The Ramble offices at Jade Street, otherwise known as "The Center" The Ramble offices on Third Street.

Leasing Office Location
1580 Jade Street , Davis, CA 95616
Hours
Monday: 10am-6pm
Saturday: 10am-5pm
Sunday: 1pm-5pm
Contact Info
Phone: 530-759-0661
Fax: 530-759-0658
[email protected]
Website
http://www.therambleapartments.com
http://www.facebook.com/the.ramble
Types of Units
2br/2ba, 3br/3ba, 4br/4ba
Price range
$789 to $963 per room, as of February 2012

The Ramble Apartments is a 192-unit apartment complex at West Village. It opened in September 2011. It is privately owned and managed by Bay Area firm Carmel Partners.

Exterior Buildings are large and brightly painted on the exteriors. Exteriors are corrugated. This produces an appearance that some have described as "industrial" and others have noted that it looks like the sides of shipping containers.

Each building is covered with solar panels. Landscaping is extensive, but it blocks easy access to the parking lots. (Some lots are accessible only through a single point which may be distant from your building.) The areas beyond the occupied portions of West Village are construction areas, or very large dirt fields.

Buildings are arranged in clusters of two to four buildings around a central courtyard area. The central area has grass, sidewalks, a BBQ grill, and bicycle parking for residents and their guests. A large grassy area with young trees, or a pool and recreation area, separates the clusters from each other. Some residents use the grassy areas to walk or play with their dogs. Bicycle paths connect the clusters to the main path to campus.

The complex is brightly lit at night, especially on the interior side of each cluster. Residents with rooms facing into a cluster interior may have significant light coming in through their windows at night, although this can be mitigated to some extent using the window blinds. Sound insulation within apartments is reasonably good, making it easier for several residents to live in close proximity.

There are large community patios for the units. Upper floor balconies are connected via walkways that run the length of the building.

As of early September, 2011 the complex lacked trash cans or recycle bins anywhere in the complex. Trash bins added later were insufficient to handle the community's trash, resulting in trash overflowing from the bins. Subsequent additions of trash cans and recycle bins along parking lot edges, and in cluster interiors have addressed the issue.

Interior Each unit has bedroom/bathroom pieces adjoining a common area that runs the length of the apartment. The common area in each apartment is the same. 2 bedroom apartments have both bedrooms on one side. 3 bedrooms are a 2 bedroom + 1 additional (larger) room on the other side of the common area. 4 bedrooms are a 2 bedroom + 2 additional (larger) bedrooms on the other side of the common area. Interiors are painted an off-white color. Doors are white, with white door frames. The front door interior color is the same as it is on the outside.

The common area has hardwood floors. Flooring in some units is wavy (uneven) rather than flat. The kitchen, which occupies the center of the common area has an island with range/oven and drawers/cupboards, a bank of cupboards with the sink, microwave, and a refrigerator with an ice maker in the freezer. All counter surfaces are covered in a white marble-like surface. Cabinets are dark brown, and have metal handles. The trim surrounding the door open button on the microwaves in multiple apartments has been observed to detach from the unit, presenting a sharp edge to anyone walking past. As this problem has appeared in many units, this appears to be a design or manufacturing flaw in the microwave itself.

Bedrooms are small and have carpeted floors. A typical bedroom has sufficient room for a XL full sized bed, a small desk, chair, and a dresser but very little else. Each bedroom also has a ceiling fan, a bathroom, and a closet accessible through the bathroom. Because bedroom closets open into the bathroom, moisture issues may result. Moisture levels may also be problematic for items stored in the closets. Bathrooms and closets in some bedrooms have doors that swing open, making several square feet of floor space unusable. In some bedrooms, however, closet doors slide into the wall, taking almost no floor space.

A network jack and cable TV outlet can be found in each bedroom and in the common area. Although the cable TV jack is located along a large wall, where a TV can likely be connected easily, the network jacks are located along small walls adjoining the bathrooms, far from where computers are likely to be used. A very long Ethernet cable or a wireless router will be required to overcome this limitation.

The ceilings are very high - at least 10 feet, and higher in some areas. High ceilings give the apartments a more spacious feel, but also lead to higher heating and cooling costs, due to the larger volume of air and the tendency of hot air to rise to the ceiling. However, large, 4 speed ceiling fans with integrated lights are provided in the common area and each bedroom, which aids in improving air circulation. The large windows and sliding doors can also be opened to provide a cross breeze on days when outside temperatures are comfortable, although construction noise sometimes makes this impractical at night.

Heating and AC are electronically controlled from a large, glowing display panel, which may be programmed to provide different temperatures at different times of the day. The control panel forgets your temperature settings whenever you change between heating, cooling, and "off" modes, switching to a temperature programmed in to a pre-set schedule. It is possible to reprogram the schedule. The panel beeps loudly when buttons are pressed, which may wake your apartment mates if used during the night. Blinds are effective in blocking out sunlight on warm days.

A quiet, stacked washer / dryer unit is included in a closet in the common area of each unit. The washer and dryer appear to have sensors that determine the proper washing time, amount of water, and drying time without user intervention. Knobs on the units allow the user to rapidly choose common pre-sets. Other settings may also be chosen manually.

Bathroom floors are made from ceramic tiles. Bathroom counters are white marble. Bathrooms contain motion sensors that turn of lights if no movement is detected for a certain amount of time. The sensors may become obstructed by the closet doors in some bedrooms, resulting in a loss of light in the bathroom at inconvenient times if the door is left open. Only some bathrooms appear to contain a fan. Some residents have reported that their fans are noisy and never turn off. Fans appear to be connected to humidity sensors, and automatically suck air out of the bathroom when humidity climbs too high. Toilets in the bathrooms are unusually high off the ground, and may not be comfortable for someone under 5'8" tall.

Bathtubs are unusually deep. This is great for taking baths, but not great for cleaning, since it may be difficult to reach the bottom of the tub from outside it. Showers have sufficient water pressure for the water to reach the opposite end of the tub, which aids in cleaning. Shower heads are 6 or 7 feet above the bottom of the tub, and may be hard for shorter residents to reach. However, the shower heads are adjustable, which aids in cleaning, and have two modes, normal and pulsing, to choose from. A soap holder is integrated into the tile shower walls. Sufficient flat space is available on top of the tub to place a shampoo bottle. The shower curtain pole curves out into the bathroom, providing more interior space when the curtain is closed. The shower is unusually refreshing for a Davis bathroom for some reason.

Bathrooms also include a towel rack, an elegant towel ring, and a "hook" next the shower for hanging your bath towel on. The medicine cabinet has an unusual design in which shelves are fixed at multiple elevations, but do not extend across the cabinet. This has the advantage of making it easy to organize items within the cabinet, but the disadvantage of not having as much surface area as if the shelves extended the length of the cabinet. Since the shelves are fixed, if an item is too tall, there is no way to rearrange the shelves to allow it to fit. Another unusual aspect to this design is a set of indentations in the shelves that can be used to hang toothbrushes from vertically, thus freeing up space within the cabinet or on the counter.

Storage Deep cupboards in the kitchen area are mounted very high as well. A person of 5'4" will need a step stool to make full use of these cupboards, which, apart from the small bedroom closets and areas under bathroom sinks, are the only storage in the unit. Bedroom closets are quite small, and contain shelving. The top shelves are too high to be reachable by a female of average height, as well as many men. The closet shelves have a rack design that allows them to be used to both hang items from on hangers, as well as to place items on top of their surfaces. Unfortunately, there is not enough separation between many of the upper and lower shelves. For example, hanging a coat from an upper shelf will cause the coat to rest on the top of the lower shelf, thus making the lower shelf unusable for storage of other items. Struts supporting some of the shelves also obstruct much of the shelf space on the shelf below. These issues make much of the tiny amount of storage in the closets impractical to use.

Those who have larger items such as boxes, vacuum cleaners, etc. may wish to leave as much as possible at home (if they have local family), or will likely need to store these items in the open in the common area.

Noise Due to the hardwood floors inside the apartments, it is often possible to hear people walking around in the apartment above you. Construction takes place during both the day and night (possibly 24 hours a day?). Residents from different points in the complex have reported hearing beeping, engine noise, generators, lifting equipment, paving machinery, sawing of metal, alarm testing, and other construction noise late at night and early in the morning. Heavy machinery can be heard backing up and beeping loudly at 2 AM, and can be seen moving past apartment windows at 7 AM! As construction is expected to take place within West Village for the next several years, this will likely be an ongoing issue.

Smells A number of residents have commented on the spread of kitchen smells through the apartments. The kitchen stove is located in the center of the common area, and lacks a fume hood, although an air vent near the ceiling on a nearby wall sucks air in from the kitchen. As reported, smells from the kitchen get sucked into the ventilation system and spread throughout the apartment. Some residents have continued to smell food cooked in the kitchen days earlier when in their bedrooms. Fortunately, the large windows allow the entire apartment to be ventilated in only a few minutes. Unfortunately, you may have to do this very frequently if you have roommates who cook a lot.

