Deer Valley

We love living here. Beautiful and peaceful. Great family place as there are lots of kids here who are the most well behaved children I’ve seen in my life. The grounds are very well maintained and I feel very safe. The pool is open year round which we love considering how warm it can be in the fall and winter here. Overall fantastic place to live.

I have lived here for almost 5 years and could not be happier with the complex itself and the new management! This is a quiet, family friendly community where neighbors know each other by name and look out for one another. The amenities are awesome (beautiful pool, gym, ample parking, and two playgrounds for the kids). The maintenance staff (Freddy and Juan) have been here for years and do an amazing job! They check in frequently to make sure nothing needs to be done and are quick and efficient with any and all issues that arise (which have been very few in the past several years). I have found Bailey, the new leasing manager, to be extremely knowledgable, committed to the residents and passionate about her work, going above and beyond what is expected to help make sure the residents here feel not only listened to, but heard and respected. She is very much working towards creating more of a community here, organizing complex-​wide garage sales, a carnival for the kids, and meet and greets for the neighbors. I feel very blessed to have found this gem in such a beautiful location, and hope to be able to continue living here for as long as possible! If I could make two suggestions it would be to put in a jacuzzi next to the pool and maybe a swing set for the kids ;)

We lived here for a year after the house we were renting was sold. We really enjoyed living here. We never had any issues and maintenance always came to fix whatever problem we had, thanks Freddy. The attached patio area was nice and I used the gym and pool a lot. The only reason we moved was because I had to relocate for my job. It was also nice to see deer and turkeys nearby.

Just awesome day with Deer Valley community manager Bailey and event planner extraordinaire Melissa
1. Garage sale great way to get social as you clean out your life.
2. Carnival for all, creative (San Rafael FD made appearance and Xfinity brought goods!!) serious good DJ knew his decades
So big thanks Essex for giving decision latitude to improve attitude

Good apartment leaving.

This complex is amazing! It is super quiet with large floor plans, and has a great gym and pool! Close to everything including a movie theater and awesome pizza place within walking distance. The leasing office is super friendly and helpful. Marsha always went out of her way for us. When we had to move out (unfortunately, to move across the country) she made the transition as stress free as possible, unlike any other apartment complex I’ve rented at. She is REALLY good at her job. Also, this complex is very dog friendly but they keep it very clean. My only complaint is that they don’t have air conditioning so you always have to keep your windows open and the courtyard acts as a megaphone so it’s hard to have people over without bothering the neighbors. However, I suggest getting a portable unit and then the one and only problem with this complex is solved!
Thanks Deer Valley and Marsha!

We moved in to the complex in July, and we are quite happy with the place so far. It was pretty hard for us to find a decent sized 3 bedroom apartment with 2 car garage in San Rafael. So we were glad that we found this place. The Unilocal reviews made me apprehensive about looking into this complex, but we went ahead anyways due to the limited availability in the area, and I’m so glad we did. The great thing is, this complex is under new management and the office staff is such a pleasure to work with. We had a few issues with the apartment on the first day of move in, which we brought to the attention of the staff and they went above and beyond to make sure we were happy with the apartment. Marsha in the leasing office is very nice and tries to go the extra mile for residents, and the maintenance guys take care of everything quickly. The neighbors are very family friendly. The location is really good. The Grocery market, Costco, Target, Toyrus and Malls are within 10−15min. Highly recommend.

What A Difference A Year Makes. A year ago when I moved in to Deer Valley, I wrote them a glowing review. Now it’s a year later and I have moved out and I have seen what goes on over the year of living there. Rent was raised to almost $ 3,000 for a 3-​bedroom townhouse (insane) and the BRE policies and procedures made living there the past three months unbearable. Besides the 10% rent increase, they kept my $ 750 security deposit by coming up with the most ridiculous charges and even had the nerve to send me a bill for $ 60 more. Beware of this complex. There are two kind or residents here — ones who lived there for years and the other 75% who move in and out with great frequency. The BRE management is a joke and if they think they are going to see one more dime from me, then Ive got some swamp land in West Marin for you. The best thing this complex has going for it is their head maintenance supervisor, Freddy, who is a prince and always got to my maintenance requests in a timely manner. Aside from him, I can only tell you to look at other places to live. It’s not worth the rent they charge, management personnel come and go with the breeze and forget about seeing your security deposit back.

