The Berkshire Apartments

I have not lived here for a full year yet and it has been a terrible experience. The apartments are infested with roaches and there are mice. They tell you that pest control will come every Monday but in reality pest control comes to your apartment once a month. My package has been stolen from the mail room twice and they do nothing about, and maintenance takes forever to fix anything.

A little over a month after I moved in, I did have pest control issues however management was quick to take care of it. I haven't had any problems since. Lowest prices in rent in the area which include all utilities, although the amenities could use improvement. The location of the place is great and within walking distance to my classes.

As a student attending VCU, the prices here are affordable. The apartments themselves are a little dated however management has done a lot of renovations this past year and they do a great job at keeping the place clean. I am walking distance to my classes and work, the location is very convenient.

To start, theres a definite roach problem. It's the whole building too, I know of people who live on different floors and also experience a roach problem. I have done as much as I can do and the management won't respond to my or anyone elses complaints about the roaches. Some neighbors I talked to even told me there are mice (which, knock on wood, I haven't experienced). I can tolerate all the other issues of this place, but the roaches is what brought this place down from 3 or even 4 stars to... just 1 star.
The kitchen needs A LOT of work. The cabinets are so old and grimey that the only thing you can really do for them is either sand them down and repaint them or just replace them all together. Again, I've seen the cabinets in other units and honestly mine look the best out of all of them. I'd ask to do it myself, but that is 100% not my job. Why should I waste anymore money on fixing this place up? The $100+ on roach spray/bait is already too much.
There is no hood over my stove and no windows in the kitchen so cooking is a challenge. The vent in my kitchen is so clogged I doubt it's even doing anything (I tried cleaning it, but I think only a professional with serious PPE can actually tackle that job).
In addition, my stove wont ignite without a match. One of the burners used to ignite with no match, but not anymore. My neighbors have a pilot light so their stove is hot to the touch all the time (in case that's something you're concerned about).
Half my outlets don't work and the bathroom has no outlet whatsoever.
Another potential concern is the "How to protect your family from lead" pamphlet they gave me when I first moved in. I understand it's an old building and I'm fine with that, but I thought it's worth a mention.
Lastly, the sundeck being closed. That was a big thing they advertised, but it's impossible to get up there. You have to ask someone in management to unlock it for you, if you can even track down anyone from management. That means the deck is only open during office hours so you can forget about going up there early in the morning, in the evening, or on Sundays.
The only plus to this place is that the maintenance workers came very quickly to fix my issues (though they did enter my apartment while I wasn't there despite me specifying to not enter my apartment while I was there because I wanted to explain the issues in person). Plus the view is very pretty, especially at night if you're facing East.
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Parts of my ceiling collapsed multiple times due to leaking from rain. They took money out of my security deposit to “fix” it. I had to go out of my way to argue with them and they finally claimed to give me back my security deposit but it’s been well over 3 months since I moved out and I still have not received back my $200.

They love stealing money from students, and the apartment itself is awful. Old, moldy, mice and cockroach infested. Please save yourself the trouble and do not live here.