After more than four years in our Flagstaff apartment, we are finally moving out!
Ryan and I recently bought our first home here in Flagstaff, and we’re in the process of fixing it up and moving in. We’re reaching the end of the two-month overlap where we’ve been living in this apartment while fixing up the new house. Regardless of where things are at with our new house, we have to be out of this place by the end of the month. The moving boxes are piling up, this apartment is in disarray and — luckily — I took photos a few years ago to share.
We’ve renewed our lease countless times over the past four years. I took all these photos two years ago, when Ryan and I had briefly planned on moving south of Flagstaff to Happy Jack, the tiny tiny town he used to work in.
But, as detailed above… Ryan decided to cancel those moving plans last-minute and we re-signed our lease, and stuck it out here another two years until we bought our house last month.
This post has been living in my drafts folder for about two years now, and I’m excited to finally share.
We’ve made a few changes since I took these photos (like some new artwork, plants, shelves, etc.), but for the most part, everything is pretty much the same as it was a few years ago when I took these photos.
And, since it’s been so long- you get some bonus photos of Yukon!
We moved out of my little one-bedroom apartment on the east side of Flagstaff to move here in September 2021.
The reason we signed a lease at our complex right across from Buffalo Park was because it was one of two apartment complexes in the city that allowed huskies, and we’d just adopted Yukon.
At the time we signed our lease, our rent was about $2,100 a month for our two-bedroom, two-bathroom and we felt like it was fair for the location, the amenities and the apartment quality (ie: no boob lights, no vinyl countertops, no nasty stained carpeting and no plastic appliances).
Flagstaff’s rental market is insane. Right now, we’re paying about $2,500 a month in rent, which is pretty typical for a two-bed/ two-bath apartment here.
And — most apartments are stuck in the 1980s, no joke.
So we’re actually pretty lucky to have the newer apartment we have.
There’s a lot that we have loved about this apartment.
The location is perfect. Our place is right across the street from Buffalo Park, which means we go on hundreds of walks around Buffalo Park and McMillian Mesa — accessible from our front door — and dozens of walks downtown, since downtown is only about 1.5 miles away.
Close proximity to Hops on Birch is important.
We also have a beautiful view of the San Francisco Peaks from our front porch and our side yard, and we never get tired of it.
We also love the higher-end (for a rental, at least) finishes and the appliances. We have stainless steel appliances and quartz countertops. No awful linoleum or vinyl anywhere!
While I don’t love the “millennial gray” vinyl plank flooring, I have to say — I will take it any and every day over carpet. I hate carpet. It’s so gross — especially when you have a dog.
We are also so lucky to have a ton of storage – way more storage than we’ll have in our new house, actually.
My old apartment had a tiny closet outside my unit (that I had to pay extra for) in addition to a single closet by the front door, a small laundry closet, a minuscule pantry and one bedroom closet.
This unit has a hall closet, a pantry three times as large as my last apartment, a laundry closet, a full-length closet in our guest room-slash-office, two closets in our master bedroom (one of which was a walk-in) and a side yard and attic — both of which we use for storage as well. We also have tons of kitchen cabinets. This kitchen is way bigger than the kitchen in our new house as well.
Which, speaking of. We love our yard. It’s nice to have a little garden, and we even built a deck! We also have plenty of room for a hot tub, storage shed and pizza oven. It’s also nice to not have to leash our pup when he has to go out since we can just slide open the side yard door and let him outside.
The layout here is really nice. I do love that we have an actual master bedroom with a guest bedroom, as well as a master bathroom and a second full bathroom.
Most apartments are designed with two equal-sized bedrooms/ closets, which is great for college roommates/ any co-living situation, but not ideal for families.
So I do love that we have the perfect set-up for our dual-income, no-kids lifestyle.
This the first time in my adult life I’ve had an actual bedroom-turned-home-office-slash-guest-room, and it’s really nice to have a dedicated space for working and guests.
With all that said, there are a few things I don’t love love about our complex.
Our property management group has either been 5/5 stars, or 0/5 stars. No in between.
The community manager when we first moved in was fantastic, but then she left a few months after we signed our lease, and our complex was sold to a new property management group.
