The new carpet looks great when you move in but ours looks worn and dirty after just six months. We vacuum and steam clean regularly but the carpet is so cheap it has stopped springing back to life. Stove burners are uneven. Dryer takes several cycles to dry one load.
6. New management has tried to touch up several areas around the complex with paint but it’s like putting lipstick on a pig.
7. «Secured private garages» are unsecured as the management doesn’t enforce the rule around keeping garages closed when not in use. Easy for anyone to enter an open garage and crawl through the rafters to drop down in to another garage.
8. Older garage door openers are miscoded so garage doors will open with various remotes.
9. Did I mention the poor management. Unresponsive to basic request. Poor communication. Great song and dance routine about how they are here for the residence but their actions (or lack of) speak much louder. They did an incredibly poor job of managing and communicating the change of ownership/​management and the issues they had with issuing water bills. And have done little to instill any confidence they are going to make Ashford Belmar a good place to live.
Unlike what their Marketing Guru claims my review is not written by a disgruntled employee. In all fairness the previous management wasn’t much better.

This is such a terrible place since new management has taken over. I wish I had the time to write everything bad about this place, but I am too busy working harder to pay for the psychiatrist I need now that they are in charge. The front office staff are about as friendly as Hitler’s mom and about as accommodating as the concierge at Rikers Island. Save yourself, run away. If you already signed a lease go ahead and meet me at the pool, a quick dip helps to hide the tears…