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Summit at Madison Park
Category: Apartments [Edit]
Neighborhood: Central District2209 E Madison St
Seattle, WA 98122
(206) 720-5553
4 reviews for Summit at Madison Park
Boyfriend lived here when we first met. And, really, his place was pretty great - giant bathroom, granite counter tops, new appliances, balcony, easy parking in the parking garage, and to top it all off, located above a Safeway. Never had to worry about forgetting to pick something up, because it was so easy to just run downstairs to get it.
But, as the relationship progressed and we started talking about moving in together, one very big problem became apparent: the Boyfriend lived in a studio. Studios are not really made for two people. As much as I loved him, I needed a door I could close when necessary. So, Boyfriend goes to the front office of the apartment complex to see what larger units are available.
"Of course you can upgrade!" then enthusiastically tell him. Sure, there's a fee, but we can handle it. Okay, great. What's available? And here, we're stonewalled. They can't tell us what's available from now until the end of August, which is my deadline for moving out of the old place. Or, they can tentatively tell us, but there's only one guy who knows how much it costs, and he's only in four days a week for like six hours at a time, during normal business hours when I'm at work. Seriously?
Fine. If they really would rather drive us away - a couple that can easily afford to live there, a tenant that has proven to pay rent on time and had been living there for a year and a half at that point - we'll go. I just really don't understand why you wouldn't want to be proactive about keeping decent tenants around, instead of making them do all the leg work to try to work something out. Whatever. We're better off anyway - boyfriend had a courtyard facing room. In the last month he lived there, a neighbor acquired a yippy little dog that they left out on the patio for HOURS AT A TIME. Seriously. Awesome.
The apartments are nice. This is our first "grown-up" apartment in the sense that it isn't "cute" or "funky" or "affordable" or "loaded with character." The interiors here are sort of ridiculously swank - to the point of ending up just that tad less than homey-and-liveable. Vast swaths of granite countertop in the bathroom and kitchen, all black appliances (my first ice maker - yay!), a fancy faux fireplace with a mantle, elegant/industrial (sooo easy to dirty up) carpet - plus the fitnss and billiards and movie rooms, rooftop decks, and clubhouse - all very nice.
Now for the bad parts.
(1) Pricing seems almost random. We moved into our 1 BR + den +deck w/the help of 3 staffmembers, all of whom gave us different pricing expectations. It's mostly little stuff, but it drives me crazy. BIG stuff alert, too. They ran our credit, we signed the lease and turned over a check for 1 month + reasonable deposit, then 3 days after we moved in, they hit us up for an additional $1200! Bad juju.
(2) PET HELL. Shit in the plantings, dog butt smell in the elevators, and a plethora of "pet people" who don't get it that it's not pleasant to be barked out - LOUDLY and VIOLENTLY - by their dog at 7:00am, on the way down in the elevator.
(3) Smokers galore! I guess most places are non-smoking now, so they all end up here. Parties in the courtyard are mostly fairly sedate, but all result in the common areas looking - and reeking - like an ashtray the next day.
(4) Well, not all of the parties are sedate. Last night, my husband had to yell "SHUT THE HECK UP!" at about 1:45am, because of loud, screaming, self-consciously over-the-top "we're having such FUN!" laughter (and power smoking) in the courtyard right under our window. We pay DECIDEDLY adult rent here, so why the hell do we have to put up with frat boy antics keeping us awake into the wee hours?
(5) Management is just AWFUL. Incompetent, dismissive, uniformly not pleasant to deal with, for a plethora of ever changing (as the actual management droogs in the "clubhouse" are ever changing) reasons. We've generally had prompt service for stuff like a broken disposal, but the office staff tend toward snippy, and/or bored, and/or dismissive, and/or too cool to deal with you.
Not to mention that nearly every financial transaction other than (A) paying your rent on time and (B) paying their random, unexplained "your account is past due $37.26 (or $18.57, or $24.13)" notices on time is met with an EVICTION NOTICE. I kid you not.
Example: you go out of town for three days. You don't tell the management folks because, well, because it's none of their business! And it's only THREE DAYS. The afternoon of the 1st day, someone posts a random "your account is past due $14.76" notice on your door. Which you don't see. Because you are out of town. So you come back from your short trip to find (1) the original past due notice and (2) an EVICTION NOTICE. For fourteen dollars and seventy-six cents. I mean, it may be legal (Seattle's laws aren't particularly kind to the tenant), but it hardly makes one feel at home. I've lived in apartments all my life. I've lived in several different apartment buildings in Seattle and never, EVER have I dealt with a more distasteful, money-grubbing, shyster-y management company.
Do yourself a favor. Don't move in here. The gym and the granite counter tops are NOT worth dealing with this management company.
Kind of a mixed bag - nice apartments here, and very reasonably priced when you look at comparable onces in Belltown or Capitol Hill. I've been here a few months, so I'll give the rundown.
The neighbhorhood can best be described as schizophrenic - while it does have some great places nearby such as Crush, The Twilight Exit, Harvest Vine, Trader Joe's, and now Bottleneck, there's also the plethora of sketchy and sometimes bizarre characters you see around. For example, last Saturday morning I step stepped out of the elevator to almost got run over by a man holding a sledgehammer, running after a beat-up Suburban shouting racial slurs. I did not find this at all alarming, nor did anyone else making their way in to Safeway. Slightly scary, but I can't complain about dull Saturday mornings around here.
It isn't the quietest place. In addition to the jets flying right overhead, certain residents like to have parties and use the courtyard as their patio. Since the sound pretty much echos straight up off the concrete, you can hear every word, not to mention smell the cigarette smoke if you've got a window open. I'd much rather have a place facing outward and just deal with the street noise. Still, there's no major clubs or firehouses around, so getting woken up by sirens is pretty rare. The roof area upstairs is nice, but there's really no place to sit down so it ends up being rather pointless.
Amenenties are decent - secured access, fitness room, pool table, clubhouse, media room, and underground parking. There's a high turnover rate amoung the staff, which is the norm for most major apartment complexes. Another downside is being stuck with Millennium Cable, which has so-so TV service and fairly crappy Internet.
All in all, it's an a'ight place if you're looking for city livin' on a budget. We're at about $1300 for a 1 bed + den. Parking is a reasonable $75 and utility costs are low. Could you do better? Maybe, but I think it would take a lot of scouting.
the good: fairly new, spacious and affordable. the view is wonderful from the rooftop and my balcony. the parking spots are huge and there is plenty of parking ALWAYS! safeway on the first floor is so handy. the bad: flippin codes for everything. the management is a bit much. crack dealers on the corner. receiving packages there is absurd! and no one has wireless for me to bootleg.