We agreed to the extremely high prices because we were so charmed when we moved in. In fact, the whole time we were living there they continued to be very nice. Thou they did raise the rent almost $ 200 after our ten month lease was up. When we decided to move out we left the apartment clean and empty. About 2 month later we receive a bill for 400 dollars!!! Not only did they take all of our security deposit, but they’re charging us for a brand new bowl and basin, when it was like new. They also charged 300 $for painting 130 $ for cleaning supplies gallons of product, one days rent for being in the apartment 71 dollars, and 128.72 for carpet replacement. We left the apart in awesome shape so please Beware they will screw you when you leave expect a huge bill. They’re just trying to make as much money off you as they can. I had tried to meet with Cynthia the blonde soooo many times to have Freddie come check the apartment. They never bothered to return my calls I went to the office she was always busy never had time. Honestly the worst mistake we made moving here. It’s already expensive moving but they really stick you hard. Also if you want a small lease they raise your rent 500 bucks so it went from 2100 to 2600 for 3month lease 2800 or more monthly! It’s just a 2bedroom apartment.
Please don’t make the mistake we did
Matt and Nick

Hi Wanted to tell about this apartment complex because I just moved out and I really hated to leave! I had the most beautiful corner apartment with a view of wetlands and Mt. Tam with southern exposure so I had sun pouring into my unit all day long! There is also a nice deck to lounge on. The grounds are so serene and there are quails running around and you hear song birds singing. Great staff too and really well maintained. I highly recommend this complex for singles or families. Thanks Jakki, Claudia and Freddy for a really wonderful experience…

GREAT FAMILY ATMOSPHERE, KIND NEIGHBORS & SUPER FRIENDLY STAFF. As a career global executive for a large multi-​national corporation, I’ve had my share of moves. Beyond question, this place ranks among the top locales I’ve lived over the years. My children (2 & 14) have plenty of friends, including the always smiling Jakki, Claudia and Freddy. Thanks guys (and gals) for making our house a ‘home’.

Management is insufferable and, they change what seems to be every other week so good luck getting anything important accomplished. We were here for a long time and are so happy now that we have moved away from the insanity of Deer Valley and BRE.
I you do end up here for some reason make sure you make a copy of EVERYTHING and go over every little detail on the lease because they screw up so many things but, you may end up paying for it in the end (ie. Putting the wrong dates on the lease including year then trying to tell you that you have been on a month to month lease for a year???)
Anyway the place looks good from a far but walk around and you will really see half the buildings are falling apart and covered in bugs ect…

Very glad I’m out of here. I moved out two years ago and have always been wary of posting things like this because it seems like ONLY negatives are posted about apartment complexes from disgruntled residents. But this really needs to be said.
Anyway, the pros:
– Location: great for commuters, the only way you could be closer to hopping on 101 is if you lived in a CHP hut.
– Also, re location — it’s tucked in a nice valley which is shielded from freeway noise and isn’t a bad spot at all.
– Unlike some other people, my dealings with maintainence were great. They always came promptly and I never had to continually follow up.
now… the cons:
– No A/​C — which isn’t that odd apparently for Marin BUT. it can get INSANELY hot. If you’re not from the area, and people try to tell you you don’t need AC here, they are liars. At least in the area where this complex is. It was so incredibly stiflingly hot. When I had visitors, they couldn’t believe I could live there. I ran the piddly fan they have (which is tantalizingly connected to a system that looks like it’s made to support cooling, but doesn’t), and it did nothing. There’s absolutely no airflow, and opening the windows doesn’t seem to even help at all. After a hot day, it was literally 87 – 90 degrees in the apartment and somehow stayed that hot all night, even until 2am. I thought heat must be coming out of the vents but it wasn’t that at all. It’s fucking DEADLY.
– Noise — as people have mentioned, cheap construction, paper thin doors/​ceiling/​floors. Expect to hear everything (and everyone) your neighbor does. Everyone I had over said it sounded like people were dragging bodies around.
– People/​Kids — I’m not gonna lie, this place is like a white trash family hangout. I can’t tell you how many people in the townhouses used the parking lot as their kids’ front yard, sitting there with their open garage in lawn chairs, etc, yelling at their kids and generally being obnoxious. It’s not even remotely a cheap apartment complex, even for San Rafael, so I was pretty surprised at the ‘clientele’ that lived there. It seemed more like a trailer park at times. There are _​lots_​of kids, and _​lots_​of pets. There was an apparently crazy woman walking her dog for about 6 hours a day, talking to it in a high pitched voice, right outside my window. It was excruciatingly loud and went into the night as well. She even woke me up at times. After about 2 months of this, I reported this — and they said nobody else had mentioned it. Really?
– Payments — maybe its better now, but when I lived there, their payment system was so screwed up. When you set up autopay, it’s very vague when it will start kicking in. It’s also vague when every month it will actually deduct. When i complained about this they said to be ‘safe’ just write a regular check too and if the OFFICIAL autopay doesnt come in in time, they’ll cash it. Huh? Guess what, they cashed both, so i was like 1 month behind in cash flow. I called and they said to turn off auto-​pay for the next month. As you can probably guess, turning it on the next time resulted in the same issue. There was some other autopay issue some months later too, and the SAME THING happened. They said it must not have worked that time, and made me pay by check again or else it would be late. Guess what, it came through on like the 10^th of the month and i was double charged again. Keep in mind this is the Deer Valley autopay site, not something with my bank. Very amateurish.
– Move-​out — My experience mirrored others. First, yes its nice that they have a lease breaking fee, which I took advantage of. However they did say I’d probably get it back because they rarely had vacancies and it would probably be rented before the 30 day notice was up. Well, that didn’t happen, so I had to pay the whole extra month. Anyway, that’s not that bad, but the worst part was when I spent forever cleaning the place, and the ‘move out’ maintainence guy came by and basically said everything was fine, there’d just be minor cleaning and carpet cleaning and touch up paint. He estimated it at a couple hundred dollars, about ¹⁄₃ of my deposit. Much like everybody else here, I later got a letter saying I wouldn’t be getting any deposit back, and the ‘invoice’ had a COMPLETE FULL REPAINT charged to my deposit — despite only living there for barely a year. This place is totally scammy regarding the move-​out/​deposit stuff. Oh yeah, and I sent about 20 emails and left voicemails to complain about this and nobody ever even called me back.
Final verdict: not the worst possible place you could live, but very overpriced, horrendous with no A/​C, and absolutely shit people for management.
P. S. I paid $ 1710 for a *very* small 1 bedroom apartment.

