The Retreat Apartments

Read all of the reviews– the negative reviews speak for themselves. PROCEED WITH CAUTION. I would be very wary of doing business with these people.
We just left this apartment complex after walking out while trying to get through the process of renting an apartment for our daughter.
Diane was the only bright spot in the process (and she has been contracted to come in and help the retreat, she does not work for the retreat, although perhaps if she did, they would have better reviews).
As we were trying to fill out the tedious paperwork for the apartment and the guarantor process, Elizabeth could not even be bothered to come out of her office, forcing poor Diane to shuttle back and forth endlessly with each question we had. On about the 5^th return trip Diane informed us about income eligibility; it was clear Elizabeth was not even correctly reading our pay stubs as she missed they were one week pay stubs and not bi-​weekly. We more than qualified for the 5 TIMES the monthly rental rate for income (which, by the way is ridiculously high to require, more than most require) but she didn’t even take the time to realize the numbers she was looking at were weekly amounts. An innocent enough mistake, HOWEVER, the fact that she couldn’t even be bothered to get out of her chair to come recognize her prospective renters was very telling, to me, of how they will handle any issues you might have after you’ve already signed the paperwork. She only came out of her office after she heard us telling Diane would would be leaving and not renting the apartment after all.
Don’t give The Retreat your time of day– they definitely don’t give you theirs.
Diane– You are far too good to be working for a place like this.

The place is modern and clean. The rent is pretty good compared to other apartments in area. However, their customer service is absolutely horrible! They are rude, incompetent, and dishonest. I might even say that they are a bit racist. I was never given a tour of the facility. They only showed me the apartment. They spoke about my finances in front of other prospect tenants without any regard to my privacy. I was given mixed information about what I needed as far as proof of income, etc. This of course delayed my move in date. Two weeks after applying, after giving them requested documents, they finally pull my credit only to tell me my deposit is a lot more than what I was originally told. At this point, I’m frustrated and not willing to pay a large deposit. I cancel my application and ask for my initial deposit. They said, sorry you had 72 hours from when you applied to get your deposit. It’s been more than 72 hrs. No shit! You dragged and you didn’t know what you were doing! I was never told this. I kept hearing, «if you decide to cancel, we will give you your deposit but keep $ 35 app fee». I was never told anything about any 72 hours! I obviously didn’t move in and from reading the reviews, it could be worse :-(
I will contact the manager but I’m not going to hold my breath.

Worst place ever. Great living experience. A bitch to get my deposit back. They are liars and thieves who threaten your credit if you don’t pay up. We should have gotten money back already (six months after moving out), but they hijack you every way possible. I’m suing. It’s unfortunate, and it’s going to cost me money, but I refuse on principle. I would never live here again. They are dishonorable.

I don’t know why people are just throwing 1 star reviews all over the place when they aren’t taking everything into consideration. Sure, mishaps can happen but The Retreat Apartments is extremely clean in my eyes. When my roommate and I moved in, our apartment felt brand new, super clean, and the staff was incredibly helpful as well. Oops, there was a tiny paint spec on the carpet in my room and there were a few drops of paint on the new granite counter tops that I scraped away but it was no big deal. The fact that we’re paying a reasonable rate in an extremely clean apartment complex is enough for me and is enough for many others I’m sure. These other reviews probably don’t even mention the free bus that basically picks you up right outside the apartment every weekday morning to give you a FREE ride to Bart and back. Can’t complain about that. I haven’t even mentioned yet the gas barbecues on the property, the swimming pool and spa, and the gym and exercise rooms that The Retreat offers as well. Summing it up, I have had no problems with The Retreat and I love it here.

Shady business I went for a viewing and was quoted one price yesterday. Then today I call and am quoted an extra $ 30 per month by the same person wtf?

