Carlyle Place

This place claims to be dog friendly, but be warned, they are crazy about letting your dog around the place. Yes, they allow animals, but the management goes crazy if your dog goes to the bathroom on the public sidewalk or anywhere near their publicly accessibly building. Management has yelled, sworn, cursed, and harassed patrons taking their dogs on walks, essentially punishing them for having animals. I was verbally attacked by a member of the management (a large white man wearing a white shirt and tie), who cursed, accused, and berated me for walking my dog near the building. My dog had already gone to the bathroom earlier, and was just sniffing around, and the manager went berserk. I walked away without losing my temper, and he kept yelling and cursing, calling me an asshole for walking my dog near his building. A colleague of his (a tall woman) just stood there and remained quiet. I suggested they put up signs advising people not to walk their dogs near their building, and he countered saying he was going to walk his dog around my car from now on and let it go to the bathroom on my car because it had no signs on it?! I continually tried to be reasonable with this man but he just got angrier and angrier. I cannot believe this place calls itself animal friendly when this is the real behavior of the staff and management. Wow! I will never live here. Just FYI, I live in a nearby apartment complex that has signs up, and they have never once complained about having pets. This was a very unfortunate experience.

I have never felt compelled to write a bad review, but the actions of this management team were unbelievable. If I could give zero stars, I would. I’m not sure if it was racial discrimination, but they singled out my boyfriend very inappropriately and unprovoked. Very scary, threatening, abusive language and body language, beyond unprofessional behavior. I am utterly shocked. I believe the manager’s name was Tony. When it was brought to his superiors attention (as it should be), it was disregarded, even though there were many witnesses. There was no apology, no corrective action, nothing. Another review used the word «belittling» and I can see nothing has changed since the last bad review. The whole experience left me sick to my stomach.
Funny how we didn’t get an apology (see below) until the incident was posted on Unilocal.A pathetic attempt for egregious behavior. We left our phone number when the complaint was filed and they never even called us back.

This is THE best apartment building that I have ever lived in. I was nervous after reading reviews about being towed, but I never had a problem with it when I lived there from 2014 – 2015. I can’t say enough nice things about their leasing office or Tom, the concierge. They are professionals and have compassion when the time calls for it. I am a little sad leaving it behind, but it was time for me to get a place of my own. I would highly recommend it to anyone. They frequently have apartment mixers to include free breakfast, ice cream socials, or dinner up in the club room. The only strike against them I would say is the lack of a grill. Otherwise, I truly loved living here with all the available amenities!

my husband and I lived here for about a year in 2012 before moving out to our own place.
they do tow if you dont display your parking sticker correctly but thats not why I’m writing a bad review.
I work at the hoffman building down the street and had to drive in today and decided to park down in the area reserved for retail parking. I was actually FOLLOWED by Ron outside after I’d told him I just wanted to go to subway but decided to head to starbucks first. He followed me out and accused me of going to the metro. I had to sit down with the manager and explain myself like a little child which was extremely belittling as to why i wasnt heading to subway first.
When I rented here, they were okay, rent was a bit high but friendly people. but since they changed their front desk staff to ron, things have gone down the drain.

Pretty nice apartment!
Close to Eisenhower Metro Station. Really clean. They have a nice swimming pool, a good gym, a great club room with a pool table, and sweet staffs. Their rooms are bigger than the average around here. Some rooms have a fantastic view. Oh, the rent included the utility. It’s a big save.

