Hudson Oakland

We had a smooth experience so far! This apartment is located around 20 walking minutes from Katz, and has a bus stop close by. Grocery stores (Giant Eagle and Aldi) are just a bus ride away on the Southside. We rented the apartment on short notice (two weeks before we moved in) and were able to get a renter's special. The apartment is very spacious and has lots of room for storage in the kitchen. There are two laundry machines and two dryers on property, which can be paid with coins. If we have any problems, we can always text our landlords and they respond quickly. Also, we were able to only rent until the end of May instead of July, which comes in handy as we graduate in May.

While the monthly rent is way too high for the quality of the apartment, it is good enough for a student only living here temporarily. It’s close to campus (10-15min walk & 2 min with the bus) and includes most utilities. The people working for this housing are also very nice.

This apartment is in either south or west Oakland, depending on who you ask—it’s about a 15 minute walk to scaife. It’s in a neighborhood with a lot of undergrads, so it can get a little loud at the beginning and end of the school year, but overall it’s not too bad. If you go deeper in the neighborhood will start to look a little more run down. Parking is through the city, and can be a little tight, but I have yet to not find at least one spot, and I can often park right outside my building. There are clear security cameras and a locked exterior door, so I’ve always felt pretty safe here.
The rental company isn’t too bad. We had some communication issues when moving in, but after that they’ve mostly left us alone and we’ve paid rent on time. They are slow to address non-essential maintenance requests, but when our toilet broke they fixed it within 24 hours, and when the stove broke they were in the same day and completely replaced it. The maintenance people are friendly. You definitely would want to get an apartment on the top floor—you get good views, and good light. If you go lower you just get a view of walls. It does run hot—like ridiculously hot in the winter, but I don’t mind that because personally I would rather open a window than be freezing for months.
The main reason why I’m not staying here again is that they raised the rent 150%, which isn’t so great.