Alterra at Grossmont Trolley Apartments

Last week I toured Alterra and fell in love. Not only with the leasing agent, Kayla, who showed me around, but also with the apartment complex. It’s located next to a trolley stop which is great since I’m a student at SDSU. It’s definitely one of my favorites I’ve seen so far while apartment hunting in San Diego and I hope to move here soon!

Don’t rent here. They’ll have you sign the lease and pay and then two months later say you never paid a deposit or the pet rent and charge you for it then after they discover their error because they didn’t process something correctly. The staff is very unprofessional and rude, especially the property manager Allison. Good luck getting anything resolved.
The apartment walls are thin and most of the people on my floor are rowdy and can be heard throughout the night. The elevators are ALWAYS broken. At least once a week and take days to repair only to break down again. People don’t clean up after their pets and there really isn’t anywhere to walk them anyways. The area is sketchy, I don’t even feel comfortable walking outside the apartment in the daytime because there are lowlifes always hanging around the trolley area.
Save yourself the trouble and look elsewhere.

Apartments look nice but the staff I dealt with were very unprofessional. I had an appointment to tour at 2 and even left work early and no one was in the office when I arrived. They finally showed up at 245 not even remembering who I was or that they even had a scheduled tour. All of my questions were not answered and emails were not replied to in a timely manner. I wont get into details but they are basically going for a certain type of person to live there. You don’t qualify if you have too much money or if you receive any government help such as social security or child support. I was told they would hold my apartment and then all of a sudden it was rented. I ended up getting a call saying that it was available again because the people who rented it made too much money. Everything that was told to me was contradictory and needless to say I changed my mind about living there.

This was the best 1br apartment I ever lived in. It was well insulated and the heating/​cooling systems were top notch (along with being efficient). The grounds are kept up well and service requests get handled quickly… also the leasing staff is great.

I have been living at Alterra since June 2015 and so far I can only say good thing about Alterra. The leasing consultants are always prompt to help you even though they have a lot on their hands, such as dealing with future and current residents as well keeping track of shipments from many different mailing companies. I have had some requests made to the maintenance and they were always fast the best they were allowed to be (as sometimes the problems depend on new products and that can take a little extra time). The cleaning staff is always keeping the place great and clean and they really keep up with the place! The landscape is always well kept and common areas always nice and clean!
As far as pets I think everyone does right as much as they can with their pets! The pick up bags by the entrances are sure a plus and help me out a lot with my two dogs!
My only issue at times can be the noise coming from other apartments but I guess that is understandable in multi-​family living. I would say that perhaps the walls are a bit thinner than other apartments I have lived in. Not a big deal to me though!
The apartment complex offers monthly cooking class and weekly yoga classes as well breakfast and other cool events. I think is a nice way to meet people if you want to and I have gone to one cooking class and the teacher was awesome!
I have a one year old and I miss a playground but the area has lots of parks half to a two mile distance which is always welcome.

I am writing this review per request of Alterra staff. However the opinions are of my own and I am writing this as a favor for the staff and receive no benefit in doing so.
I have worked with all the management staff at Alterra (primarily Mustafa), and have come across the maintenance staff while walking around the premise. I have absolutely nothing terrible to say regarding the service and professionalism they provide! Although I have lived here for only a few months, all of my personal interactions with the staff have been very positive (and it’s been quite a few!). I sincerely hope that when the time comes to renew my lease, assuming the price is right, we can continue living here.
— Repairs are quick and easy. Our dryer did not properly dry out clothes. It took two visits to determine the exact cause but since then it’s been drying our clothes without issue
— When you need to pick up a package from the leasing office, even if they’re busy with a customer they will help you out quickly, and make sure that you have no other remaining packages (sometimes I forget what I order online and what’s waiting).
— Facilities have always been nice and clean. I’m very impressed, especially with the complex being dog-​friendly.
— Lots of underground, covered parking. Guest parking is straight forward. No stupid stickers or «guest passes»
— Conveniently located next to the trolley.
— Pets OK. We have a Great Pyrenees (75lb dog). Poop bags provided along the property. Seems like 95% of dog owners pick up after their pets. There’s also a few parks close by that are great to take your dog to!
— There’s always security from what I’ve seen.
— Free yoga class every Tuesday is neat, and they have other community programs that offer free food.
— Gym has free weights and accessible 24 hrs a day.
I think your experience with noise will depend on what side of the property you live on (trolley noise, people swimming in the pool). That’s true with most properties. So just keep that in mind.
The negative review Richard B made on 3÷2÷2015 has not been my experience at all with Alterra. Older reviews in 2013 don’t seem to apply anymore in my opinion.
Some improvements that could be made
— There should be some safety mirrors for cars exiting so they can see pedestrians walking on the side walks.
— There needs to be more proactive action taken to stop people from leaving their trash bags in

