The Grad San Jose

Leasing manager the best! So helpful and made me feel the best about my decision to come stay here!

Absolutely horrible and lazy staff who work here. It's clearly during their business hours and they put an open sign in front of the office door but no one is here. This happens at least 10 times since I moved here.

Parent of a student living here - Was a few hrs late as was out of town for work for a week and did not get a second - slept less than 3 hrs even - got back early morning today and checked email - saw a past due rent which is just a few hrs over and they will absolutely not remove the $75 late charge even though it's first time. And the manager was super unfriendly as if speaking to a teenager and not an adult parent (seemed she had no experience and was herself just out of teens super annoying way to talk with parents talking as if I am dimwitted and don't understand regulations and according to her she is the manager and no one over her - she reports to no one) - also my son opened a fix it request for a broken door lock the week of move in and it has been over 5 months - it still has not been fixed.

Absolutely horrible place to live in! Very unsafe and noisy.
-Elevators never work so if you live on the top floors you are screwed.
-Staff unhelpful and unprofessional.
-The facilities are dirty as there are way too many people always having parties at the pool/hot tub. Lots of noise at every hour of the day.
-Instead of providing me with a receipt for "damage" charges at the end of the lease term, they just sent it to a collection agency and BTW, they over charge for everything!
-They made no effort to work with us during COVID so we ended up stuck paying a full year of rent even though I never lived there.

Only positive thing is that it is right across the street from campus.
Do not fall for this place, they lure you in with "special" deals but there's nothing special about it.

This is the first time I’ve leased here and I probably will not be leasing here again. 1) My door locked on its own while I was showering and my key was in my room, I called the maintenance hotline and they charged me $50 to just unlock it. 2) There is only 3 elevators in this whole entire complex and 1 has only been working for 2 weeks, I’ve seen maintenance people come by but I saw 2 of them sitting down just chatting to each other while a big lined formed for that 1 elevator. 3) The wifi stopped working for 3 days and they had a number available for the residents to call and try to fix it … the complex is suppose to fix it not the residents. All of this just to say that we pay too much money for bad quality service at the Grad. Again, they probably won’t see me again.

Honestly the worst place to live…it wasn’t a nightmare last year, but they charged me $600 for a cleaning fee when i moved out. I didn't pay because I told them the beginning of the year that these damages were from previous tenants and you can’t legally charge them to me or I will get a lawyer. The flies are the worst and came out of no where this year. They are on every floor and I honestly should be filing a health and safety code violation. Move in was horrible waiting in line and hearing you have 24 hours to move in. The wifi broke and I had to go on campus to get work in on time, management is horrible won’t let me move out to a different unit because my roommates are treating me horribly and won’t help me find a solution. They're just straight up rude, I should've just commuted from Santa Cruz with family than to deal with this.

Been living here almost a month, so far everything has been smooth and the staff is helpful. Maintenance responds fast and the rooms are very spacious with good lighting. Highly recommend!

PLEASE go check the YELP for honest review.

I agree with one of the one-star comments, which states, "The lack of accountability is ridiculous from the Grad. " I feel that after signing a lease with them, nothing they said counts. Additionally, they simply don't respond to emails or calls.

It’s been a great experience living here! Rooms are so spacious, state of the art facilities, beautiful amenities deck! I would definitely recommend it.

It has been 3 days with trash in trash room and now flies have taken over the building. Front office is useless, they don't even know how to contact the management. I have
Contacted the City for a health and safety inspection. Nothing g like a large fine to move management to do something about this.

Good place for college students, close to campus and walking distance of restaurants, bars, clubs, and stores.

Lack of efficiency and bad soundproof dissatisfy me. If residents want to pick up their packages, they will need to be informed by the staff or the staff will not let you pick up your packages. But it always took so long. My packages from Amazon were ready to pick up and it took about 2 days to get informed by staff from the Grad. My friends even took more than 3 days. Also the chaos of the moving day really scared me. Lines without order and lack of trained staff are disappointing.
Warning for people who want to move in there:
1. Soundproof here is absolutely bad. There are quite many young people live in there. They like to play their music out loud even if it’s 12: 00pm. I can clearly hear what they are listening to or their conversation. Also, frequently, there are people shouting like a maniac at night on the road, and it can be heard clearly if your room is facing the road, so if you are a light sleeper, this place won’t suit you.
2. Staff members are nice and friendly here. They will help you with patience if you have any questions. However, work efficiency is pretty low here. For example, If you want to pick up your packages, you will have to wait until they inform you or you can’t pick up them. But it always take so long to get informed by them. So if you frequently buy things on Amazon, do not choose the address of the grad as a place to receive your packages. Just choose an Amazon pick up location, it will be faster than pick up from the grad. Also, the maintenance always takes so long to wait. I made a request
last week, and I am still waiting now:). Moreover, if you send email messages to them, you will have to wait so long to receive the replies (maybe they won’t even read). Well, the reason of the lack of efficiency may be lack of employees, but they like to hold parties, and I saw so many staff members standing there and just chatting. So, I was quite speechless at that moment. Can’t you just send some of them to do other things like check packages or whatever things that can help residents.
3. People who don’t smoke or like the smell of cigarettes may not feel comfortable if living here. It seems like they mix units having non-smokers and units having smokers together. You will smell the smell of cigarettes although your roommates don’t smoke if people live next to your unit are smokers. It’s really disgusting. (One of my friends also assume that some of people living there do drugs, cuz sometimes there’s smell that really like cannabis.)
Although there are so many cons living here, there are still have some pros:
1. It is convenient for sjsu students cuz it’s literally in font of the school.
2. There are so many restaurants nearby the grad, and they provide nice food and drinks.
Well, that’s it. The pros living here are still less.
Summary:
If you are a light sleeper, impatient person, the grad is not the best choice. You can find better choices that have same or even lower price than here.
However,
If you are a party person who love staying up late or even don’t sleep and love playing music out loud. Congratulations! You find the right place! Cuz staff here doesn’t care about residents suffering from noises caused by others. They will just ask you to call the police or security guards. But that won’t work, cuz they always cause intermittent noises. The noises may stop at any time when the police come, and start again when the police leave.

I’ve had a really bad experience with management and maintenance. They have been very disorganized and make false promises regarding our dryer. They have also not compensated despite our dryer not working for over 3 weeks. I have tried to communicate these issues with the managers for a month and it is impossible to get in contact with them. The elevators are almost always not working and it takes at least a week to get packages.

The Grad has provided a nice environment for me as a student and a resident. I really appreciate that the staff try their hardest to accommodate everyone even when it is busy.

The management is so bad here. My lease has been stuck for so many days and they just don't have answers for the questions asked. How am supposed to resolve an issue if they don't have answers to my questions. And it's not just me, everyone I see come into the office leaves the office being disappointed. Everyone has issues with their policies, yet they don't change it. No one lifts the phone even when people are not doing anything. It's like the management finds ways to run away from work. Leasing a home here is a headache, even though the community, "seems" to be nice. For the price of the homes, the residents should at least have better management and services.

Along with that, packages have been sitting in their office for over months now. Move in day was August 19, and it has been over a month. If someone was proactive enough they would've had their staff get the packages removed from their office. But, no they are waiting until it is difficult for everyone can walk around the office.

Real picture of the grad attached. Line to get the keys during move is was 3 hours. I moved in the dirty apartment, nobody cleaned it after last residents. Exterior windows has not been cleaned in ages. There is a hazardous trash problem. Management does not solve any problems. General manager Michelle should be fired for incompetence.

This event is awesome, a lot of things happening overall. Good music, food, nice event overall.