This place deserves negative stars!
I moved out of this place beginning of the year. It was complete hell to get my deposit back. Felt like nobody in their office knew what they were doing. Nobody ever got back to you on any concerns you had. I provided them my new address for my deposit break down and never heard anything from them. I called and they continued to argue that they mailed me my break down then to discover they had mailed the break down to my address at the retreat, the place I had moved out of. Ummm wtf?! the girl I dealt with had no clue what she was doing. I don’t know how she manages to make it through life. Living here was a horrible idea. Happy it’s over, but save yourself the mistake.

I never has chance to respond to Annette from her comment so here it is: «when you contacted our office regarding the return of your security deposit, we reviewed your account. We found that we had made an error by misplacing your move-​in inspection form. We did provide you a refund for all damage charges. «- No, you didn’t. The facts are that I had to threaten to take you to court. When you didn’t find the documentation to support your false claims you accepted «graciously». You and I both know that, but that was a cute try.
«We believe we satisfactorily handled your concerns. We are surprised you have left us additional feedback on not having been satisfied.» — No you’re not. You know full well that paying me the partial deposit meant most judges would have thrown the case out. In addition you know full well I wasn’t pleased but you didn’t care (and probably still don’t)
«We pride ourselves on offering excellent resident service, including apologizing and making the appropriate gestures when we are wrong, which we did in your case. This is why we have to stand by our belief that we have a great team at The Retreat, and we welcome all residents and prospects to visit us any time with concerns.» — Of course you do. That’s why you have a 2 star average. 21 one stars out of 31 reviews can’t feel good. How’s that 2 stars average treating you? In today’s market, you’re probably not short of residents but let’s be honest here, you don’t care, so pretending you do just feeds into your predatory record.
One last comment Annette. You’re a manager there but you were NOT the person who did my review and was so rude and dishonest. I’d give you the benefit of the doubt but given your company’s track record, I can’t even afford you that. So essentially this was a cute PR ploy. You sound polite but I’m not sure how you can sleep at night, knowing full well you’ve been taking advantage of people for so many years. You either can and you’re not as polite as you sound or you’ve convinced yourself that you’re doing such a great job, but I bet the 2 star average is a slap of reality. Good luck with that.