I rented at Carlyle Place for just under a year after moving to DC for a military position. Location is excellent — right across from the Eisenhower Ave. metro stop, about a 15 minute walk to Old Town Alexandria, walking distance to many restaurants and AMC movie theatre, and across the street for the express ramp to 495 E toward Baltimore.
Before renting here, I looked at Courts at Huntington and someplace near Largo. Courts at Huntington was also nice. I wanted to stay under 1900/​month.
Cost is on par with the area, but see if you can find a move-​in special for a free month’s rent. This helped quite a bit, and I’m sure that I would not be fond of paying another few hundred bucks a month for the same apartment.
I rented a 1 bed/​bath 826 sq ft apartment and it was maintained extremely well. Maintenance was super responsive to any problem I had, and it was typically fixed within a day. The one issue that I had that took longer was noticing some wet carpet near my bathroom entrance. This required them to cut into the wall, identify the leak, dry the carpet, patch the wall, and repaint.
Kitchen is granite, stainless steel, and nice tile floors. Never had an issue with any of it. Cabinets are plentiful for the size and also nice. Bathroom also has a granite countertop, the same tile floors as the kitchen, and adequate storage. Carpet throughout the rest of my apartment was new and installed just before I moved in.
Apartment was very clean when I moved in, and they are not sticklers about things having to be spick and span when moving out. I also had no problem breaking my lease under the military clause for a deployment. The office was always accommodating. Sometimes the office staff isn’t exactly personable, but they always get the job done.
Apartments seem well insulated from sound, and it was very rare I’d hear someone above or beside me in another apartment. My apartment was next to the trash chute, and I would hear trash sliding down the chute from upper floors.
I can’t say I ever had a concierge where I had lived before, but Carlyle Place cannot pay John or Tom enough to stay. Excellent service from these two and they will go out of their way to help you. They’ve got the personalities to go with it as well! Packages are always delivered to the front desk, and picking them up after receiving an email was never an issue. You can also check out luggage carts, get visitor parking passes, and general help from the concierge desk.
To address the comments found in other reviews, I never had an issue with towing, and I had a car and motorcycle in the garage. I can’t say I had much of an issue with siren noise — I honestly can’t remember an incident where I actually noticed it, and I had moved from the country in the midwest. You will absolutely notice the noise from the metro and 495, but I guess that’s the price you pay for convenience. I always slept with an air purifier on and never woke up to any outdoor sound.

Carlyle Place was originally built as condos, hence its location right next to another apartment complex, but when the market turned it was converted to apartments. I mention this because I believe the layouts of the apartments in CP are reflective of a condo and not an apartment, which was definitely a pro for me. We spent a total of 3 years in CP and originally I loved living there, the staff was great, I was the first rented in my unit, and building was well maintained. After about a year and a half the front office experienced significant turnover and things just quickly went downhill from there, the service was terrible, maintenance was less responsive, the grounds around the building became infested with dog poop, and I could go on and on. The location is obviously a major perk as it is about a block away from the Eisenhower metro station which is serviced by the yellow line. As high as the rent is, I do believe it is comparable for other similar properties in the area and along metro lines. The convenience is a major factor for living here, however that has to be tempered with the service, the limited parking situation (for yourself and your guest), the increases in rent, and extremely small crowded gym.

Who are all these people getting their cars towed??? I’ve been in the building for 3 years and no tows, no issues.
Also, it is insane to say that maintenance should take the trash down the garage ramp. VERY unsafe. I don’t like seeing trash cans in the elevators in the early AM either but I don’t want the staff to be injured — seriously, those cans are the recycling anyway, there’s not much of a smell.
I think this building is the best priced high-​rise near Old Town proper. Move-​in is cheaper than everywhere else nearby except Carlyle Mill, where the apartments open onto open air halls. Parking is competitively priced as well. Metro can be loud but you get used to it — I’m not a heavy sleeper and after a few weeks slept through it fine. Very safe neighborhood and really close to the AMC.
Maintenance and front desk are amazingly responsive and helpful, leasing office will negotiate a 15-​month lease, which helps keep rent cheaper longer. All in all highly recommended.

I lived in this building for 17 months and found the office to be pretty unorganized. Although the building is clean, and the amenities are nice, these bonuses did not make up for the negatives below:
1. They told me I cancelled my elevator reservation when I was moving out which I never did. So the day I moved out I had to use the community elevator which made it very hard for the movers.
2. THEY TOW YOUR CAR. If your pass ever falls off your rear view mirror, your car will be automatically towed with no check at all. This is $ 150 down the drain. They must be getting a cut from the towing company because who just gives a towing company access to their garage without providing any type of verification before towing your car.
3. The manager is not personable at all.

