Avalon Towers Bellevue

I love living here. My situation recently changed where I went from a two-​bedroom to a one-​bedroom apartment, and I didn’t even consider another apartment complex. The staff is wonderful. Everyone is always smiling and helpful. Reba and Michael are wonderful to work with, Stephen and Ken are welcoming at the concierge desk, and Attila is always immediately responsive with maintenance issues. Thanks everyone for making me feel at home.

They say that people take time to only write negative reviews. Well, I am taking time to write a positive review because I truly enjoyed my stay over there for the duration of 4 years.
[begin short review]
During my 4 years living there, the community and its staff lived up to their word.
The concierge staff was always professional and friendly (hello Ken and Stephen). Apart from greeting them when I enter the building, they took care of the package reception and delivery and other mundane issues.
When it comes to maintenance requests, I can say it was top notch. Mr. Attila Madaras, the maintenance supervisor, was always there in person to fix all kinds of problems in the apartments: from replacing busted light bulbs to repairing a broken appliance. I would place a maintenance request online and within the same day (or max the next day) I would get the issue taken care of.
The leasing office staff was also very friendly (hello Cathy, Michael, Rebecca and Terri). I interacted with them often, not just once a year when I was renewing my lease.
As a positive «side-​effect» of the staff’s friendliness, they became like a small family to me.
Note: I don’t want to sound all sensual in my experience, I have to say that I did encounter some misunderstandings with the staff during my stay, but when I communicated my concerns politely, I was met with nothing but good and prompt service.
Inside the apartment:
— — — — — — — — — — — –
I will not include pictures of inside the apartments because the layout varies from an apartment to another and therefore pictures won’t do them justice. My advise is that you go to the leasing office so they offer you a tour. Instead, I will be briefly citing all of the positive points I enjoyed in my apartment:
*All the cabinets are brand new and shiny. Depending on the apartment, you may find that you have a lot of spacey cabinets for storing kitchenware.
*Glass electric stove tops. I never had to worry, as an amateur cook, when cooking rice and the water boils and spills over for example. The glass stove top was always easy to clean!
*Spacey and quiet fridge = sleep soundly at night!
*The walls have very good noise isolation from next door apartments or the ones above. I was rarely annoyed by my neighbors playing music, watching TV or just having fun. When I entered my apartment it felt all fun, quiet and private.
*The awesome view. Being on one of the higher floors, I had a nice view of the mountains from my window. Since my apartment was facing the east, I would witness the sunrise each morning.
*The bathroom is all new (marble sink tops) and shiny. A nice bathtub to help you relax and soak in whenever you muscles feel tight or overwhelmed with stress.
*The modern washer and dryer, located in the bathroom, are stacked on top of each other saving you space.
*A nice balcony where you can put a table and couple of chair to enjoy your coffee in the morning when the weather permits.
[end short review]
I have written a more elaborate review on here:

Avalon Towers Bellevue is one of the best metropolitan apartment communities I’ve seen. It’s certainly the best I’ve lived in.
The staff is professional and friendly. The community buildings are contemporary, clean and full of amenities that make it feel like a luxurious home.
The location can’t be beat. It is in the heart of downtown Bellevue and makes living in Bellevue an easy, enjoyable experience.

We like the location of this apartment building but our apartment has serious issues with year round noise coming from the wall and constant circuit breaker tripping. The noise keeps me from having a good night sleep and the circuit breaker keeps tripping whenever we feel like watching TV or using the computer. :/​the maintenance staff are really efficient and friendly but can’t seem to find the root cause of our problems.
Edit: BTW the majority of our living space power comes from a 15 amp circuit breaker… So it could the a building wiring issue more than staff competency. (The staff is great!)

the place is ok.
Bad pretend flooring, showers you cant adjust the pressure in and VERY VERY THIN WALLS!!! We can hear our upstairs neighbours enjoying themselves in very specific detail a few times a day. Good on them but ew. They’re so thin We can hear conversations and light foot steps.
Staff are really lovely and the communal areas are nice.
We were only here for a month as corporate housing with work but there is no way we’d ever move here.