A number of residents have commented on the sound insulation inside the apartments. Sound insulation between bedrooms is good, however noise from the common area can be heard inside the bedrooms. Sinks, dishes, talking, refrigerators, the temperature control, and microwaves can be heard through closed bedroom doors, although what you hear may depend on where your bedroom is located relative to these things in the common area. The front door is also audible when opened and closed.

HVAC units can be found outside, near the windows of many exterior bedrooms and living rooms. There appear to be two types of HVAC units. The rounded type is very quiet, and is difficult to hear in operation, even when standing outside a few feet away from one. A larger, boxy unit with a large fan on top can be found in building corners, near the large bedrooms. These are quite noisy, and can be heard from quite some distance. (If you know the difference in functionality between these two types of units, please update this paragraph.)

Construction Construction throughout West Village is extensive. Ramble Phase I and portions of Veridian Phase I are complete, however not all of the first set of Veridian buildings were completed in time for a September 1st move-in. Ramble is expected to have 3 phases. Veridian has 1-2 phases. West Village will also include a community college (one building of which appears to have been completed), and may contain a large number of single family homes. Some reports have stated that 1-2 single family home models will be built first to gauge interest in the development. Construction on all of these structures is expected to be ongoing for at least 2-4 years. The main vehicle entrance to the complex is shared between residents, Unitrans buses, and construction vehicles. Although, construction vehicles are routed into the construction area, and do not usually enter the actively occupied portions of the complex, some have been spotted in the occupied portions of the complex.

Maintenance Some residents have experienced rapid responses to maintenance issues, while others have had long delays or no response at all, with some residents reporting issues going unresolved for two weeks, with no contact by maintenance personnel and no estimate of when problems would be fixed! This may be due to the very large number of people moving in simultaneously to a brand new complex, but may also reflect an inadequate number of maintenance staff to handle the issues present in a large complex. If you are a resident, please share your experience with maintenance, both good and bad, below.

Some residents have expressed concern that maintenance did not show up for their appointments, despite contacting the office about it. Others have reported difficulty in scheduling appointments, or in getting maintenance issues resolved. Many have reported in the comments and elsewhere that maintenance showed up at their apartment without giving proper notice (at least 24 hours is required by law) or working with the residents to perform work at times that would be least disruptive to residents. Reasons cited why the sudden presence of maintenance might cause problems included the presence of pets that might be let loose, visitors, studying for exams or other work, security of belongings, being sick, being in the shower (or otherwise undressed), and the general need for a sense of security and privacy.

Utility Maintenance There have been many instances in which utility service (water or electricity) has been shut off for two to six hours with less than 24 hour notice to residents. Paper notices are usually posted on doors the afternoon/evening before the maintenance is scheduled to occur.

Internet Internet is provided as part of the lease. There are two forms of Internet service available - wired and 802.11n wireless. The wireless network is unencrypted, and has poor reliability, but is available throughout the complex. Connections on the wireless network have been observed to drop every 60 seconds or so. The wired network has much better reliability and performance, but also experiences outages, and can be very slow when many people are online. In recent weeks, wired network outages have become frequent and long in duration, sometimes lasting several days or more.

Some residents have reported their data routing through Comcast, while others appear to route through the UCD backbone. Starting in late September, the ISP for the complex, Korcett, restricted all residents to a maximum of 12 Mbits/second - a significant reduction in network performance - even when the network was not heavily utilized. This has greatly increased the time required to download software updates and other large files, and is significantly worse than the service provided to most Davis residents by Comcast or by the University (for those on Resnet).

Korcett is a company that appears to provide network services to large student complexes. Calls for network problems are directed to Korcett, rather than to the upstream data provider, Comcast. Korcett only takes trouble calls during regular business hours. After hours (after around 5 PM Central Time) calls are handled by an answering machine. Attempts by residents from different buildings to reach a Korcett representative to report a major network outage resulted in reaching the answering machine. This is an important consideration for Ramble residents, as many residents depend on reliable connectivity for their academic work, especially at night. During business hours, Korcett technical support can be reached at (800)-379-3729.

Cell Phone Service AT&T: AT&T reception is poor at some locations within complex. Verizon: Likewise, Verizon reception is substandard. That's because West Village is in the middle of nowhere. Sprint: Little to no issues with signal, but internet from my phone is spotty. T-Mobile: Perhaps cell towers were recently improved; T-Mobile has 3-5 bars on my iPhone. Signal seems pretty stable except on the edges of West Village, and is spotty inside buildings (because it's T-Mobile).

Security Exterior doors and bedrooms use electronic keys, most likely using contact (very short range) RFID tags. Door locks require AA batteries. It is unclear what happens when batteries run out of power. The complex is patrolled during the day by the UCD police department. At night, private security guards have been seen patrolling the grounds. A UCD police vehicle has also sometimes been observed at the entrance to the complex at night.

A security guard also patrols at night, mostly to watch the uninhabited new apartments (likely to protect against vandals). Don't rely on them to break up noisy neighbors' parties or watch your bikes, their job is not to help you. However, currently there is a friendly guard who has been known to respond to complaints about noisy neighbors during quiet hours.

Shade There is very little exterior shade available, so going outside in summer can be exceptionally warm. There are trees planted throughout the complex, however these are currently very young, and do not provide any shade. Apartments are shaded by the balconies of apartments above them, and by awnings that appear to have been designed to reduce, but not entirely block, sunlight at certain times of the day.

Access Entry to The Ramble is via Hutchinson just west of the 113 off-ramps. Go west from the Rec Pool (La Rue), turn north where the road splits Hutchinson vs Campbell, and navigate roundabouts. Access via bike path is available from a bridge that crosses 113 just behind Orchard Park. Access by bicycle using this method is easy and safe, and is highly recommended. Caution: dividers have recently been added to the bike path where it intersects the bridge over the 113 freeway. These dividers are hard to see at night, and consist of holes cut in the path about an inch deep. Some holes have been filled with large rocks. Running into one of these dividers on a bicycle is likely to cause injury. UCD TAPS appears to have placed warning cones and other devices around the dividers. Bicycle access along Hutchison Drive is possible, but not recommended, as it requires crossing several highway entrance and exit ramps with little visibility for cars, potentially creating a very dangerous situation for cyclists.

Parking Bicycle parking is ample. Each apartment has one bicycle rack space per bedroom, or may park their bike on their balcony if they have one. Additional spots for guests are located close by.

Automobile parking is a mix of on-street and reserved lot spaces. As of mid-September, the (expensive) assigned parking spaces have been assigned, and residents must place a parking sticker on their rear window. There is a $50 replacement fee for a lost parking sticker. The complex has stated that UCD TAPS patrols the lot, although several residents reported on this page that they have not seen TAPS at the complex, nor have they observed tickets being handed out or cars being towed. When someone parks in a resident's spot, the resident is supposed to go to the office, obtain a violation notice, and place it on the car in question. The resident then has to find a place to park, which may be problematic given the parking restrictions. Non-residents can park in unreserved spaces (those without numbers above them or the word "Reserved" painted on them), but only for two hours at a time. After 10 PM on weekdays, or during weekends, the parking restriction is not enforced. Access to the parking lots is via Hutchison Drive. There is no way to access Russell Blvd directly from the parking lots.

The parking lot also contains large solar arrays, which provide some shade to cars parked under them. The arrays are very high off the ground, so due to the angle of the sun, do not provide consistent shade throughout the day. The covering also does not protect cars underneath from rain, as gaps between the individual solar panels allow rain to splash onto cars. This results in even dirtier cars due to the rain cleaning off dust and dirt on the solar panels before splashing onto the cars below. The animated picture to the right illustrates water leaking through the gaps in-between solar panels during a period of light rain. The solar arrays in the parking lots were apparently not connected into the electrical grid when residents moved in. Since then, workers have hooked up the arrays in sections. During the times that work was being done on the arrays, residents who have parking spaces under the affected arrays were required to park elsewhere within the complex.

Amenities The complex has a swimming pool, a beach volleyball court, and a gym with a variety of exercise machines such as treadmills and stationary bikes, which are helpful for those who (ironically) do not wish to bike 3-4 minutes to the ARC. Pool tables and XBox 360s with Kinnects are also provided. Inclined mesh fabric chair-like things support those who wish to play games, although these seem incompatible with using Kinnect games, since those require active motion.

Unusual Leases Leases in the complex may be per bedroom or per unit. If you choose to lease per bedroom, you are responsible for your bedroom plus your share of the common area.

Although electricity is provided for free, usage is capped. Usage beyond the cap results in charges added to your *water* bill. Your water is free unless you exceed a certain cap. If you have exceeded your cap, please post your experiences, including your rates of power and water consumption (if known) here.

Additionally, there is currently no way of tracking usage, and there are no warnings about approaching cap limits or commendations for being particularly frugal with power and water. The Greenwave devices were initially intended for this purpose but ran into significant logistical conflicts with WiFi upon roll-out.

Rent Rental rates are listed below.

Management is inflexible with regards to considering specials that are not explicitly offered.

Rental rates are very high for Davis, although some of the amenities in the complex are also unusual for Davis. A substantial amount of rent goes to throw frequent parties and fund promotions, many of which are aimed at marketing the complex to future renters, rather than towards resolving some of the numerous issues that have been documented on this wiki page and elsewhere.