We’ve left the place at least 6 months ago and we recently got more bills from them… insane!
Apparently they charge you for paint if you stay there for less than a year, carpet cleaning (whether they really do or not is another thing), and «additional» cleaning of everything else. Can you believe it? After taking $ 300 of our security deposit, they want to charge $ 1300 MORE! Totally ridiculous, I know the economy is tough right now but you’re STEALING people’s money at this rate!
Their only means to contact us was to my home address because they recorded everything else wrong — the other address we put and both phone numbers. Imagine how bad that would be if they couldn’t reach us at all!
I DO NOT RECOMMEND THIS PLACE.

Don’t move here. My husband and I just closed our lease after trying to renew only to be told there was only a 3 bedroom, 3 bath town home available. We had the carpets professionally cleaned and got charged $ 350, so of course they kept most of our deposit. It’s mainly a community of families and small children so you would think everyone would be friendly, well think again. This was the worst experience I’ve ever had.

So when we moved out here from DC, we needed to find an apartment. With the wifey working in Marin, we decided to look in the San Rafael area, and settled on Deer Valley — mainly because they’d allow us to break our lease. (For a one month penalty, of course.)
The area is pretty serene — stashed in the rolling hills of northern San Rafael. And the rent was pretty decent: $ 1,915 at the time for a 2br 2ba with a washer dryer. It has a small pool, and a pretty modest fitness center for the residents.
Unfortunately, for us, that’s where the good stuff ended. Trash pickup happened EARLY on Saturday morning — which we didn’t appreciate — and once during the week. But with a couple of small dumpsters serving a complex of this size, they were always overflowing and stinking long before they showed up. The buildings themselves are paper-​thin, so much so that every movement from our upstairs neighbor sounded like an elephant doing Riverdance. (We were convinced she was 300lbs, but when we met her, she was barely 5 feet tall, and weighed 100lbs soaking wet.)
The staff were hit and miss — the maintenance guys were friendly, but not 100% on their game, and tended to take a while to show up. The management office made promises that they rarely followed through with — it was very much intimated to us that although we wouldn’t get most of our security deposit back (since they ALWAYS paint, clean the carpets, and have a cleaning service come through no matter what condition you leave the place in) that we wouldn’t be held responsible for the entire one month’s rent penalty, since they had people waiting to move in. Most likely we would be getting a check for $ 1,200 or so back. (That never came.)
But the thing that bothered me most about living here was the complete lack of any sense of community. I’ve lived in enough apartments over the years where I’ve made at least a couple of friends in the building pretty quickly, but it seemed like at the very least we were placed in the anti-​social building. I rarely saw people cooking out together, I never saw people hanging out at the pool, and whenever I said hi to anyone while getting my mail, or walking around the property, they’d generally keep their heads down and mumble a response.
They do accept pets (healthy deposit) which is a plus, and all in all, Deer Valley is a reasonable place to call home — as long as it’s temporary.