I have mixed feelings about living here. I’ll list the Cons first, followed by Pros:
Cons:
— Expect to pay over a grand when moving out. Every Avalon property I’ve lived at does this, but this one went out of their way. I somehow owed a ridiculous amount, something close to $ 1500 when moving out, and I’m dead serious when I say that I left the place in reasonable condition.
— Apartment condition upon move-​in wasn’t all that great to begin with. Carpets and paint looked new, but the cabinets were all scuffed up and it didn’t feel all that «luxurious».
— The thermostat was in a weird location and it caused one of the rooms to be either ridiculously cold or ridiculously hot depending on how you set it. There was never a way to equal out the temperature.
— The HVAC system broke three times in one year. One time it has to actually be serviced, the other two times the maintenance team just reset it.
— Wall paint, like all Avalon properties, is terrible. They repaint after every resident because simply brushing a backpack against the wall will cause black marks to appear, which you cannot wash off.
Pros:
— Location is good. A walk to QFC.
— Price is reasonable for downtown living, but obviously expect to pay a premium for the «luxury» aspect.
— The staff were generally nice. Not over the top nice, but not rude. The concierge was always very nice.
— Parking is not bad.
— Amenities are really good. Loved the rooftop and used the gym a lot.
— Nice balcony in our apartment.
— Noise insulation was really good, I never heard any of my neighbors, or anything really.
Overall, I wouldn’t move back in, but I can’t say that you shouldn’t try it. Three stars may be harsh, but something about this place was always a bit off and the move out costs are crazy.
If you’re looking for a very nice place to live downtown that’s more reasonable in price than the Bravern or Ten20, I recommend looking at Metro 112. I loved living there and the apartments are much nicer. Prices are about the same.

Pros: Nice apt layout, staff are usually friendly.
Cons: The walls are thin, Almost everyday, i heard my neighbor’s fooling around. Or someone dropping a ball right above you. The hallways had heavy wear and tear and was left unaddressed for over 6 months. If you wish to break the lease they charge 2 months rent. Guest parking is only 2 hours. Expect to kick your friends out before otherwise they have to pay. Roof top is always crowded on a sunny day, people usually hog up all seating. The TV room in the evening is always packed with 1 Avalon resident with all their friends who play video games there all day and night who are loud. Older crowd is here, lots of pets particularly dogs… dogs always pee in the elevators… place is usually empty when its not nice out. Internet in lobby is slow! If you have any complaints you have to go to corporate which is in a different state on the other side of the US.
I paid my bills from the portal on time every month. I got ½ of my deposit back which is fine. But I have been getting a blocked # calling me weekly asking me to pay them some bill which is odd. Sounds like a spam. They leave messages for you to call 1−855−282−4100 which is really annoying.
They are a bit disorganized when you check out. There is no walk through. 3 or 4 times in the year that I was there, someone set the firealarm off causing everyone to evacuate the place. Oh the water bill here is usually 100 $/​month
Make sure you check out the amenities and environment several times and make sure you are okay with it before you sign lease.
Place is really dusty btw!
This was my experience here… I did not renew.