Seriously. DO NOT LIVE HERE. The only thing this place has going for them is their location, and if you are that set on living on Creekside… then I urge you to look at ANY place other than The Retreat. From the outside this place looks great thennnn you sign a lease with these people and everything goes downhill REAL quick.
For starters… my roommate and I signed a year long lease for a 2 bedroom 2 bathroom apartment. In my opinion, when you are each paying $ 1228 a month for rent you should each be guaranteed a parking space. Wrong. They will only guarantee you one parking space and will tell you that you will either have to alternate the parking pass with your roommate, park on the street (which on Creekside is a joke and unsafe… so that is out of the question) OR pay $ 100 extra a month for an additional parking permit. Feeling like we had no other choice due to do our work schedules, my roommate and I decided to pay the extra $ 100 a month. I believe this was a huge scam because the number of extra parking spaces in the underground garage’s does not depict their «limited parking» claim, which leads to you paying into an extremely overpriced parking scam.
The day we moved in we did our pre-​move in inspection. From what we saw during our inspection I can say that their idea of «cleaning» and «maintenance» is sloppy. Paint dripped on the granite counters in the bathroom, paint dripped on the shower walls, chipped shower tiles, and mold on the bathroom walls and ceilings due to steam. OH and this is my favorite. The day I had Comcast come and hookup my cable he could’t get the outlet in my room to work (which was installed upside down by the way). Once he unscrewed the outlet he found weed stashed inside the wall from the previous tenant. Lovely.
Forget about maintenance requests. They either don’t show up at the time or day they say, or they don’t show up at all. (you’ll wait all day for them to show up). I rarely had any significant issues with the people working in the leasing office other than the fact that they are just generally not very friendly or helpful. They kind of have a «I don’t want to be bothered by you» attitude… which makes any trip to the office dreadful. The only one who was ever exceptionally helpful and acted like they cared was Paul. Elizabeth seemed overly annoyed when I mentioned I would have a POD in the parking lot (which at this point, as I was moving out, the complex seemed pretty vacant so I didn’t see the harm in having a POD on the property for a few days). However, any questions or concerns I had about the POD were answered in a polite manner when talking to Paul.
DO NOT LOSE YOUR KEYS. This was the biggest money pit EVER. It cost me over $ 200 to replace my 3 keys. Reason one this was a total scam, they had a locksmith come and change my locks and give me new keys. This is interesting seeing as their maintenance people seem to get into my apartment when need be with no problem, so there is clearly a way to make a spare copy of tenants keys. Just always keep track of your keys. Don’t lose your parking permit either as I was informed it was $ 75 or something close to that to replace a piece of plastic. WHAT A JOKE. I was a day late paying rent one month and within HOURS they had a sign on my door saying we would be evicted in three days if rent was not paid. Then I was charged a $ 75 late fee for rent being late, and when I gave them a personal check I was told it wouldn’t be accepted and had to get a cashiers check. ugh.
Lastly, don’t expect to get any of your deposit back. We had a $ 900 deposit and we got back $ 194. My roommate made an attempt to dispute this issue with no success. But at that point I just wanted to get back whatever money we could, and be done with this place once and for all. $ 400 dollars went to renovation fees. They claim that they have the right to charge us for renovation fees and that it is stated in the lease, but we were never made aware that almost our entire deposit was gonna go towards renovations for the following tenants. Let me remind you that I put about $ 200 plus more into our original deposit for my key replacement, so it goes to show that any extra money they get from you within your lease that goes towards your security deposit will be taken from you if they can find some BS reason in doing so. In addition to «renovation fees» we were charged $ 90 for carpet cleaning, $ 53 to replace drip pans and light bulbs. are you kidding me? We had a pre-​move out inspection and the guy gave me a list of things we would be charged for, but our final security deposit receipt showed way more than what he had originally told us. Bottom line… say bye bye to any deposit you give them. You’ll never see it again.
Our experience with this complex was so miserable at times that it made it a very undesirable place to live. Do yourself a favor. Think long and hard before signing a lease here because you will regret it really quickly. It is a money pit.

Worst place to live. The noise of your neighbors is unbearable. The place looks nice, but if u want quite time and to able to function like a normal person and not be bothered by every foot step of your neighbors ! don’t move there– trust me. I’m looking into suing. I can’t even began to tell you how problematic this place was. After they completely screwed me, and I had to cry, beg, record the noise, have multiple people that worked there listen to the banging etc. they claimed get me into another unit waiting for 5 – 7 months. I also started taking medication for not being able to sleep.
They continuously would telling they were waiting for a free unit. Multiple others moved into other units.
Also, they had the nerve to take my deposit as well. I’m a complete OCD NEAT FREAK. No damage was done and professional cleaned.
Due to feeling as I was going to lose my mind. I asked for them to pay for my moving expenses due to not disclosing all the noise and for the toll it took on me. Never say a dime. Their don’t give a CRAP ABOUT U PERIOD or ur well being. The place is a dump and kids live there leaving garbage everywhere. Move to the BRIO.

My gf and I have lived here for over 2 years and we love it. Apart from the the minor negatives that come with living in an apartment, things are great here. I feel like it’s a reasonable price to live in a nice apartment in WC. It’s a safe, friend community to live in. Nice gym downstairs, nice pool and BBQ area. Only downside is paying for second parking spot.

Shady business practices. Our daughter who moved in less than a year ago recently received a letter from the Retreat stating she would need to vacate her apartment at the end of her lease. The reason given that they are making upgrades to a number of units requiring that the occupants vacate, and her unit is one of the ones affected. While this was totally within their right, they never offered her alternative arrangements but instead said she could be added to a waiting list for a new apartment in the event one became available. In the meantime she personally knows of at least 2 people who recently signed new contracts for the same floor plan at a higher rate. Renter beware, this place clearly is all about the bottom line. Be careful when you sign a contract. The facilties may appear nice, but the management is slimy. Not worth taking the risk.