Our apartment complex ownership has changed hands three times since we first moved in (almost every time we’ve re-signed our lease, it’s been with a new property management group) and for a period of time there was someone new working at the front desk or in maintenance almost every other month — no exaggeration.
Apartment management and maintenance have been consistent for the past two or so years and I have positive reviews now, but 2022-2023 was an absolute nightmare dealing with the incompetent guy working the front desk and the completely absent maintenance.
At one point a few years ago, we went about nine months without being able to get in contact with anyone at this complex. The front office stopped replying to calls and emails, and none of our maintenance requests were addressed. We had to start repairing things ourselves.
We also had a major security issue during that time period (I’m the woman that caught a pervert filming her in the shower, SO FUCKING FUN, right?!) and the guy working at the front desk was the least useful person ever when it happened. I think he finally got fired, which couldn’t have happened soon enough.
Apartment management has fluctuated so much over the past four years. I would have given management 6/5 stars when we first moved in, 0/5 stars (possibly -2 stars) during the second two years of our tenure, and back up to 4.5/5 stars now that we’re leaving.
In addition to the leasing office/ maintenance/ management company and security issues I mentioned above, there were a few more things we didn’t really love.
We love having our own little yard, but we share a fence with neighbors to our east and a fence with neighbors to our south. That means we smell and heard EVERYTHING. Our entire side yard gets smoked out when our east neighbors grill, and we have to constantly deal with yipping from our south neighbor’s dog.
Since all of our neighbors have dogs, smells (and flies) carry easily when side yards aren’t cleaned. One of our neighbors is also a smoker, which has ruined a lot of hot tub nights.
We also aren’t technically supposed to have grills or open flames, but we’ve noticed a lot of tenants break that rule frequently.
Our parking situation here also isn’t ideal.
We don’t have assigned or covered parking here, so I usually have to park at least five or six buildings away and walk to our apartment.
Normally I wouldn’t care, but with the security issues we’ve had, walking at dark isn’t my favorite. Plus, I can’t use my car’s remote starter in the winter unless I snag one of the coveted close parking spots, and loading/unloading my car is a huge PITA when I’m parked several buildings away.
I do love that our apartment complex has some community amenities — like fire pits, grills, a gym, a dog park and a clubhouse — but the tenant neglect I mentioned above has bled over to those amenities in the past.
The complex gym wasn’t heated at all a few winters ago (tenants ended up bringing their own space heaters), the fire pits were broken for about a full year and the dog waste stations weren’t routinely restocked, so a lot of times, I was stepping over and around pet excrement left all over the grounds.
Plus, for as much as we’ve paid in rent, I do wish the complex had a few more amenities, like a pool, covered parking and package holding.
I’m also a little bummed about the lack of windows! This is just a Flagstaff thing. Buildings here don’t seem to have a lot of windows, which is a huge disappointment! So many of the plants I had at my last apartment died once we moved here.
I mean, if I was designing a building with a view of Arizona’s premier mountain range? Floor-to-ceiling windows. Obviously.
I also don’t love the design of our main room. I prefer it when an apartment opens up into an entry way, foyer or the kitchen instead of right into the living room in front of the TV. We couldn’t get a rug that covered the space between our couch and TV stand since it was an awkward size, and there wasn’t really a different way to lay our apartment out.
I know it sounds like I’m complaining, but honestly, for as much as we pay for rent? The housing market sucks SO much, and it’s kind of impossible to not feel jaded when you’re paying twice what a mortgage should cost for shared walls.
Overall, though, we’ve been mostly happy with our apartment. It’s been really good to us, and it’s served us perfectly over the course of the last four years.
We’ll miss our view more than anything else, as well as our easy access to Flagstaff’s trails. But, we’re beyond excited to finally own our first real home! Being able to choose our own paint colors, appliances and flooring — while building equity and owning a garage (!!!) — is definitely worth the trade off.
We hope our unit’s next tenants love this little apartment as much as we have — and we also hope they enjoy receiving all the mail addressed to Mark Martin and David Demello, which has plagued us for half a decade now.
Mark Martin and David Demello, if you’re reading this, please for the love of god set up mail forwarding. And Cherrill Melcon, please stop sending your family Christmas cards here.