Moved out recently from this NIGHTMARE and would never recommend anyone rent from Avalon Towers. Details below…
What was good:
— Great location, places to shop and buy takeout. Best QFC in the eastside
— Great folks downstairs to help with packages
THE BAD (divided into multiple sections)
SECTION 1: Air Conditioning and Power Outlet Nightmare
— Air conditioner system runs on automatic but they wont tell you that when you move in (ops?). That means while you have cooling and heating, you wont have control of it. Every day it «resets» which changes temperature setting! I asked them to disable the auto reset as I HATED having my AC reset to blow extremely cold air overnight and at other random times but they told me they wont unless I take full liability for the AC unit breaking (2−5k liability).
This caused me to have a really really terrible experience in a building where I was paying 2k+ for rent. And be warned, the folks who sold me on the apartment rental had no clue (according tot heir own words) how the AC actually works.
— The living room was a nightmare trying to plugin ONE COMPUTER (and yes I had talked to maintenance who told me «Sorry its just how it is»). What I mean is after moving in I plugged in one computer desktop, one lamp, my wireless router, and BAM the power went out in the house. After resetting the fuse box I realized that all the plugs in the living room blow out the fuse box if I kept my computer plugged in.
Maintenance came by and told me to «use a computer somewhere else». Really? I had to run a wire to an outlet in another room just to USE THE LIVING ROOM. Who creates a brand new apartment with power in the living room that cant handle a single computer with a few other devices? If I used any other outlet outside the living room it was fine, I used the kitchen outlet with 2 desktops, multiple devices, etc and it was fine. But imagine having an ugly power wire running through an apartment you’re paying over 2k for?
— ²⁴⁄₇ maintenance? Not really… the weekend (a Sunday) that I moved in and my power blew out due to me plugging in one computer (See above), I had called maintenance because I honestly didn’t realize how the fuse box reset worked. It seemed you needed to push the lever left, then right, silly thing but whatever I just didn’t know for the first day.
So to make a long story short I called them on the «24 hour support line» for help, I did so multiple times and no one called until about 30 hours later on the next day. So don’t believe the whole «²⁴⁄₇ maintenance support» idea it just doesn’t exist here.
SECTION 2: Day-​to-​day living (noise, fire alarms, help from management)
— Its not the buildings fault but its a fact of life living in this building over the year I was there they had at least 4 major fire alarms go off. The bad thing is when it does the fire department comes and you’re trapped because they shutdown the elevators. And I do get it, safety first but man it was annoying
— I know many folks here say there isn’t much noise and I agree the building floors and ceilings are fairly well soundproofed. But here is the kicker, not the walls between apartment bedrooms. Funny enough the living room was fine but my bedroom I could hear my neighbors TALKING, I could hear their music, etc. This makes having an adult relationship with your loved one sometimes awkward if you know what I mean. One heck of a serious design flaw.
— And on the note of «noise», I contacted the management office multiple times to help me with my neighbor that played loud club music at 10pm to 5am a few days a week but they didn’t do a damn thing about it after multiple promises. Lucky enough I went over there (multiple times) and talked them into being more reasonable myself but I shouldn’t have to do that.
— During the holidays in December they put on various X-​MAS shows in the mall. I lived facing Bellevue Way and it was terrible. I felt like the XMAS show was happening in my living room with all the noise that comes up into the apartment. I’m not against any holidays but I certainly never expected it to be this bad
SECTION 3: You’re pets wont be safe, and I hope you don’t mind barking dogs
— A lot of people in this area generally (and I mean Bellevue, Seattle, Kirkland, etc) don’t seem to care if their animals make your life a living hell. In this building its no different, some folks had dogs that would bark for 12 hours +. Management doesn’t do anything about it.
— Apartment windows are designed to open outwards and then its basically an opening facing straight down the side of the building. I had a cat and I lived in constant fear that it would fall out the window since there was no protection. What idiot designed this «pet friendly» building? You’ll never feel safe with your dog, cat or even child.
Unilocal only allows 5000 char so I cant write more :(, but I hope this is a good warning to others and its all 100% true. Please think hard before moving into this building

I moved out a few weeks ago and it has been the most painful process trying to get my «refundable» security deposit and rent receivable back. I moved out before the end of March but they charged me for the entire month of March. When I talked to them about this, they claim this was by «accident» and will give me my money back but it has been two months since I pointed this out and I am still waiting for my check. I called customer service and they said this was «not processed properly» so I have to wait another 3 weeks to get my rent receivable back.
When you move out, they charge everyone AT LEAST $ 215 for cleaning which they never mentioned to me before. They also charged me for a $ 200 new paint job which is ridiculous because my walls were really clean when I moved out. I have photos to prove this.
Aside from terrible experience from moving out, living here was mediocre. High rent, no community events, super thin walls to the point you can hear your neighbors sneezing or opening their closet doors, some neighbors have parties and they blast loud music, party room got so trashed before they closed it for a week. I would not recommend Avalon Towers Bellevue to anyone.