I have lived at the Retreat for over a year now and cannot say enough good things about the property, staff and community. I live in a one bedroom apartment on the second floor. I am a single female so safety was hugely important to me when choosing where to live. There is a building door locked at all times on the outside entrance, and a hallway protected entrance in to my particular unit — it is surely safe and comfortable for anyone concerned about those things.
The fixtures, carpeting and kitchen are all top notch, and some of the best I have seen in visiting my other friends’ apartments locally. A few things that I really love about the Retreat are the gated entrance, and how it is locked after 9pm to any non residents. I appreciate the pool and barbeque area. It has a very community feel, and everyone spends time out there on the weekends. My neighbors are quiet yet friendly and I hardly ever hear them make noise.
I was reading a few of the other reviews and I have never had a problem with the maintenance staff or getting anything fixed in my apartment. They usually have it taken care of within 48 hours. I have never had any packages stolen. In fact, because I travel often for work, the concierge staff has been kind enough to place my packages inside my unit for me while I am gone. You are able to pay rent online, and auto paid to a credit card which is so much easier than trying to remember to bring down a check.
I am actually fighting tooth and nail to secure a spot for myself for the next 12 months as units are a hot ticket given property upgrades and construction. Truly, cannot imagine living anywhere else. The convenience to freeways and downtown is unrivaled. The staff is always accommodating and helpful, and even remembers my name and apartment number without me asking.
I suggest living here. It is worth every penny!

I wrong review on wrong apt. My apologies.

I have had numerous issues living here. Most resolved a
Most immediately. When the manager Mariah was off you could tell there was a huge disorganization with the apartments. Now that Mariah is back all seems to be returning to the good service we have received before.

Are you a virgin?
You wont be by the time you leave here, «The Retreat» will do everything they can to screw you at even the mere hint of you doing something that even remotely resembles breaking their rules. They typically respond by taping a «convent or quit» 3-​day notice on your door, which is embarrassing. While I lived at The Retreat, the following thins happened to me:
Had water pour all over my personal belongings; ruining numerous items and electronics; this was a direct result of maintenance staff blindly piercing walls with nails for baseboards at 7am — no warning.
My business laptop ruined, and was responsible for recouping tens of hours of lost work;
I have been threatened to be evicted 3 times via covenant or quit notices that were filed improperly, one of the times for posting pet sitting notices trying to recoup losses from the water incident — I was just trying to help some residents and those that I did help were incredibly grateful and many became friends of mine;
I use the same methods to file my intent to vacate form and I’m told that I am a lair or someone «took» the notice, forced to pay an extra 700 dollars to live an extra week;
I have had maintenance come into my house, put dead batteries in my fire alarm with caused my dog to jump out the window and my other dog to have seizures for over two hours, imagine being locked in an apartment for 2 hours with a nonstop beeping noise — my dogs literally went insane;
I have had packages stolen from my doorstep;
I have had my own car towed from «The Retreat» at a cost of over $ 250 dollars when «The Retreat» could have easily informed me that I was going to be towed (they take plate data from everyone that moves into the complex) — the pass was in the car just not in the right spot hanging from the rear view mirror;
I have been charged $ 200 dollars for losing a piece of plastic that represented a parking pass, an inordinate sum of money that could easily be used to reproduce every parking pass over, or to create new ones. The new place I moved — its $ 25 for a lost pass.
Misled regarding amenities before I moved in — heated pool? The joke is that yeah, its heated… by the sun. Working hot tubs??? NOT.
Absolutely relentless management whenever there is an issue.
Furthermore, to top all of this off… you’re living in WALNUT CREEK, which is a a real-​life 100-​degree suburban hell littered with stores like crate and barrel, gucci, lululemon, ect. I guess that is cool though if you are into selling an organ to afford a shirt or a piece furniture.
To top that top off you’ll be living off Creekside Drive where you’ll be forced to duel with people for parking if you get home past 5:30.
Other notables:
Homeless people live in the abandoned apartment complex next door
loud-​ass parties at the moose head (or whatever) lodge
an abundance of frat-​esque dudes that make their rounds shouting at 2am after the bars close
a cool pool scene
probably the most secure apartment on creekside dr.
Overall, run. Fast. While you’re running, get the hell out of Walnut Creek. That place sucks to live. This place is like a dorm style living nightmare like hotel California without the cocaine.