The management offers various leasing specials at different times. This is not unusual at apartment complexes that need to fill empty units, or that want to maintain higher rental rates over the long term while offering short term incentives. Many former residents are unhappy with the size of the discounts being offered to lure new residents compared to the size of any incentives that they received.

Please Note: The Ramble is not part of UC Davis Student Housing.

Press Coverage The Ramble was recently reviewed in an article in the California Aggie. The article mentions both the supposedly environmentally friendly design of the complex (including the 4 Megawatt solar array), as well as the problems that residents have had with noise, non-functional appliances, and promised amenities not matching actual amenities.

Recommendations for the Ramble Management Discussions with many Ramble and Viridian residents, as well as issues cited on the Wiki on the Ramble, Viridian, and West Village pages, and those cited in the Aggie, have led to a series of recommendations for the Ramble management:

  • Managers need to communicate better with each other about information related to the complex. Currently, you may get different answers (or no answer) to questions or issues depending on who you talk to.
  • Clear and frequent communication with residents about any issues that come up is essential.
  • When in doubt, use policies that make life easier for the residents. For example, if there are two possible policies for how to accomplish the same goal, and one policy would result in a resident being strongly inconvenienced while the other policy would work with the resident's needs, choose the policy that works with the resident's needs.
  • Residents are smart and talk to each other, to their friends, and to potential future residents. The reputation of the complex is a strong driver of future demand for housing at the complex, and therefore of the prices you can charge. Always consider how an action will impact the residents. If it is positive from the resident's point of view, this will improve the reputation of the complex, and thus raise future rental prices. If it is negative from a resident's view, it will likely lower future demand.
  • Give residents clear answers to questions, not carefully worded non-answers.
  • If a resident is paying for something, be sure to deliver it as promised, and on time.
  • Be sure everything in an apartment has been cleaned and tested before new residents are scheduled to move in.
  • Noisy activities shouldn't take place when people are normally sleeping. 10 PM - 8 AM are times when construction will probably wake people up.
  • Keep a list of solutions to common maintenance and management problems so that everyone can learn from each person's experience.
  • Think about how you would react to a decision if you were a resident affected by it. Would you feel better or worse about living at the complex if someone made that decision and you were affected by it?
  • Keep in mind that Davis is a small town, and word travels fast. If you do things that make residents happy, word will get around quickly. If you do things that make resident life more difficult, word about that gets around quickly too.
  • If something goes wrong (i.e. the internet) inform the residents of what you did to fix it. All residents assume that if nothing was said, nothing was done.
  • "Environmental Stewardship" = Do not falsely advertise sustainability if you don't actually practice it. Which you don't.
  • Involve residents in the creation of policies that affect them. This will help you to create policies that serve the needs of both the management and the residents. It will also make your job easier, since the residents may come up with solutions that you may not have thought of, or that solve the problems that policies are intended to address more effectively than those that don't include resident involvement.
  • Don't lose resident mail and deny responsibility.

Currently Offered

Features & Amenities

This new West Village student housing community uses green building technologies and design principles. Apartment Features Include:

  • Full size washers and dryers in every unit
  • Energy efficient appliances
  • Electricity, internet, and water included in rent
  • Private bathroom for each bedroom
  • Walk-in closets in some apartments
  • Normal-sized windows
  • Courtyards
  • Ceiling fans in bedrooms and living room

A view of the pool and volleyball court The Center Amenities:

  • Average fitness center with yoga room
  • Sand volleyball court
  • Outdoor kitchens and grilling areas
  • Outdoor fireplace with seating
  • Study lounges and conference rooms with current technology
  • Recreation pool, heated lap pool, and a hot tub
  • Wireless internet connected to MoobileNet

Individual Leases and Roommate Matching Provided

Pet Friendly Community: Note that some residents are very careless about picking up after their pets than others so you will encounter animal feces on a regular basis.

Net Zero Energy

The Ramble was designed as a model community for energy efficiency and environmental stewardship. Energy efficient building design and technologies have been incorporated throughout to decrease energy consumption dramatically. In theory, The Ramble is designed to use 50% less energy than traditionally-constructed buildings. The Ramble is marketed as working both sides of the energy equation by reducing energy demand while converting sun into energy to power the community, essentially eliminating its energy footprint for a net zero energy impact (after initial building energy costs).

In reality, this is likely bad math, essentially saying that once you remove the community's largest source of energy consumption (it's construction), and the second largest (its eventual decommissioning and deconstruction) it nets no energy consumption. That's like saying that once you cut out the box of donuts you eat every day, you burn more calories than you take in. The only way that the community can actually net no energy usage is if, over its entire life cycle, it produces at least as much energy as it consumes. This does not mean that the community is unusually energy efficient, however.

Mobility

The bike path and highway pedestrian bridge that connects West Village to the UC Davis campus. Public Transportation - The Apartments are located on Unitrans V bus line. Several Yolobus routes stop nearby.

Bicycle - You can get to the Davis Bike Loop. The UC Davis campus is just over half a mile away. There are bike lanes/connectors on some of the surrounding streets.

Parking - Covered/uncovered, single/tandem parking provided. Pay per space.

Parking type
Cost
Single (unassigned space)
$15/month
Single (assigned covered space)
$30/month
Tandem (assigned covered space)
$12.50/month
Tandem (assigned uncovered space)
$10/month

Floor Plans

Ramble A - 898 sq. ft Ramble B - 1132 sq. ft Ramble C - 1219 sq. ft Ramble D - 1453 sq. ft

 
Apt Size
Sq ft
Rent
Deposit
Price by Room
Comments
2 bedrooms x 2 bathrooms
898 sq. ft
$1926/month
$300
$963
Not allowed to share rooms in any floor plan
3 bedrooms x 3 bathrooms
1132 sq. ft
$2475/month
$450
$825

Application Fee: $40/person 

CAAA, Aggie Parents Association and SAA members get this fee waived when you have your membership card at time of application
3 bedrooms x 3 bathrooms
1219 sq. ft
$2475-2535/month
$450
$825-$845
Larger room for $845
4 bedrooms x 4 bathrooms
1453 sq. ft
$3156-3196/month
$600
$789-$799
Larger room for $799

It would appear that beginning in 2012, leases are only offered by the room, which require a $150 deposit each. The "Rent" and "Deposit" columns simply reflect the aggregate cost for each unit.

Rent includes electricity, high speed internet with WiFi, water, sewer and trash.

There is an additional $400 deposit per pet (limit two per unit), subject to age, weight, and breed restrictions. Furniture packages are available for $25 per person per month and includes a desk, chair, dresser, and bed.

Month
4 bedroom
3 bedroom
2 bedroom
January
905 kWh
643 kWh
556 kWh
February
665 kWh
510 kWh
411 kWh
March
579 kWh
493 kWh
373 kWh
April
540 kWh
464 kWh
422 kWh
May
578 kWh
481 kWh
459 kWh
June
595 kWh
503 kWh
473 kWh
July
652 kWh
552 kWh
515 kWh
August
622 kWh
528 kWh
493 kWh
September
555 kWh
474 kWh
439 kWh
October
532 kWh
465 kWh
405 kWh
November
599 kWh
628 kWh
376 kWh
December
884 kWh
628 kWh
547 kWh
Unit type
Monthly quota for cold water
2 bedroom
883 gallons
3 bedroom
1,324 gallons
4 bedroom
1,767 gallons

Electrical usage beyond the allocated quota may result in billing of excess cold water usage.

There is still no way for residents to monitor utilities usage online, as promised.

Internet Access

A brief overview of the networking equipment involved in providing Internet access to residents.

 

Residents experiencing difficulties with Internet access should be aware that:

  • Management is incapable of resolving any issues directly—they will refer you to either Korcett or Comcast

  • Korcett only manages the provision of access to the Internet—the scope of their support services is limited to equipment they have set up

  • Comcast Business Class provides the Internet service itself—if there is a problem on their end, residents will just have to ride it out

  • This is a new complex and many of the details below have, and are subject to change

The main building (The Center) has traditional moobilenet(x) service as you would normally encounter on campus. The workstations (2 Apple, 2 Dell) are run through a single NAT device on 192.168/16 and use UC Davis IP address space. You should be able to access University resources without logging into the "Library VPN".

Internet access for the dwelling units is managed via a DHCP server regardless of whether you connect via hardwired Ethernet or 802.11 wireless. The large subnet combined with the fact that DHCP leases are offered for one hour, means that there will be plenty of available IP address space that cycles around on a frequent basis.

DHCP clients appear to be mapped 1:1 with Comcast IP address space and you are firewalled. Pinging firewalled IPs (ICMP) from outside will result in a TTL expired error. Turn on encryption if you don't want them snooping on you as there are management devices and DNS servers (on 10/8). Outbound SMTP traffic on port 25 is usually throttled or blocked. There are no bandwidth quotas.

One bedroom in each unit will have a Ubiquiti wireless access point that broadcasts the "West Village Wireless" SSID. Another bedroom will have a low-voltage cabinet that contains among other things, an unmanaged Netgear 100M switch. Maintenance took away the keys to these cabinets in the midst of addressing the Internet connectivity issues, so don't expect access to this cabinet.

