The Village at Idlewild

The two college kids that live on the third floor in building 7 drive me completely insane. They sound like they are stomping around on purpose in the apartment all day. I’m sure they’re unemployed because they never leave and make it impossible for me to work from home. I would have loved this place if it weren’t for the college kids. Oh, and the security lights outside my bedroom window make it impossible to sleep at night.

I have lived at the Village at Idlewild for a year now and just renewed my lease for a second year. The BEST thing about this apartment complex is it’s location. It’s right across the street from Idlewild Park and I absolutely love being able to walk to the park for events or just to enjoy the park with my husband and my dogs. The apartments themselves are some of the nicest and newest that I’ve seen in Reno. They have marble counter tops, stainless steel appliances, and new lighting fixtures.
There are a couple of things you should know if you are considering moving here. There is free parking available but if you want covered, dedicated parking you have to pay for each spot each month (currently $ 15). Also, we have a 2×1 on the ground floor and we don’t have any storage. Some apartments do actually have a storage closet attached to the outdoor patio. Speaking of the patio, because we are on the ground floor we don’t have any railing on the patio and therefore our dogs cannot enjoy sitting outside. The upper floors all have railings on the balcony.
The office staff and grounds keepers are really nice and make sure to respond to maintenance requests as soon as possible.
The apartment gym is on the small side but has everything you need for a workout if you’re creative.
There are no bike racks but you can rent a shared garage (just for bikes) for about $ 10 per month.
There are a few green spaces on property to walk your pets but a lot of residents don’t pick up after their pets so you have to dodge the poop while walking your dog.
There is no recycling available on property. I have to take my recycling elsewhere. They stopped doing this right before we moved in.

Moved here to get away from low income apartments after finally getting on my feet. Now paying more money to live next to snobby college kids of rich parents and professionals that act as they own the place.
Before I signed, I asked how many college kids lived here and I was told there are few in the complex. This turned out to be false. Whole floor of party college kids with no regard for others.
Walls are paper thin and floors are crap. I can hear every foot step, toilet flush, washer/​dyer, water heater turning on, windows opening/​closing, front/​balcony door opening/​closing, walks up/​down the stairs– even worse: I can hear my upstairs neighbors talking. TALKING– not yelling (although I can hear that too) My old studio was quieter than this!
HOA won’t do anything because it’s during normal hours (9AM to 10PM), which would be fine– but they won’t do anything during the evening either as it’s consider normal noise. Imagine having someone get up in the evening to go to the bathroom, the moment they start walking towards the bathroom, you’re awaken at their foot steps. If you can sleep past that– the flush will sure do it! I’d consider that (and everything else I can hear) a lack of privacy for them– and me. Upstairs neighbors have flushed 2 times since writing this from another room over!
For being a newer building and having rent for a two bedroom at $ 1000/​month (heard some people are stuck with $ 1200/​mo!!!) I can’t believe the lack of building quality.
If you’re a college kid with rich parents, this is the place for you to meet your buddies! No lie! You can race around the buildings too before heading off to class at 6AM after you woken up your downstairs neighbors at 3AM when you crashed hard on the floor from your drunk night of fun!
As for the professionals who own the place– this includes having them parking in your $ 15/​mo extra parking spot (security will only tag their car), travel faster than 25MPH (almost been hit TWICE walking to the park at the crosswalk, with a stop, with speed bump), cut you off after you enter the gate code to take that front office parking spot after hours. Most of these people are those that own their unit and therefore don’t think they need to listen to the almighty HOA or anyone else for that matter.
Coming up on my year I’ve gained more information about how crappy this place is. HOA itself is all family as other reviewers have stated. None of them care about anything else but themselves after they get you to sign. They take 2 to 3 hour lunch breaks daily together where there’s no one available to sign for packages. Which after 5PM you can no longer get access to and forget trying to pick it up at your lunch break unless it’s before 11AM or after 2PM. Then make sure you have 10 minutes for them to find it. I’m not entirely sure what they do each day other than rent out the same units from people breaking their lease. Every week there’s a new U-​Haul truck somewhere on the property of people leaving or moving in. I’d really like to know Beth’s boss as within the year I’ve been here nothing has changed for the good. But then again why should it when they clearly want to be a college party complex.
Seriously though, this is not the place to live if you’re someone who looks at Unilocal for reviews. You’re probably the type that can put up with some issues here and there, make nice complaints to notify staff and neighbors of their doings and possibly even change your habits to cope with the faults of others. This place will ruin your moral, ethics and enjoyment to call the place home and not a unit– no matter how hard, nice, rude, loud or caring you may try.
Counting down the days to when my lease is up to being a normal loving person.

We moved from here asap. We lived next to drug dealers and strippers, my fourteen year old was harassed everyday. Cannot complain about ANYTHING to the office manager about how disgusting the place is because it’s her son and his girlfriend who are the relief managers and maintenance. I was threatened with eviction over my son hopping the fence and they said they were going to call the cops on him. JUST to him. I was never notified. Let’s just say you can’t evict someone for 1. Something you didn’t know about. 2. Because they don’t like your kid. This place sucks. Gated means your car will be keyed, you’ll be harassed, live next to drug dealers and no one will do anything!

PROS: Pretty good insulation, so heating/​cooling bills are low, great views form the top (3^rd) floor, no matter what direction you look. The refrigerator and other kitchen appliances are quite nice. The bathroom tubs interlock and don’t use caulking, so it’s nice not having to clean out any grout/​caulking and it looks good. The fencing and gateways are secure and work well and at least the HOA keeps building maintenance timely and well.
CON: It’s a bit odd that the HOA forbids storing your bike on your own balcony, since Reno is more of an outdoors kinda town («Gateway to Adventure»). So, you have to store that adventure indoors or arrange for bike storage, which is available as a rental space.

I’ve been in a one bedroom apartment for 2 years with minimal complaints, but lets start there.
1-​Crappy HOA. After 2 years you realize my windchime has the wrong hook and I have to remove it? Stupid.
2-Don’t waste the money to «upgrade» to a park or mountain view. The park views are blocked by ugly subsidized housing and the mountain view has to listen to really loud announcers for games at the high school both morning and evening.
That’s it! My energy bill is low because it’s so well insulated, relatively quiet with the usual footstep sounds from neighbors etc. I love being a short walk from downtown, and the security patrols regularly at night to make sure no one has hopped the fence to use the hot tub. I’d stay here if I wasn’t relocating for a new job.