I reviewed Alterra previously and gave a good rating and had issue with the behaviour of some tenants in terms of pride in where they live.
For sure, other than that element, which I suppose is part and parcel of big apartment style living, most of the people here are good people and the staff is really the best.
It’s like anything and anyone, if you treat your premises and others with respect, you get it right back.
I have found the maintenance and service from the staff to be exemplary.
When you need something or have a concern, they handle it quickly with good communication.
Top notch in my book.

Nope. Don’t even bother touring this place! Alterra oversells itself as a luxury apartment complex with energy efficient fixtures and a young, hip «downtown San Diego» vibe — It’s far from the truth! It’s urban sprawl! It’s a crowded complex of cheaply-​constructed cubicles sandwiched between a trolley stop and a busy La Mesa through street.
My wife & daughter and I recently escaped! And I could not be more happy to have this experience behind us.
The elevator is almost always broken. Like once a month. One month (December 2014) it was down for a week and then again for another week. The staff is practically non-​existent when it comes to rectifying the situation and getting the elevators working again — they blame the elevator repair company (who they’ve hired) and just pass the buck. They tape a vague sign on the door and let it sit for a week.
In addition to the elevators, I’ve listed many other horrid aspects to this complex below:
The appliances are utter shit. They are so called «energy-​efficient» which basically means you need to cook food longer, wash/​dry clothes twice, run the HVAC almost constantly and scrape food off pots and pans post-​dishwasher cycle.
The low-​flow toilets contain 4oz. of water in the bowl, so enjoy shitting on porcelain. I understand there’s a drought right now, but and extra 3oz of water would be okay.
The crappy faux counter tops are fiberboard topped in plastic. That’s what you get in a $ 2000/​month apartment? They look & feel like complete garbage. It’s literally ground up saw dust glued under plastic!
The HVAC barely cools the unit and the thermostat is really just there for looks because it does not regulate the temperature at all! It’ll sit there running for an hour with no change in temperature, then suddenly turn off. Then it’ll come back on and the temp will drop three degrees.
Our carpeting looks like we had parked a pick up truck on it within a month of moving in. It’s matted and faded and looks like someone just rolled out some brown butcher paper and called it carpet. It’s extremely low quality and looks like shit within a month of move-​in.
Overall building construction is composed of particle board and newspaper. The walls are as thin as cardboard and the floor/​ceilings are slightly thicker. We could hear every step our upstairs neighbors took. Every cabinet door shut, every toilet flush, every burp, sneeze and cough. Anytime the kid next door wet the crib, we’d hear the baby cry. Seriously, get used to talking over people. We had numerous sleepless nights due to the constant barrage of noises coming from every single wall and floor.
The trolley stop (for which Alterra uses in it’s name) is known to serve as the mecca of sketch. All hours of the day & night, tweekers and their friends, low-​lifes, has beens and MTS security shuffle back and forth yelling and fighting, spitting and cursing, littering and peeing, sleeping and screaming. It literally never ends. La Mesa Police and Heartland Fire make two to five stops here a night, lights and sirens blasting — it’s extremely unpleasant.
And the amenities are rubbish. Half the BBQs do not work and the few that do work are usually filthy and barely get hot enough to properly cook food. And how nice it is to grill some chicken while watching some riff-​raff fight over some cigarette butts next to the trolley tracks. The pool & spa are tiny for a complex this size and their gym, even smaller.
Save yourself the headache and don’t bother with Alterra. With the exception of the first three days, I regard our year there as the worst apartment experience I have ever encountered. Alterra is not a place to call home, or look forward to returning to after work. Please look elsewhere.