The Ethernet drops provided to the Netgear switches in the dwelling units are connected to a patch panel in the fire alarm control panel room. Individual patch panel ports are then connected to a 48-port Dell managed switch upstream at 100M. This Dell switch in turn, is connected to other devices via a CAT5 Ethernet cable and a fiber optic cable with two LC to LC connectors. There are a lot of measures in place to prevent TFUs (tenant, er... foul-ups). Spanning-tree is enabled to prevent bridging loops. ARP/DHCP is dropped by the managed switch, in case someone plugs in their router backwards. Everything seems to be set up as it should, to prevent TFUs.

For the layman: WiFi provided by the complex inside your apartment is unreliable if you have microwave-happy housemates. Bring a long Ethernet cable or set up your own 5GHz wireless access point (you can place one in the living room). Tech support (Korcett) is based in Texas and operates during business hours over there.

Fun fact: NAT table overflow on Korcett equipment occasionally allows residents to get around the 12/12 Internet speed provisioning. Don't ask.

Complaining on their Facebook page seems to be the most effective method of communicating the loss of Internet connectivity Significant outages There have been a number of Internet outages throughout the course of WQ 2012 finals week (3/18-3/24). Only Comcast service (provided via Korcett) was affected. Internet connectivity through the UCD NOC (moobilenet(x)) available at the Business Center remained unaffected. On August 9 2012, connectivity to the Internet was down for the entire apartment complex through Korcett-managed Comcast Business Class and UCD moobilenet: a first for the complex since it first opened in 2011.

Mitigating loss of Internet connectivity Over the course of the 2011-2012 leasing year, residents have experienced two primary types of outages: 1. Inability to request DHCP addresses (via wired Ethernet, or 802.11 wireless) - this is what residents typically experience, a workaround for this type of issue is available 2. Service gateway downtime - in this case, the "bridge" to the Internet itself is down, and Korcett/Comcast must manually restore connectivity to the complex

As mentioned before, setting up a personal wireless router will eliminate most issues if it is configured with a static public (global) IP address—and thus not rely on DHCP IP provisioning or Korcett's border firewall. To do this:

  • Set up your router and register it to a KMC account, noting down the MAC address and account number for easy reference

  • Call up Korcett and mention that you'd like to request a public IP address for one of your registered devices

  • Power cycle your router after this is done, request your public IP address via DHCP, note it down, and reconfigure your router with the same IP settings manually (static IP)

  • Note: Normal DHCP leases cycle around on a regular basis and have dynamic IP-to-MAC associations whereas a public IP address is permanently bound to your MAC address. Do not reconfigure a DHCP NAT IP as static unless you want to be promptly kicked off in an hour.

Photos

An artist's rendering of an apartment building An artist's rendering of The Center

 

Comments:

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2011-03-16 18:37:55   "Parking - Covered and uncovered parking provided. Pay per space." — what is the price? —SeabassM

2011-06-06 17:45:21   Parking Covered (Single Space): $30/month // Covered [Tandem Space (front-back double space)]: $25/month ($12.50/month/car) NOTE: These spaces are situated in the center of the lot so neither person will be blocked in (or so I was told). Uncovered (Single Space): sold out // Uncovered (Tandem Space (front-back double space by wall) $20/month NOTE: These spaces require that one person be blocked in for second person to park —OrlyHooter916

2011-06-06 18:20:38   Disclaimer: tl;dr version at bottom :p

Why The Ramble popped out of my apartment radar and hit me in the face: Amazing amenities, personal bathrooms for each room, un-lived in and new, WASHER AND DRYER IN EACH UNIT!!

My Impressions after visiting the model:

The complex is gorgeous. Right now, since construction isn't complete on the whole community, it is a literal oasis on the western end of Hutchison. The buildings are really nice on the outside and the inside. They chose a great color palette and you can tell at first glance a lot of consideration went into placement and construction.

The model is a 4x4 slightly modified with a back door in one of the smaller rooms to allow easy access to tour the "entertainment hub". The floor plan can be viewed on their website.

My first impression of the place was that the space was compact but efficient. The common areas were spacious and felt modern. The bigger bedroom(s) in the 3x3L and 4x4 have huge walk-in closets. There is enough room to take a few steps forward, and to the sides as opposed to the smaller ones Davis apartments are used to. Oversized windows and thoughtful placement depending on room location allow for a lot of natural light and the ceiling fans are a definite plus.

The furniture in the model is available for an extra $25/month/person and will be delivered and set-up by the complex.

The clubhouse/entertainment hub/gym/visual orgasm:

The pool, lap pool, spa, barbeque/kitchen area and sand volleyball court were right behind the model apartment. Absolutely stunning. The highlight for me was the outdoor fireplace next to the pool.

Inside the clubhouse (the big building above the pools in the posted photo on this page) there is a large theater with super interesting/comfortable chairs (I am seriously considering tracking down a few for my parents :p). There's also two billiard tables, a ping pong table, four big screens that will be hooked up to gaming systems (ps3/wii/xbox/??) and lots of seating. The second floor had a fitness area, yoga studio and A FREAKIN' TANNING BOOTH. There were also multiple study rooms (open and private) available on both floors iirc. The building was obviously built to maximize shock and awe. I'd describe it as a mini-ARC/MU with a theater.

Needless to say, after the tour I would have signed the contract with my own blood if necessary. But I still had some concerns; it just sounded, felt and appeared too good to be true. I uncovered a few lines of fine print.

1) The offer for the free month's rent on the 3x3L units has expired as of today, and the availability of the 42" flat screen for use during your stay is only there if you fill the 3x3 or 4x4 unit within 72 hours of your tour.

2) Construction will continue next year while residents are living in the completed units. It will run from 7AM-4PM on the southern area of the community proceeding only further south (so northern units may be more desirable if noise is a concern for your mornings).

3) NOT A BAD THING: The free high-speed internet is 12 Mbps Comcast service for each apartment with router included for each unit.

4) IMPORTANT: This one was the biggest concern for me. There's an asterisk next to the "Free Electricity and High-Speed Internet" that prompts the customer to contact the office for details. At first I was compelled to only ask about the High-Speed Internet, since it was the closest item to the asterisk and I didn't know what kinds of stipulations there could be on electricity. However, since The Ramble is being promoted as a Green community with a zero-net-energy footprint, I had my suspicions about "free" electricity. There would obviously be at least a few people that would try to take advantage of that by being neglectful or irresponsible with electricity, so I was told there was a "liberal" cap on monthly electricity usage. The management has yet to pass down the specifics of the cap, but I was told there will be a mobile App and webpage allowing you to monitor your usage at anytime and ration towards staying under the cap. This was a large concern for me, because Davis summers are terribly hot, and myself and another apartment-mate have two large gaming rigs that remain on 24/7. This is definitely something that should be investigated further when the management makes more information available.

tl;dr version: SUPER NICE apartments, AWESOME clubhouse/outer-common area, you get what you pay for in terms of amenities. Look out for: MONTHLY ELECTRICITY CAP, construction noise, pricing/availability/offers subject to change without notice.

—OrlyHooter916

    2011-06-20 10:24:51   They spam a crap load on Craig's List with ads that make me want to facepalm hard. Stuff like you can't spell Rambles without zero net energy or something. And wow are they expensive. Sure, utilities are included, but I pay maybe thirty bucks total a month on energy and internet. But then again I don't crank the air conditioning on in full all day long, but if the price of energy is fixed, why not? I guess it's more luxury living than affordable living? —hankim

    2011-06-26 05:53:30   The comment from OrlyHooter916 is very suspicious and is written more like an advertisement than a review. —TimJ

    • I don't read it that way. He lists a whole bunch of issues, saying that "But I still had some concerns; it just sounded, felt and appeared too good to be true. I uncovered a few lines of fine print." That doesn't seem like somebody hawking the product. He even lists some serious problems that apply to common tenants in Davis (always on computer systems), and is worried about unspecific items that the management can change or has yet to finalize. That's not really a glowing review; he or she seems to really like the buildings, and is enthusiastic, but is worried about the lease. Not really something management would sockpuppet or even encourage as meatpuppeting. ⁓ʝ⍵

    2011-06-26 13:38:28   I've been to the complex, and I agree with Orly's review. —IDoNotExist

    2011-09-10 09:18:08   Price for parking is $30 per month for covered. Uncovered is $25. 3 bed 3 bath price for larger room is $822 per month. —AlexMcFall

    2011-09-30 16:48:52   I've lived here for a month now and even though it has been a sort of "work in progress" transition into a property that can function efficiently I will highlight some pros and cons. Pros: the property amenities, the location, the property itself, the rooms are large and the apartments spacious and it is very aesthetically appealing. Cons: the serious lack of customer service (despite that everyone seems nice, they also seem to not hear what you are asking for and dilly daddle around helping achieve a desired solution), the fact that things were installed "wrong" and considering everything is "new" you would expect a microwave to not be falling apart within a month of use. You will notice people just basically chit chatting in the center and you wonder why things never seem to get done or what some of these people do at "their job." Internet has also had some serious issues throughout the entire property but they have supposedly now been resolved. I really want to give this place a big gold star because it is so gorgeous and well if you are spending over 800 bucks a month to live somewhere you definitely want to validate every penny you spend but I'm finding it really hard to do so. I would warn future prospective residents to wait and see how the property is functioning in a few years before jumping on Ramble board. Like I said, I really want to see the good in this place and maybe I'm still even so optimistic that I want to blame all this on them being new and there are always kinks to work out but I guess we'll see... —kann

    2011-10-01 04:11:54   So I've been living at The Ramble for about a month now, and so far things have gone swimmingly. It is evident though that the complex is still working out kinks in how it does business. The staff here are very young, which probably accounts for the inexperience, inefficiency and lack of communication amongst themselves. Maintenance requests for my particular apartment have been fulfilled quickly, although the problem was not resolved. We filed a request to fix our door because it doesn't stay shut unless locked. It was reported that this was happening throughout the complex as a result of faulty door latches. The resolution is pending.

