Montebello Apartments

Nice community. Clean and grassy territory. Renovation is needed. Generally, great place to live.

I just had to take a second and update my review. it’s been awhile since we’ve moved out but hey, at least I’m finally following up. I needed to add that the move out process couldn’t have better better or easier. Charges for things that needed replacing were more than fair and it was really just am easy smooth process. I’m not sure I could make this comment on any other apartments we have lived in so, great job montebello staff– you guys are awesome!

I’m giving this place 4 stars. Everything it’s great. Very nice management.
Really clean community.
Very quite place and that imported
The only thing it’s the parking.
a lot of cars and not a lot of parking almost very ones have garage or parking spots but no one park in there on parking.

There really was nothing I liked about this place. As far as living went the place was standard… My apartment was pretty awkwardly shaped so it was «spacious» in the sense there was no way to fill the shape. They remodeled outside while I lived there rather sloppily while I lived there. I was given a note told I wouldn’t have a patio for a while, so I thought nothing of it when my patio door was sealed shut. Later I found out the four months of heck construction job they did resulted in them painting over and paint-​sealing my patio door shut.
On move out i found out $ 500 of my deposits was magically missing. Admittedly, they never took it out of my bank account, but the fact that the deposits that I put down for my pet, have documents for, and signed for in my lease has unknown whereabouts is scary. Overall, my move out fees cost $ 358, $ 200 which was cleaning fees.
I feel like there was very questions anyone at the front desk new the answer to, from day 1 I asked a simple question about water/​electricity bills and the answer was «I don’t know either.»
if you’re going to pay this much for a place, look up the road to the apartments at the other end of 132 or in Juanita. At least then you’ll be paying money for a good location, and even if the place is a bit smaller the layout will make more sense.

OK, I moved out in July and the new Essex Property Management Trust promptly sent me a bill with the cleaning fees — which I’m OK with, but I had military duty and couldn’t get a check sent to their Southern California address for a couple weeks. 3 weeks after moving out — Essex sent me a threatening letter demanding the cleaning fee (and a keys fee — despite they change the locks?) or else they will send me to collections. Then, in December I learned that a friend sent a package to my old address by mistake. I called the office phone and left a message about a package that was sent to my old Montebello address. They didn’t call me back — I had to call them again twice and then the guy on the phone in office said I’d have to call him back tomorrow because he, ‘…had two lines going’. So I asked him if he was too busy to help me. He said no. Verdict: bad customer service. I suppose if you’re a former tenant or you’re not interested in renting, you get treated like a leper: no return phone calls, we’re too busy to help now, call us back tomorrow. I had to resort to emailing the community address. Stay tuned for a follow-​up review.

I am moving out at the end of this month and it is more of a «I’m sick of my commute to Seattle» than a «I hate this place» reason.
In general I found the business staff pleasant with one exception of the last hire before we left but since they sold the property in the last few weeks she left too.(yeah) I have not had much interaction with the new staff but they seemed nice. I wished the other pet owners would keep their dogs on a leash or at least clean up after them but that is not the fault of anyone that works there that people are lazy. The community provides multiple pet patches and bags for the resident’s convenience. It is also a 10 minute drive to Marymoor so your pooch can run! That was a huge bonus to us.
I like that you can pay your rent online or with a check to the office, the new office hours are longer and more convenient to working residents. The new management has more rules that really should have already been in place but it’s all good.
Parking is hard when there are 5 adults living in one unit and teach have a car and there isn’t enough parking. Each apartment gets either a garage or covered parking. Some people use their garage for storage which they are not suppose to but if they were there prior to FPI buying it, too bad. So often you have to park far away or just get home early. Sometimes you will see residents parking in handicap spaces rather than parking farther away and walking but the community thankfully does not tolerate this behavior and for that matter I have seen residents leave nasty notes.
Hopefully my move out with the new company won’t be a case of them gouging us because we are leaving but our notice was in well before the purchase so I may update my star rating after my move out.

I was going to give this place a 4 star rating because living there wasn’t bad at all. But when we moved out, we spent a week scrubbing that place from top to bottom until it was way cleaner than when we moved in. We spackled all the holes we left from nails and even purchased new drip pans for the stove. Then we got our deposit back and they charged us to have the drip pans replaced and $ 170 to have the apartment professionally cleaned! We called and they said they would send us a check for the drip pans but said that it’s just their policy to have each apartment cleaned after the tenant moves out. That’s great! That’s how it should be, but not at the tenants expense with no warning. That’s not what we were told our REFUNDABLE deposit was for!

This apartment is so convinience if u study at LWTC. I walk 5mins to school. price is lil higher than other apartments in the area, but to save time and money commute is about the same price.