So I agree with all the negatives to the place. They *will* tow your car, even though they have your car make and model and license plate number if they believe your sticker was not «properly displayed». That was a $ 125 mistake for me (and they do not refund you). Also the rents are indeed kind of high, and they raise it up to $ 150 every year, but from friends in other apartment buildings, this seems sadly kind of normal for the DC metro region. And it can indeed be noisy, as you are situated by a police station and the metro. Now on to why I still loved my complex:
1. It is a 5 minute walk to the metro, a 7 minute walk to restaurants and the movie theater, right next to the police station so crime is non-​existent, and also with so many important things going on there, the power company makes sure that energy grid never goes down — in the storms we pretty much never lost power for more than maybe an hour.
2. John the concierge really is unbelievably good. He tells you that there is a package for you as soon as you walk in the door, and is always friendly saying hello. Even with a ton of apartments, he knows who you are and what apartment you are in, and goes out of his way for you. He is also a notary, quite helpful when you need something notarized. Tom is at the desk at night, I think until about 2AM, he is also super friendly and nice. Made me feel like I was a part of a Carlyle Place family :)
3. The maintenance guys are *amazing* — I call down with a problem, and they are always there to fix it within 20 minutes. This is from light bulbs to busted cabinets to the time I exploded the glass shelf from my refrigerator by putting it in hot water (yes, not my brightest move). And they are sooo nice! They always say hello and they are so friendly.
4. Free coffee in the lobby. And nice cleaning ladies that keep the public areas immaculate.
5. 24 hour rent drop box
All in all, thus far, I have had a pleasant experience here.

Clean place, very convenient location. Lived there for 13 months before moving into a house. Overall experience was pleasant with a few annoyances.
I concur with the previous reviewer who mentioned the police and fire department sirens… it happens at all hours and is frequent. You also get a fair amount of noise from I-​495.
The area is safe and clean. No graffiti. Adjacent to courthouse and police station.
Rents are expensive.
Biggest disappointment for me was that building management allowed my car to be towed from the parking garage, absent any attempt whatsoever to determine the owner or to validate parking garage rights. My car was authorized to park in the building garage; however, the parking tag fell from my rear view mirror. Next thing I knew… no car. No notification from anybody. I had to track it down, myself. I did discuss it with the building manager, who held his ground and was very professional, but the bottom line is it still cost me about $ 150 and some dealings with wrecking yard goons to get my car back. My fault for not displaying the parking tag… I get that. Management’s fault for not checking the plate against their computerized records that clearly had my plate number. They have no excuse, either, particularly since I had to provide all of this information in the first place, just to get parking rights (for a fee, mind you.)
I didn’t get a security deposit back, either. Something about that doesn’t seem right, and so, I’m going to check my records again.
One last thing: the front desk concierge, John, is one of the best in the business. The guy goes out of his way to be a helper, friend, and an embassador to translate the front office doublespeak to the average renter. If I were his boss, I would give him an immediate raise. That guy is awesome.
UPDATE: I was so angry about my car being towed, I moved OUT. Smart move.

Carlyle Place has an pig-​head building manager which makes life unpleasant when you have to deal with him. The rest of the staff is great and helpful. The noise can be unbearable in some areas of the building because it is near the metro and the police department. It was common to be woken up at 1 a.m. hearing «EISENHOWER STATION. DOORS OPENING ON THE RIGHT.» Alexandria Police have every siren imaginable and don’t hesitate to use them at all hours. When I moved out I brought in a cleaning lady to make sure everything was spotless. They charged me $ 200 for minor spots on the carpet, I mean two quarter size spots, which I could have taken care of in two minutes with Resolve, but the Resolve was already packed. The office person said the carpet would be shampooed and we agreed it would come out with that. What a total scam. Just another way to rip you off beyond the non-​refundable administration fee and non-​refundable pet fee. Don’t agree that anything is amiss during check out. Lord knows what they would charge for real damage.