If anyone else out there would be interested in joining a lawsuit let me know. I will be filing agains these crooks for not returning $ 400 of my security deposit. The apartment was in pristine condition when I left. I think they figure that $ 400 is not worth bringing a case; they will lose.
Other notable issues. The hot tub did not work most of the year. Entering our apartment without any reason on numerous occasions. Telling me I could not have legitimate patio furniture on my balcony and leaving notes on my door.

I used to love this apartment.
However, now the management is run by some rude, unlawful and deceiving individuals.
A few months ago I got into a heat argument with the staff Elizabeth over the fact that she refused to accept a cashier check including an additional $ 50 late fee on top of the invoice due amount that they posted on our door. (Oh yeah if you are late for a day they will put a 3 days pay or quit notice openly on your door so that everyone can see it.)
Her reason is that, the amount on the post is actually less then what was in their internal record. Therefore we have to go to the bank again immediately to get another cashier check that matches what is in their internal record.
The argument ended with she refused to take the check and asked me to bring down more documents for discussion. This time, my partner to go down to the office to make the third attempt to pay for our rent instead. At first another staff (now quit) accepted the check, but then the manager Mariah called my partner phone and stated that they refused the check because Elizabeth had filed a police report that I had assaulted her; and that polices will come and arrest me soon.
Afterward I visited city hall and had confirmed with the police department that was no such a call or a police report ever exist. We have the recording of the manager Mariah making those untrue statements just to scare us.
Two days later, I came down to the office and tried to understand why she made such a defamation claim, she called the police, and lied to the police officer that I was an evicted tenant and the owner of the apartment would throw us out tomorrow. Weeks went by and nothing happened of course.
To protect ourselves, we had consulted with a lawyer about the on going event.
After we talked to our lawyer, we found out that the way they treated their tenants and the many charging fees they have in here, are illegal in the California Rental Law.
We have filed a complain to the HR of their corporation for the management harassment to tenants.
Sadly I still live in this apartment currently but can’t wait until the lease ended.
I guess at this point, all I want to say is if you are considering about renting in this apartment; beware of who you are dealing with– some individuals who are on a power trip, have no understand of rental laws and are willing to lie about anything to get what they want, or meet their monthly quota.
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Unfortunately, all previously stated inconveniences aside, this complex should be deemed uninhabitable (if it hasn’t been already).
What can we add to this already beautifully manicured complex? Mold, and lot’s of it in apartment #3053.
Short version: Mold had formed in the dry wall in my closet from roof damage the year prior. Eventually the mold covered a large, visible portion of the shelves in the corner of the closet in my one bedroom apartment, now touching shoeboxes and other items. At the time, all I saw was black colored mold covering my belongings and walls. I was horrified. I had no idea that it covered damn near the entire back wall of my room. At least that is what I have been led to believe since the abatement company was called into my home 3 times, each time to, «remove more drywall to ensure proper air clearance.»
The apartment always had a rather musty-​mildew smell, which was always mixed with the smell of garbage as my bedroom closet also shared a wall with my floor’s garbage chute. Awesome. Never thought much of the smell. Until my clothes started smelling. The smell intensified for the duration of a week while the abatement company had a hot fan blowing 24hrs/​day inside a half-a$$ed NASA space tent. Oh, yea, meanwhile they expected me to live in this 700 sq ft. death trap and offered no help what so ever financially to stay else where. BTW, that air clearance they kept having to come back to ensure and something I had asked for in writing several times, was never produced. When I kept perusing the air clearance issue, corporate denied there ever having to be an air clearance issued in a series of emails. Huh. Sucks for my asthma.
Furthermore, they did acknowledge my letter demanding dissolution of my lease without penalty. However, prior to signing any closing documents with this property, I requested specific information regarding the strain of the mold (WHICH I WOULD THINK THEY WOULD WANT TO KNOW THEMSELVES, IF THE BLACK MOLD IN APARTMENT #3053 WAS TOXIC OR NOT?). Management stated no such tested could be produced because it was not conducted. This is not good news for current residents. Well, I paid for my own test. Mold was not in fact the dreaded Black Mold, but a different strain particularly irritating to people with hay fever/​asthma allergies. Another Awesome.
I never did properly close out with The Retreat as the property manager refused to continue to converse with me after a heated discussion over the possibility of having to throw away all my belongings due to spore contamination. I literally walked into the office the last day and asked someone to at least give me proof I returned their precious key fob, parking pass, and last of my headaches.
Deposit was returned a week past their rightful 21 day mark. This was to be expected, naturally. Deuces.