    Similarly, there have been huge issues with internet connection, the largest issue occurring today. While it was agreed upon that residents would receive bandwidth equaling 12mbps, the ISP, Korcett, limited residents to 10mbps, resulting in a serious decline in internet efficiency. The internet runs slowly, multiple tabs are impossible, and sites that require large amounts of bandwidth are inaccessible (e.g. Netflix, Hulu, etc.). These particular issues occur not just during peak hours when the internet is heavily used, but during down time. It is currently 4 am and Netflix has been trying to load for 25 minutes. The complex responded by saying that the bandwidth is now equally distributed throughout the complex, thus ensuring that everyone has a fair amount of bandwidth. Because of this, everyone has crappy internet. But I guess this is what happens when people in a position of power gather resources, redistribute them equally among everybody, and hope for the best. Seeing as how college students spend a large portion of time on the internet, be it for leisure or academic reasons, it seems as if efficient internet should be at the top of The Ramble's list of priorities. Due to these internet issues I will vehemently discourage any potential residents from signing a lease with The Ramble until these issue are resolved.

    In addition to poor internet, The Ramble faces several other logistical problems. Storage space is ridiculous. The aforementioned description of closets is entirely accurate in that the shelves are essentially useless when one hangs garments from higher rungs. You must dig through your own clothes in order to find whatever you've stacked. Also, I am 5'3" and cannot reach the top shelf in my closet, rendering it useless. In the living space, storage is also hard to come by. There are no common closets in which one can store cleaning supplies like vacuums, mops, detergents, etc. Cabinets are ridiculously high and a step-stool is barely adequate for reaching the top shelves.

    Parking has also been a serious issue. And while tandem parking is always a pain, I knew that when I signed up for it. The real problem is the lack of guest parking which results in guests parking in resident spaces for sometimes long periods of time, thereby forcing residents to park in other residents' spaces and so on. While this is an issue that many apartment complexes face, a solution has yet to be enforced by The Ramble staff regarding parking enforcement. Tickets have been threatened, but I have not yet seen or heard of one being issues. Residents have resorted to leaving notes on windshields and using traffic cones to mark spaces.

    I'm done with my rant, time to watch some Netflix. Oh wait... —kelso

    2011-10-03 23:30:02   The Ramble Apartments is absolutely the worst place to live in Davis. Although they bill the complex as the "latest and greatest" place to live in Davis (and even brag about how they are 'environmentally responsible'), it is quite the contrary and the complex runs like a natural disaster from a horror movie. From the outside, the place looks shiny and brand new. A word of caution: don't be fooled. This isn't the place you want to live at all. It is a nightmare.

    Let us closely examine everything about the Ramble. 1) Apartments- You can visibly see that they made a bunch of shortcuts in the construction of this place. The building materials are of shoddy quality and there are numerous problems that have been reported by residents. Example: the clicking ceiling fan and the unusable microwave. Management is either slow or doesn't even bother to respond. On their Facebook page, you can see many residents ranting about how maintenance never showed up, despite an appointment being set up. The buildings use brutish industrial materials. Example: the metal squiggly walls are reminiscent of industrial factories. Insulation is actually quite POOR. You can hear loud parties easily or even people playing video games next door.

    2) Customer Service- This is one of the worst things about the Ramble. Customer service is virtually non-existent. The clowns that work at the office shouldn't have been hired. They aren't trained to do anything right. They don't treat residents with respect. (They just think we are a bunch of stupid students). For some odd reason, everyone says something different. There is no uniform policy. Also, they definitely try to avoid you if you have a problem. I've seen some Ramble people lie to residents that "x person" is currently in an "important meeting" right now, though the person was NOT. Lying to residents is quite troublesome. Management never takes you seriously. They always blame you if something is wrong, even though they clearly know their apartments are shoddy and crappy. Management is completely inacessible. (in fact, most people are inaccessible; they are only available if you want to lease or pay rent).

    I just can't say enough about how bad the customer service is here. This in itself is one reason to stay far away from this complex. Everyone appears nice, but they are not well intentioned. They just dont care period. It is hard to get any help at all. They can never do anything right.

    3) Package Handling- This is quite absurd. Many people have complained about the way packages are delivered at the Ramble, yet nothing has been done. Currently, many carriers dont even press ur door bell. They just drop off the packages at the office. The office does not notify you at all that you have a package. They deflect responsibility for this and say that you should know and track your own packages. Well, that's all fine and good if I ordered the package myself. What happens if grandma wants to send me a care package as as surprise? I would have no idea that I had a package at the office waiting for me, without any notification. The office people are clearly lazy and just want to make life harder for us, though keep in mind we're paying over $700 a month just for a single tiny room. (but ill get to the cost of the place in a moment).

    4) Pricing- The prices here are ridiculous! They must have the wrong locale. This is Davis, California, not New York City. Where did they get the notion that they could charge $800 for a room or basically $3000 for a 4 bedroom apartment. We have tons of land and apartments in Davis. This is no urban city. They are just trying to jip students of our hard earned cash, and some fools bought into the marketing scheme. If you want to charge exorbiant rents, you better provide the service- but that's clearly not the case here. They think they can get away with charging exorbiant amounts and then force us to live in shanty town conditions. Yes, because we as little UCD students don't have any power. We all signed our leases. They can do whatever they want now. The Viridian's pricing is even crazier, about $1000 for a room in a 2 bedroom apartment. No wonder they have to use all these "incentives" to get people to lease. According to the Aggie, Viridian is only 20% leased out right now- just look at the non-existent lights at night. No one lives there- it's a ghost town.

    5) Marketing Scam- They call themselves environmentally friendly, but look at the irony. They have spent countless amounts of money buying cheap plastic stuff and tshirts from China and then giving it out for free around Davis in hopes that people would be stupid enough to sign a lease for the free stuff. I dont see how this is being environmentally friendly. All of their free swag, as they call it, is literally junk. The whole complex is an irony in itself. Someone was complaining about sprinklers being on all the time on the West Village Davis wiki page.

    6) Water Pressure- If you like your showers and being able to wash up in the morning, DON'T Live here period. It is hard to take a shower here. The water pressure is so bad. The water that comes out of the shower is literally like a few rain drops. The shower head limits the flow of water to 1 gallon per minute, which is absolutely ridiculous. Also, the bathroom faucet's water is just as small. It is hard to brush your teeth in the morning without adequate water. They are just trying to limit your use of water, although it is "included" in the rent.

    7) Parking- This has been a huge problem at the complex. The parking spots are by no means all leased out. There are still many empty spots out there, probably at least 1/3. Nevertheless, you still have people parking in all the wrong spaces. Though parking tickets and TAPS enforcement has been threatened, NOTHING period has been done for parking violations. It is absolutely silly what happens when someone parks in your space. You call up the office and the office says, there's nothing we can do about it, but YOU NEED TO COME IN RIGHT NOW TO THE OFFICE AND PICK UP A NOTE TO LEAVE ON THE VIOLATER'S CAR. What is this? We live here, we are paying customers, yet you ask us to come to the office to pick up a trivial note to place on the car that's in my space that I paid $30 a month for? Stop treating us like children. We are not stupid. You need to tow them right away, but instead the ramble staff dilly daddies and doesn't care.

    8) Loud Parties/Noise- No one cares about the ramble complex. Even calling the UCD police for a noise complaint doesnt yield anything. The UCD police never show up. You're on your own if you have loud neighbors.

    9) Construction- This is an ongoing issue that many residents are concerned about. The ramble staff were quite clever in making us all sign waivers for the construction that is going on. Some apartments are directly next to the construction areas. You can hear loud machines all day and all night. The dust and dirt that picks up around the complex is terrible. Even within the complex, landscaping has yet to be completed. They are still jackhammering around. This area is surrounded by nothing except for construction and believe me, it will get worse as the year progresses, as buildings start to be built. Right now, they are just laying the groundwork, but once buildings start coming up, the construction noise/dirt/dust whatever you want to call it will get significantly worse. But because everyone signed a lease, who cares?

    10) Location- The ramble calls itself "on campus" apartments. What a joke! They are indeed technically on-campus, I'll give them that, but there is NOTHING in West campus. It's just barren land (now construction land). The ramble is close to nothing at all. It takes a great deal of effort to get from the ramble to anywhere, even central campus. You must bike a great distance. Dont get me started on walking. Also, bus access is not very good- it only takes you to the silo and the buses are not frequent.