I’m not going to lie, I love living here, but dealing with Avalon Corporate has been a total nightmare. I’ll get to that in a minute, but allow me first to list what I like about the property.
— Location: It’s the best in Bellevue, and it isn’t close. The Bellevue Collection is right across the street and all the major bars/​restaurants are within easy walking distance.
— Unit: I’ve got a corner in the East tower with a killer view, so I’m one of the lucky ones. Units are totally quiet, I’ve been here 3 months now, and have yet to hear my neighbors.
— Amenities: Great gym and community room, both open 24 hours, which is rare.
— Staff: Locally, they are great! Terri, Barbara, and Steven are true assets to the community that make living here as painless as possible.
HOWEVER, the corporate office in Virginia is a NIGHTMARE. Read my words again, NIGHTMARE. I’ve had a billing mistake on my account each and every month that I’ve lived here. It’s taken no less than three phone calls EACH time to clear up the issue, all of which were their mistake by the way. I’d cap the character limit for sure if I was to go into a full on diatribe, so I’ll leave it for another day. After reading other reviews about Avalon Towers, I’m starting to worry what’s going to happen if we decide to move out. Not a good sign that I’m already negatively thinking about something that’s nine months away.
If you’re looking for high rise living in the heart of downtown Bellevue, the Towers are very appealing, just be sure to stay vigilant over your monthly statements to make sure you aren’t being double charged like I was.

I have been living here now a little over a week. It is a beautiful new place with an amazing view! People here are great and the gym here rocks.

I’ve only lived her for about a month, but I have been overly impressed with their fabulous leasing staff and helpful and courteous concierge. I came from the Bravern and their leasing team was rude and contradictory in most of their information to us. The Avalon and Itzel has been amazing in following up with requests in a very timely manner. My fiancée and I have been very impressed with her level of customer service as we are both experienced Realtors. Highly recommend Avalon Towers! Itzel is a GEM!

I recommend NOT moving into this place, NO customer service at all. No wonder why people move in and out all the time. I as well did not receive my deposit after we moved out. And the reason we moved out is that they increased the rent +200 dollars! After you move out the leasing office always refer to you to the Customer care number which in return directs me to the leasing office to get the details. Makes no sense at all.
More Cons about this place:
–Walls are thin and you can hear EVERYTHING! i mean everything… i couldnt sleep the first month i was there and eventually had to rearrange my bedroom.
–The white paint on the walls are so easily marked like they did this on purpose so they can upcharge you when you move out to take your deposit.
–The washer and dryer… yea its convenient that its in your unit, but it sucks! my clothes come out soaking wet and the dryer is weak. so you get nice and soggy clothes that take forever to dry.
–the lady at the front is very rude as well. You go in front to pick up a package and she is just sitting there talking on the phone without acknowledging you. So considerate of her i know.
–Guest parking is terrible because you are also sharing with retail stores
–the actual parking spots for residents are terrible. most of them are all very compact so expect dings on your doors
–throwing away boxes etc. you have to go to P2 level yourself. whats the point of paying so much for amenities if you don’t even get this advantage?
–Random fire drills in the middle of the night, why cant they get this done during the day?
–Leasing office only friendly when you sign, after that good luck youre on your own.
–I wasted so much time talking on the phone with both leasing office and customer care center to get nothing accomplished.
I will never sign with Avalon again. I advise there are other nicer places to rent in Bellevue downtown. Please consider again if you have decided to stay here, I would strongly recommend doing more searching.

Year review: renewed lease. Hard to get everything you want downtown Bellevue at this price point. The only other upgrades ate Ashton, Ten20 and The Bravern (ultimate). However, all of those are way more expensive. Avalon also has the best location: across the street from Bellevue Square, Joeys, Black Bottle downstairs, Din Tai Fun, Parlor, Facing East, QFC, drug store, and tons of other convenient things. Grub Hub and Eat24 have like 15 places that will deliver including Chinese food.
550 bus route is 2 blocks away (by Safeway) for anyone going to Seattle.
New members of staff are awesome too: Itzel and Steven. Good people and always friendly.
Cons: front door sound suppression is poor compared to other apartments but lateral and vertical sound dampening from neighbors is still very good.

As with all apartments there are pro’s and cons. But we we expect as customers is integrity and honesty. This organizations lacks both, or at best you could say they don’t pay attention to detail/
When i departed the Avalon I made sure that I did everything correctly to ensure my deposit was returned, ie move out inspection. They made it difficult (I had to chase up the move out inspection guy for an hour) but they signed off to say I would have the deposit returned.
So several weeks later I get a bill for:
Accelerated rent — $ 189 (Please !!!)
Rent Receivable — $ 40 (No clue what this is .no explanation)
Utilities, this we ok I did owe these fees
Also, because I gave notice within the 30 day period my 300 dollar deposit for amenities was refundable, but of course they did not refund this either.
When you call they make you deal with a faceless entity on the east coast rather than the manager that signed the contract. This creates more confusion.
To tell the truth I am fed up with the hoops we have to go thru to keep these people honest. Thus far I still feel they owe me more than 500 dollars.
I was so angry when i got my $ 58 refund, instead of 500 dollars plus, I threw it in the bottom of my bag.
So i spent 20 minutes on the phone today… feeling irate that I have to waste my time keeping these guys honest. We should be paid for this time we waste. The outcome is to be determined, but there is a principal here.
I would not rent with the Avalon again. I have rented many apartments, they all have there issues, but when it comes to the almighty dollar they need to get it right the first time.