And to add on, my condo was broken into by the people working on the apartments. Because they just hand keys out like its nothing. They took my laptop, ps3, and iPad. The were nice enough to lock my door for me.
The management really didn’t care much. Just said that they were sorry. If they say they need to inspect your place, make sure you are there. Don’t let them go In to inspect or spray for bugs. Good luck

Just as a quick update, I cannot recommend living here. The staff is nice at first, but once there are actual problems, they can’t do much for you. I had extremely noisy upstairs neighbors that would wake me up daily around 5am, and keep me up late by stomping around loudly or generally being noisy with a large group of friends.
I tried to stay patient and work with management. I asked if I could transfer, but they had a strict corporate policy that my circumstances didn’t meet– even though they told me they had several open units. After going back and forth for months, I had to make a decision. Stay and continue being sleep-​deprived, or move out. I went with the latter, a suggestion they made after multiple e-​mails.
Later that day, I had a bill on my door for $ 18,000 that was due at the beginning of the next month. To say that was stressful would be a major understatement.
After receiving this, I notified them that I would not be paying, that they were in a breach of the original lease terms, and that it was preposterous to ask for that kind of money in 2 weeks. They assured me that they would work out payment plans if it came to that, using vaguely threatening terms like «collection agency,» which I later discovered was actually an «internal» department. Overall, they approached the situation aggressively.
When it was all said and done, I ended up paying for 5 days. Someone else rented the unit 5 days after I moved out and I had to cover the difference. Thank god.
This was one of the most stressful things I’ve ever had to deal with in my life.
Water on average was $ 49.99 a month
PG&E was about $ 50 a month
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I have yet to move into my unit, but thus far my experience has been great. I’m really nervous about moving so I’ve asked a billion questions especially after reading all the reviews. They told me that…
1. Guest parking is $ 5 and you get a spot with a 1 bedroom. It’s not a specific spot, but there should be no problem with parking.
2. Average utilities /​water is about $ 75 a month. (This is what I was told still cannot verify)
3. I’ve placed a $ 250 holding fee and can cancel by Tuesday at the end of the day.
4. You get a clicker to let you into the parking lot after hours.
5. I asked current residents what they thought of the place while I was there and they said it was great.
6. The asbestos someone posted about is true, but almost every building built before 1981 has asbestos in it. Because it is hazardous to remove you need to seal it and re-​seal it which they have done. Every unit I looked at built before 1990 had this same procedure done to make sure the tenants were safe from any harmful effects.
I still haven’t moved in and could still cancel, but based simply on the amount of time they took to show me several units and answer my questions it’s been a pleasant experience. I do have a 1×1 held currently on the 2^nd floor, but may see if the first floor unit was available instead. Every one of the units I looked at had nice appliances, plenty of space and were priced right. I didn’t care about all the amenities very much, but my girlfriend did like all of them and was excited to try them out when she visited. I will update after I’ve been there a month or when I find something worth noting. So far so good though! I’m nervous but moving forward.