    11) Internet- This is a huge issue of contention. On the Ramble facebook page, people have complained loudly that the internet just sucks and doesnt work. Ramble staff has been unresponsive. They don't care about the internet situation at all. They ignore all the facebook posts about the internet. Residents have reported that the internet is worse than dial up. The wifi coverage is extremely spotty. You're on your own if the internet doesnt work. -JamesHendrick

    2011-10-04 12:17:49   I smell a class action lawsuit. —TimJ

    2011-10-09 19:30:33   Oh and don't bother paying for "covered" and "assigned" parking. Both of those words really mean just about as much as "nothing" does to Ramble. The solar panels from the thing that is supposed to "cover" your car have gaps which constantly leak muddy water onto your car. There is also sprinklers that are installed anywhere near "plants" (or well dirt in general) have this uncanny ability to spray your entire car leaving these fleck spots all over it which chip your paint (if you can even get the spots to go away after numerous washes) and cover your window so that you can barely see out of your own damn car! Word to the wise: carry an extra water bottle in your car for emergency window drenching and window wiping in order to somewhat help the situation since no offense but to Ramble you are paying for absolute bullshit promises of "covered" and "assigned" parking. Oh and I suggest not getting too mad at whoever that damn person is who is parking in your assigned spot. Someone else probably parked in their spot and so they went in yours not realizing it was yours. Don't take it too personally especially considering your shitty parking space isn't all that great anyways. Seriously down for a class action lawsuit at this point. —kann

    • I also informed the Ramble management about this issue, and they said they've contacted others to address this issue. How long they will take to fix this (if ever) is up for interpretation. And honestly, at this point I would say don't bother paying for parking at all. They aren't checking, nothing is being enforced, and guest parking is a joke so I honestly feel cheated out of my parking money.—tlei

    2011-10-17 13:29:54   Refer to #2 of JamesHendrick's comment above. My recommendation is not to live here. The nice apartments (with their numerous problems) is not worth the bullshit that management puts you through. They emphasize their "good customer service" but good customer service means that you help out the residents without them explicitly asking, which is NOT what the management here does at all. They won't uphold your request even after you ask! Good customer service means going above and beyond what is average customer service to help and to service your customers, but the customer service here is not even the bare minimum, but is horrible. They only think of their ease and not what the residents would like. Every issue that is brought up, they act as if its not their issue to deal with but rather someone else's fault. They will even blame you and basically refuse to help. Places with good customer service would try to accommodate you or offer you some type of compensation for your troubles. They think that because you have already signed a lease that you are completely under their lockhold and can treat you however badly they want. And don't believe anything they say to you unless its written down and signed. They have straight up said to me that verbal agreements don't mean shit. And anything that they mentioned/promised that they would provide that wasn't explicitly written on the lease? Yeah, they will never honor that, they'll just blame the misinformation as someone else's mistake and "there is absolutely nothing I can do about it". And worst of all? They lie to your face in order to save their own asses. Honestly this doesn't even cover it. It is awful. Don't subject yourself to their bullshit.

    Also, what is up with the crazy extravagant parties every month?! That's where our rent is going- in sponsoring silly parties promoting West Village. We are a part of their marketing campaign by paying these rents. Last month, they had a welcome home party- ok thats fine. Now again, they're going to have a "pep rally" whatever that means...What a waste of money! They just waste our rent. -JamesHendrick

    2011-11-01 10:01:14   What is with all these free party and events happening during times when oh I duno EVERYONE is in class or working. Seriously after everything wouldn't mind being able to take advantage of some free shit and fun but of course Ramble carefully plans these wasteful events when no one can attend anyways. So much for resident appreciation. —kann

    2011-11-05 17:46:49   My comment is not about The Ramble Apartments, which I love, rather it is about this wiki page. The contributors to this joke of a page have long since lost site of the purpose of a wiki. While the page is certainly lengthy, and contains some information which internet users would not be able to otherwise get, it is marred by useless opinion based commentary. Much of it is written in the first person. Most of it outdated, conversational non-information.

    ex: "We agree that this is a waste of rent (if the Ramble pays for it) or a waste of university resources (in the event UCD pays for it)."

    "The wireless network is unencrypted, and has poor reliability, but is available throughout the complex. Connections on the wireless network have been observed to drop every 60 seconds or so."

    • This is nonsense. It does not belong here.

      To those seeking *information* about The Ramble Apartments, look elsewhere. This page is nothing but a one sided opinion article. As a resident myself I disagree with almost all of the content of this page that wasn't lifted directly from Ramble brochures.

      I'm giving up on this page.

      —IanHaydon

      • Ian: Like any wiki page, this one is the result of the editing efforts of lots of people. I agree with you on the first statement (the opinion on waste of rent). I don't agree on the second - it's accurate, plus the reliability of features advertised as part of the complex is of concern to people who live at the complex, or who may want to live there in the future. Also, please note that not everyone may have the same experiences with the complex that you do. Of the many people whom I've talked to about the complex, most have expressed nearly identical opinions about it. Also, checking the edit logs, it looks like most of the revisions you are talking about were made in the last few days by a single editor. I've revised the affected portions to incorporate their observations while maintaining a neutral and factual tone for the page.

      Come on, just look at the previous editing history. EBAustin, AKA The Ramble Marketing Manager is writing a bunch of these comments and trying to white wash this Wiki page in order to hide these harsh facts about The Ramble. Knock it off, Ramble Management. We don't appreciate this. Word is spreading faster than you can say "The Ramble" Have fun trying to fill your Phase 2 or even Phase 1 for that matter. As a dissatisfied resident, I wholeheartedly agree with the comments/observations in this wiki page of my fellow Ramblers. It's time we stood up and after this year and, REFUSE TO RENEW OUR CONTRACTS FOR NEXT YEAR. Have fun Ramble!

      2011-11-11 20:24:01   @JamesHendrick You are a moron with nothing better to do but bitch bitch bitch about the apartment your mommy and daddy pay for. DO them a favor and instead of writing these elaborate rants about the place you live hit the books to not waste your over priced education. Get a life. Check out all the stuff you get compared to many other apartment complexes all over the country. Your a jackass —JackSwagger

      2011-11-12 12:48:42   No I am not and I am not attacking you clown I just see so much whining and complaining about everything in this town and your lives. Life isn't perfect and neither with every living situation. You want everything your way buy a house, otherwise take the good with the not so good and get on with your day. Ah thank you —JackSwagger

      2011-11-13 12:01:50   Although atypical for the nation as a whole, and in a very different housing market than Davis, I did find this article, about housing at UC Merced, very interesting: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/13/us/homework-and-jacuzzis-as-dorms-move-to-mcmansions-in-california.html?pagewanted=2&ref=us

      —IDoNotExist

        2011-11-15 15:25:15   I am quite shocked to see how many complaints there are. I don't deny the fact The Ramble apartments are expensive, but I highly doubt that many college students get the opportunity to live in such luxury. The fact that we have a gym, rec center, pool, and spa to enjoy should be plenty to be happy about. What purpose does it serve to rant on Davis Wiki about all The Ramble's imperfections? Perhaps it would be more productive to rant here: http://www.carmelpartners.net/contact.htm. We are living in luxury apartments as college students in a time where people are struggling to keep their homes. I am grateful for the opportunity to live in such an environment but sad to to see that my peers clear lack of appreciation. I don't work here and have no incentives to protect The Ramble (I, too, realize they aren't perfect) just think that some need to get a clue. —danielbadiali

        Two or more of the following comments comefrom the same IP address and may be the same person.

        • You're thinking about it the wrong way. I appreciate the amenities (and pay for them). Though I get annoyed by the smaller issues such as inconsistent and slow internet, those are minor issues that I do expect will be fully fixed in time. However, what I cannot put up with is problems with management's attitudes and incompetency. I have been lied to multiple times, not just about rules or leasing or other things like that, but about my own character. They have lied about my reliability, with one main staff member (not a student) answering my questions on multiple occasions, giving me incorrect information that later put me at risk in terms of my lease, and afterwards when questioned about it by another staff member, lied and said he had never talked to me or seen me in the office. Problems such as these are unlikely to be changed. They are not minor inconveniences of superficial nature, but are problems with the people running the system, the lack of honesty and transparency in the whole process, and their attitudes towards the people they should be serving. All the amenities and extra goodies cannot change that. - tlei

        2011-11-15 16:30:13   Daniel: They are indeed nice apartments - among the nicest in Davis. I don't think people are complaining about the amenities. But there are a variety of problems, and as with everything else in Davis, people report them on the Wiki. Many people on here seem to have posted about issues with the apartments, while others have reported issues with the management - including things that they apparently tried to resolve with the management, but were not able to. Just because it's expensive doesn't mean that people shouldn't expect things to work right, or to have issues resolved in a timely manner. In fact, when you pay a premium to live somewhere, you expect that some of that premium will be used to provide a better level of service.