Nice location, but ~$ 1800/​mo to live in a small 1 BR/​1BA? Hmmm, really folks, this is Bellevue, not SF. I like the walk-​ability to local stores and restaurants and the security provided. I guess this spot would fetch $ 3500 in SF.
For me, the industrial, poorly-​lit ambiance would be a depressing place to live, especially in an already low-​light city (Seattle/​Bellevue)
Since, I don’t have to live here and the location is good, the staff is attentive and parking wasn’t as bad as I have heard, I’ll give this a 3 star, average rating.

Great location, great pet services, excellent security

Pros:
Next door to Bellevue Square mall
Concierge service is good.
Cons:
1. Parking garage has several blind turns. In the few months I have been living here I have already had several close calls. To add to that, few months ago they gave out one week notice asking residents to remove their vehicles from parking garage on the name of cleaning the garage. The vehicles which were not removed, were towed away. So if you happen to be out on a two week vacation you may come back to find that your car has been towed away. This in spite of the fact that you have to pay to park in the parking garage.
2. In general the attitude of the management when handling building wide issues is very immature. There is a common entertainment area which you can rent for larger parties and such. Over the holidays someone used that room to have a party there and didn’t clean up the place after the party. It was a completely wrong thing to do whoever was using the area should have cleaned the place up. However, instead of working with that tenant on resolving the issue, the management sent out a notice to all residents telling them that if it happens again they will stop letting residents host parties in the entertainment area!!! So essentially one person screwed up and their response to that was to threaten all residents with the consequences!
3. There used to be a community message board where folks were complaining about issues in the building. The solution implemented by the management was to remove the community board. Essentially instead of working on improving the building and addressing complaints, their solution to everything is to make it harder for folks to do anything which might require the management to do some work.
4. The building is supposed to be smoke free but I can always smell smoke in the elevators. The management hasn’t done anything about it other than constantly send out letters to residents reminding them of the policy.
5. The elevators take forever to arrive.
6. Guest parking is non-​existent.
At the end of the day, I don’t pay 2200+ to deal with the tantrums of the management. For the rent I pay, I shouldn’t have to worry about coming home from vacation to find out that my car has been towed, or that the elevator smells of smoke, or to receive notices threatening all residents of the building about something which should have been handled more maturely.
I will be out of this building as soon as my lease is up. If you are considering moving in, I would strongly recommend against that.

