Apartment Ratings / Google Reviews of Apartment complex (Houston, Spring: lease, high crime)

[couimet1]

I am currently hunting for an apartment complex and i've been using various sources such as apartmentratings and Google reviews as a guide.

I'm finding that there alot of complex's that seem to be review poorly. alot of negative reviews on various complex's stating issue with safety, ie robberies and gun fire. many car breakins. and general crime.
now, i've been looking up in North Houston, TX ( areas such as Spring, Humble and Jersey village ), and i dont think that this areas are so called "high crime" areas.

now what i wanted to know are if these reviews are biased in any way, do locals tend to use these sources as an accurate gauge of the quality of life at these apartment complex's?

[diggity101]

people don't generally get on apartment review sites to post positive things. Take them with a grain of salt.

[thisgrub4u]

I noticed similar but I there are positive reviews as well, so they are out there. We are moving from WI and started my lease on May 2nd. I looked at 20 different places before settling on the 20th place! Was a long hunt. I primarily drove around and used the apartment.com app as I went. I thought it was a pretty useful tool for tracking what we liked and didn't like. What I found, was that anywhere along 1960 was not where we wanted to be. Lots of places looked good on paper but once I drove around and saw the traffic and area I'm sure some of the negative reviews I saw had valid references.

I looked at Jersey Village, near West Road, seems to be a high traffic area so I passed. Some areas in there looked really nice but the apartments were older and you could tell.

On of the apartment people told me to stay away from apartments that were on/near the bus lines. Seemed to be decent advice. Of course your budget may dictate otherwise.

Some nice apartments in Spring especially close to the new Exxon Campus, but $$$$.

We ended up closer to Tomball off 249/Northpointe. Easy commute to work for me and easy spring board into Cypress/Spring/Woodlands when we start home shopping later this year.

[kaelti12]

I have, and have had friends, who lived in plenty of apartments with really bad reviews. None up north though, mostly around the medical center/braeswood.

I think most are people who have a chip on their shoulder; Late rent but didn't want to pay the fines, didn't take care of their apartment etc..
Just make sure to be pleasant to office staff and always take time to say hi to the grounds/maintenance guys. And pay your rent on time

I know that some of the apartments are probably truly bad, but make that decision in person, not based on online reviews.

[rockinar]

Humble is pure high crime, Spring is getting there, and Jersey Village is eye of the beholder (I would not live there).

[couimet1]

Originally Posted by rockinar

Humble is pure high crime, Spring is getting there, and Jersey Village is eye of the beholder (I would not live there).

well noted, where would you recommend ?