        One of the biggest problems with apartments in Davis is that because there's a tight housing market and rapid turnover by the students, the management in most complexes has little incentive to improve things. If something isn't right in most cities, you contact the management and it gets fixed. In Davis, they wait a year and half the residents go somewhere else regardless. Management at some complexes dictates terms to prospective renters that would be considered outrageous anywhere else. The wiki gives residents the power to change this. By posting issues, managers can't ignore problems and wait for the residents to go away. They have to address them! That leads to happier residents who are more likely to stay, and to recommend a complex to their friends, which in turn improves the management's ability to attract and retain residents.

        Another reason that you're seeing this on here is that it's important to keep people informed about both the good and bad points of any business. Managers always emphasize the good points of their products, but avoid telling you about the issues you may run into, or try to downplay them. They have their own websites and marketing. They are the voice and advocates for their products. Residents and customers need a voice too - both to express their satisfaction, and to get issues resolved.

        The wiki is really the only forum that people in Davis have to do that. —IDoNotExist

        Two or more of the following comments comefrom the same IP address and may be the same person.

        2011-11-29 19:00:07   Although there have been some issues with the internet, I LOVE the Ramble. The amenities are amazing, the rooms are gorgeous, and I feel really safe here. It is a new apartment complex, and there are definitely some communication issues between staff and residents, but I am sure that all of those kinks will be worked out. True, The Ramble is expensive, but SO WORTH IT! —CarliJean

        2012-02-03 15:29:45   Since it's the time of year when students are looking for housing for the following school year, I thought I'd give my two cents about The Ramble. I live in a 2 bedroom, and my rent is $967.50 total. ($955/month rent, $12.50/month covered tandem parking.)

        Some pros are: - The gym. Really nice, each machine has a TV attached to it, and it's generally not very crowded (unlike the ARC) however with more units being built for next year, it will probably get more crowded. - Each room has its own bathroom - Washer & dryer in unit - Nice kitchen appliances (with the exception of a really small microwave). - Brand new! Clean, nice floors, nice cabinets. - Nice TV (that stays in the apartment) and one month free rent special when we signed our lease.

        I know this complex is new so they are still working out the kinks, however there have been quite a few problems this year.

        Some cons are: - Parking. The covered spot is not worth it. The covers are so high that it does not protect your car against rain, and only moderately protects the car from the sun when it's hot. Not worth the price. Also, tandem parking is extremely inconvenient but it is really expensive ($25/month) for your a single parking spot. It is better to get an uncovered reserved spot because you are not going to ever be "boxed in" to your parking spot.

        - Guest parking. There is none. When my friends came to visit for the weekend, they had to park at my friends' house on the other side of Davis and I had to go pick them up. There is only 2 hour visitor parking that is enforced M-F 10:00am-6:00pm. The Ramble argues that your friends can stay for the weekend, but the catch is they can park in a visitor spot on a Friday at 4pm (no earlier) and won't have to move their car until Monday at 10:00am. When we signed our lease they said there would be guest passes, but then when we asked after move-in they acted like they never said that. I would have seriously considered not living here had I known that it would almost be impossible for my friends to come visit (for longer than two hours) because The Ramble is not located near any shopping centers or anything so there is really nowhere for visitors to park.

        - Packages. They do not notify you when you get a package, and then send out e-mails complaining that their mail room is full and residents need to pick up their packages. Many apartments send out a mass e-mail each day to the residents that received a packages, it's not a very difficult task and I don't see why someone in their office could have that responsibility.

        - Pets. Dogs are allowed at the Ramble, however there is a 40lb weight limit so there are quite a lot of small, yappy dogs. We unfortunately live above an apartment where a Chihuahua lives and because it is cooped up, alone in an apartment all day, it barks incessantly. I have also been woken up to dogs barking very loudly at each other while on a walk. through the complex.

        - Internet - The internet in this complex is awful. It goes out constantly, and when it does work, it runs painfully slow. I have had to go to friend's houses late at night because the internet died while I was trying to study. I recently bought a TV episode off of iTunes, and it has taken 4 hours to download this show. The internet is extremely unreliable and definitely the biggest consistent problem for residents.

        Overall, I would not live here again. Yes, it is a very nice apartment, but definitely not worth the price. Even if we did not have as many problems, I still think it's just too expensive. There are plenty of nice apartments and houses in Davis that are much more affordable. —sgw12

        Please do yourself a favor and don't live here. The apartment really sucks. I mean it. Although it looks nice and modern on the outside, the materials and workmanship of the apartments are crap. Because the apartment is so new, no one understands how to do anything. The management team is extremely incompetent. They're all transplants from outside of Davis and don't understand that us UC Davis students aren't so stupid to fall for their tricks. There is one person in the office, Terry Massey, that always lies to you. Avoid him at all costs. I have no idea why they would hire a bunch of clowns. Plus, they waste a bunch of money for their over the top marketing campaigns. Imagine this: $800 on an AD in the campus newspaper and buying a bunch of stupid foam fingers. Everything in your apartment breaks down constantly. Don't renew, don't lease here.

        2012-02-19 05:32:04   Over time, I've noticed that the trend regarding reviews and comments on DavisWiki is that they generally tend to come from people with strongly positive or strongly negative opinions. I'm not going to try and explicitly dissuade prospective lessees from considering The Ramble, but my experiences have prompted me to rant on at *great* length about this complex. Use your own judgement.

        I had a remarkably poor experience with the leasing professionals—inexperience is not an excuse for unprofessionalism. I was told among other things that I would be able to monitor my utility usage, sign up for my own Internet service, and that sound isolation would be superb. None of these turned out to be true. Get everything written down on paper and be skeptical of everything they tell you. They're good at fixing issues once there's enough negative feedback.

        Moving in was, for lack of a better word, messy. Some units were furnished when they should've been unfurnished, and vice-versa. The parking lot borders Highway 113. Parking was originally unenforced, then when enforcement came, it was ineffective. Now that enforcement is effective, it is a great inconvenience for visitors. We were promised guest passes, but this never happened. The covered parking consists of an overhead solar panel array with gaps in-between each panel. Expect minor protection from sunlight and overhead lighting for when it's dark out, but that's about it. Tandem parking spots subject your vehicle to being boxed in. Because West Village is technically on campus, addresses at this complex are ineligible for the standard parking permits (C, L, whatever).

        The interior common area is nice: hardwood floors, a ceiling fan, stainless-steel appliances (refrigerator, electric range/oven, microwave oven). The electric range/oven is in the middle of the common area and there is no range hood. On opposite sides of the electric range/oven are the sink and a closet containing your high-efficiency washer and dryer units.

        The lack of a range hood: your cooking, and that of your housemates, will first spread throughout the common area, then permeate into your bedrooms and bathrooms. There is a tiny always-on ventilating fan that someone in your apartment will bear the misfortune of, in their bathroom (more on this later), but those cooking odors will likely first reach the much-larger intake for the central HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) system. Also, if the odors are... er, pungent enough, this will set off the fire alarm on a regular basis.

        The bedrooms have the same ceiling fan as is present in the common area. Noise made inside the bedroom will be almost inaudible to those in the common area (great for uh, intimacy), but not vice-versa. If your door is next to the refrigerator, expect to be woken up if your housemates have the tummy-rumblies at 3AM. Windows are double-pane and do a decent job of maintaining the inside climate, but don't fare so well in terms of noise isolation. Windy weather, such as gusts above 50km/h, will incite highly audible responses from the windows (flexing/rattling) or the building structure itself. Do not expect to get a good nights sleep during periods of turbulent weather without the aid of earplugs.

        Bathrooms could be improved. Low-flow faucets and low-flow showerheads: you'll probably use the same amount of water, it'll just take you more time to shower or brush your teeth. If you have a closet inside your bathroom, expect a weird juxtaposition of not being able to use your closet door and bathroom door independently of each other. If your closet door happens to cover the light/fan switches when opened, expect the motion-detecting light switch (more accurately: occupancy sensors) to turn off when you're in the middle of doing your business. The bathroom fan does a poor job of sucking up steam. Expect a foggy mirror regardless of whether you have it on or not. It would appear that the water heaters run on natural gas (or just have insanely large tanks) as I had hot water throughout the last extended power outage.

        One bathroom in every unit has their bathroom fan on the same ventilation shaft as the ventilating fan in the kitchen. The ventilating fan in the kitchen is always on. You will hear an obnoxious "whoosh" 24/7. The ventilating fan in your bathroom is not always on, and is controlled by a DewStop fan switch which limits operation time to approximately 30 minutes. Result: odors from the kitchen area will seep into your bathroom. You'll have to keep your bathroom door closed to block out the noise and smell.

        Entry to the main leasing office (The Center) and pool is controlled via an ioProx keyfob. This is a large complex and as such, most of the amenities they flaunt to prospective buyers are oversold. The study lounge has two Apple computers and two Dell computers, along with one multi-function printer (which is almost always out of paper, toner, or both). There are seating accommodations for at most, 20 people, but the complex has 192 units for Phase I alone. Don't expect to use what you want, when you want it.