Smokers: They promise a smoke free environment, but lack the provisions to ensure that it remains a smoke free environment. I had douchey 20 somethings partying/​smoking in the stairwell for like a week straight, Avalon would do nothing about it and essentially told me to pound sand. I got the same response when someone was smoking on my floor. At one point in time, they actually asked me to go investigate the smoking/​smokers myself, which is asinine considering that I pay them $ 2,155 a month to NOT have to deal with stuff like that.
Parking Garage: One of their exit signs was broken either by a drunk tenant or a truck that was too tall and was hanging much lower than the 7 Foot Clearance posted. It scraped up my roof of my truck and Avalon is forcing me to take them to small claims in order to recover damages. Parking spaces are wide and abundant though.
Management Communication: You are bombarded with letters on your door (even if you sign up for Avalon Access) almost bi-​weekly and spammed via email. In the 11 months that I’ve been here, I’ve gotten just under 200 emails from them. When a complaint is filed, they will send an email out to everyone instead of addressing the individuals causing the problem
Noise: The floors are concrete, the walls are paper thin. They don’t do anything about dogs that do nothing but bark all day, so I get to hear dogs barking at all times of the day. It still happens after numerous complaints. The buildings aren’t insulated properly either, you hear a lot of city noise, bring earplugs in December when Bellevue does its’ Christmas Shows. Also, if you’re fortunate enough to have a great view DT Bellevue, you’re also going to be pelted by the sounds of fire trucks and ambulances about 8 times a day, again, bring ear plugs. I haven’t even bothered complaining about the new tenants next door to me that sound like they have a sybian machine pressed against our shared wall when they’re boning. He only lasts for 4 – 6 minutes though, it’s kind of pathetic.
Smell: When it doesn’t smell like curry because the apartments lack proper ventilation for cooking (they’ll tell you to open a door/​window), it smells like cigarette smoke on occasion. The Elevators often smell like vomit on weekends. There have been two occasions where the garbage can on the 4^th floor of the parking garage has been painted with vomit and the waiting area for the elevator smelled of said vomit for almost a week and a half.
Douchebags: Being that it’s a block away from Douchepocalypse, there are a lot of douchebags. Almost every time you walk on to an elevator on Saturday or Sunday morning, you will see some cheap smelling, Juicy wearing slut burning your nostrils with her shitty perfume and daddy issues. At the very least, you will smell it.
Guest Parking: Sucks
The Apartment: They’re set up right for the most part. The carpet is cheap, the appliances are normal sized, granite/​tile isn’t bad. No Utilities are included with rent though, water and electricity bills are excessive in my opinion. Walk in closets are nice.
Concierges: Very nice and helpful. Always friendly
Management: Boneheads. They actually towed peoples cars from the premises in order to clean the garage on a weeks notice… which looked no different when they were done. They also got rid of the community message board because too many people were complaining about Avalon.
Maintenance Staff: Very Nice & Helpful
Leasing Staff: Have always been friendly and helpful.
Summary
There are plenty of other places in Bellevue to spend your hard earned money on overpriced rent. These guys don’t meet the bar that’s set in my head for $ 2,000+ a month for rent. I can’t wait for my lease to be up next month. This place might as well be called «Little Renton». The only reason that I gave them 1 Star was because I couldn’t give them 0 or –5 Stars. They wanted to raise my rent too.
Update:
I took them to small claims after they sent me to collections for damages, without even giving me a verbal or written notice. We mediated and they re-​imbursed me. What’s funny is that they admitted it up front, yet I had to take them to court to get them to own up to it.

I’ve lived in Avalon Towers Bellevue for 2 months on a corporate relocation. It’s okay, but I’ve decided to sign a lease in a building 2 blocks away.
Pros:
— Great location in downtown Bellevue
— Brand new building
— Very friendly staff for maintenance, concierge, and anything you need
Cons:
— Loud
— Long wait time for elevators going up /​down to apartment
— Tight parking with poor visibility
— Low value for the money relative to square footage and quality of fixtures versus comparable buildings.
Overall, I’d say it’s a fine place to live. And downtown Bellevue can be difficult to get a good building with availability. However, the cons were too much for me to take. In particular, most of the tenants are early 20s professionals who are very loud and up at all hours. And there’s something about how the building was made that you can hear doors opening /​closing and people talking in the hallway throughout the building.
I’m not sure why, but every time I need an elevator up /​down to my apartment, the average wait time is 2+ minutes (I’ve timed it). Perhaps there aren’t enough elevators in the building, or perhaps only one or two elevators is typically running to reduce energy costs?
Another annoyance is the parking garage. It’s really tight with poor corner visibility. I’m convinced if I lived here any longer I’d get into a fender bender in the garage for sure. And as exiting the residents’ parking out onto the street, there is always a dumpster blocking the view. The building has 1 too many dumpsters for the space allocated for dumpsters, so the «extra» dumpster is basically right there as you’re trying to pull out every morning.
Finally, for a brand new building, the fixtures and overall feel is still relatively cheap in the building. I noticed that other buildings such as the Bravern or the Ashton are nicer overall for the same price point.
All of that above said, it’s still an okay place to live. And if it’s important to you, the staff who work here are the best of anyplace I’ve ever lived. From concierge, to maintenance staff, to the other «customer service» staff who I suppose are leasing and tenant staff — everyone is just great. It’s just too bad that the building itself isn’t a little better constructed or thought out. Honestly, it just feels like the place was designed either to be low budget or just not well thought-​through in the design.