        Entry to the apartment unit and bedrooms are controlled by a SAFLOK INSYNC system. I'm going to let the cat out of the bag: look up "SAFLOK INSYNC" on YouTube—the first result should be from BrickHouseSecurity. If this weren't Davis, I'd have those suckers off in an instant. These units are battery-operated and there is a mini-USB port in the front for programming and operation when the batteries are depleted. Maintenance has had a history of unwelcome (and unnecessary) visits.

        Internet access here is managed through Korcett, which provides service via Comcast (business class). At first, it was unregulated, meaning glorious symmetrical 100M access to the Internet. Now we have MAC address registration (any fake information will do), and you're limited to 12Mbit symmetrical per device (not account, apparently). None of their equipment is behind uninterruptible power supplies, so when there's a power outage, Internet service goes down and won't be back up until addressed by management.

        Wireless access is provided by means of 802.11n Ubiquiti access points that completely saturate the 2.4GHz frequency range. Most of the complaints regarding slow or unreliable Internet access stem from the fact that we have so many wireless access points in close proximity at high transmit power (effectively blinding each other). The microwave ovens don't help much regarding this issue, and management has blamed the unreliability on the GreenWave power management gateways.

        Nerd time: the West Village Wireless access points are unencrypted, client-isolated, and have spanning-tree-protocol enabled. Like everything else, these are hooked up at 100M links. If you want to bring your own wireless access point/wireless router, I would suggest getting a 5GHz-capable one for best performance.

        Lastly, their marketing tactics: Green! LEED! Good for the environment! Where? How? A few residents got a "The Ramble LEED Certified Apartments Resident Resource Guide" CD. This has maintenance information regarding the EcoQuartz countertops, Earthwerks vinyl flooring, and GE appliances. It mentions that it has exceeded the California Building Title 24 (established in 1978), but nothing about the 2008 standards. It tells us about the LEED for Homes initiative, but the LEED checklist is empty with the following explanation: "Final LEED checklist will be received once certification is complete".

        Electricity usage is metered and you are given a quota for usage. Hot water is "unlimited", whereas cold water is subject to a billing if you exceed your electricity quota. Management obviously has access to utility consumption data, but has not provided it to tenants. Perhaps things aren't so net-zero-energy? Either way, this is pretty shady.

        I'm not even going to start on how much it costs to live here.

        So, if I were asked: Why did you leave The Ramble?, my response would be: questionable business practices. As an addendum, I'd go on about how the workmanship is lacking, the apathy shown by their staff, and minimal foresight in regards to how it's like to actually live here. Also, their tagline is a sham: Maximum living? Hardly. Minimum impact? Definitely not.

        If all that didn't sink in, hopefully this does: I don't want to live here, do you? —Roarasaurus

        2012-02-19 16:16:49   I created an account just so I could warn people about this place.

        First off, it is ridiculously expensive. I live in a 2 bedroom and pay $950. That is insane. Students can find much cheaper studio or 1 bedrooms apartments for less than that. Secondly, the staff here could care less about you, no matter how they try to play off that they're all about making residents happy. They are apathetic, unknowledgable, rude, and untruthful. They will tell you anything just to shut you up and make you go away. The front desk staff is atrocious. I can't believe that people get paid to behave as unprofessionally as they do to people who are paying for a service. You can never get a real answer out of them, and half the time they have no clue what they're talking about so they make something up that will bite you in the ass later. On one occasion, a front desk attendant actually told me that "I'd just have to deal with it" when I had an issue. I really don't understand how these people are hired. As for their "professional" staff, they never answer emails in regards to important lease questions or anything else for that matter.

        As for maintenance, don't even get me started. They come in whenever the hell the want, and when you complain to the Ramble about it, they say "oh, you were notified, you just must not have remembered." Bullshit. Maintenance will knock once and just barge in to your apartment. I have a dog and had to fight tooth and nail with management not to enter my apartment unless an appointment was set up. This took 3 months until they finally relented.

        I also have to agree with other posts on here about there being no hood over the stove, so no matter what is being cooked, it smells up your entire apartment, which really sucks when your roommates decide to cook something that smells terrible or is really potent. Unless you have every window open, your bedroom will wreak.

        Also, anything that happens in the common area, you can hear as loud as if it were right next to you if you're in your bedroom. The acoustics are unreal. Every little sound echos.

        Staff is incapable of keeping track of packages. I constantly have to argue with them that yes, my parcel is in your mailroom, because I can see when it arrived and who signed for it, but they will continue to fight with you, until finally, they open their eyes and, wonder of wonders, your name is on the list of packages that have been received that day. It took 3 people to find a package I had once, and on another occasion, they had one of my packages for two weeks and claimed it was never delivered! And the only sort of apology you'll get is "Oh. Yeah.I guess it was here" or "Oops". There has got to be a better way to organize this.

        Another thing that I know ticks of residents is the amount of money they spend on lavish, useless services. They hired a limo service for a week to take students to campus because the unitrans didn't run as often to a particular bus stop yet. Really?? How much renters money did that cost? Also, they spend tons on tshirts, foam fingers, and other useless stuff that hardly any residents actually get. Or food parties that are at such random times, that only about 30 residents reap the benefits of it. Sorry, but I'd rather my rent be lower than have any of that stuff that I, or hardly anyone else for that matter, get to participate in.

        Visitor parking is virtually non existent. Before signing my lease, that was a huge point for me, and they swore upside down and sideways that there would be guest passes that visitors would be able to put on their cars. Now they act as if this was a figment of hundreds of people imaginations. Ramble is completely isolated, so when my boyfriend flew here to visit me from halfway across the country, the rental car had to be parked like a 20 minute walk away because this complex goes back on their word.

        Also, construction is constant, and if you live next to one of the quad like areas, on the weekend you will constantly have drunken people yelling, screaming and vandalizing plants (which is beyond my understanding) at 3 am.

        Oh and internet? Yeah. Don't count on it.

        Also, lights are on outside CONSTANTLY. I don't know how they can say that this place is energy efficient. At night, they keep everything so brightly lit it will take you forever to get to sleep. Lights never go off, so they have no motion sensors or anything. I mean you can see this place glowing from campus at night. It's a ridiculous waste.

        All in all, I can't wait to leave. Staff sucks, things residents were promised are dismissed as "oh we never said that", and its too damn expensive. Sure they gym is nice, the pool area is nice, and being a little isolated is nice because its quite (when construction isn't going on), but all in all, don't live here. You can find somewhere just as good for a hell of a lot cheaper. —Jacksonian

        I can vouch for the above users' issues with The Ramble Apartments. What they are saying is absolutely true. Again, don't fall victim to the ramble and their shady business practices. Everything really sucks. The little small things add up. Even though the apartments look nice, there are so many issues that will annoy the heck out of you. You'd rather live in an older place where at least things are more stable like internet and management. Also, the construction going on is ridiculous. They had to turn the water off for 2 days! The rent is also increasing for the 2012-13 year. THINK THREE TIMES. don't lease here! plus, they said there is a "tremendous" interest in their apartments. My ass there is. —JamesHendrick

        The other important thing to note here is: NEVER sign a lease for an apartment you have not yet seen. If you have not seen the physical apartment that you will live in, don't lease there. Ramble Phase 2 will be another pain in the ass maintenance issue, if history holds true from Ramble Phase 1. —JamesHendrick

        I am so annoyed with this complex that I have no choice but to echoe the same concerns as everybody else.

        Have a guest? Forget about it.

        Internet issues have been a nightmare.

        The apartment complex is "green" and environmentally friendly, but as far as I can tell, the apartment just wastes money on plastic frisbeez and other stupid shit that is everything but environmentally friendly.

        Whoever designed this complex should get fired. The apartments are all facing each other (as though it's a closed box), so that when a drunk idiot runs around, screaming WOHHOOOOO and breaking stuff at night (which happens often here), everybody wakes up.

        If that's not enough to disturb your sleep, you will be happy to find that the interior of the apartments are built in the same manner. The kitchen and living room are in the center of the apartment, and all bedrooms are literally inches away from the common living areas. So when your roommate comes in late at night, you hear the door open. You wake up. When your roommate gets hungry at 2 A.M and uses the microwave, you hear it. You wake up. I think you get the point. You won't sleep here, unless you are a super heavy sleeper, which most people aren't. This is by far the most annoying thing about this place.

        Stay away. —JoeChiller

        2012-03-22 14:33:40   In light of the most recent internet outage, I'd like to post something for the good of future potentials. I agree with the fact that it *was nice because it *was new, that it had a very nice initial shock factor, that it has SIGNIFICANT logistical and construction issues...

        So I have nothing really new to add about the quality of apartments themselves. About the people, however...

        I'd like to iron out some specifics. There are names and faces that need to recognize for their special inattention, rudeness or otherwise complete disregard for tenant interests. The people at the front desk are of particular interest... one Gage Feller comes to mind. The word 'douchebag' does not often come to mind, but I am completely unapologetic about labeling this person as such. Among other people, he has gone OUT OF HIS WAY to make me and my friends uncomfortable when trying to use the amenities our OWN APARTMENT COMPLEX has to offer. A leasing agent, when trying to address a friend's package delivery had ABSOLUTELY no patience when it came to address his pick-up. He was trying to remember the exact name of the package (a very specific delivery) and in that moment of hesitation she moved instantly to the next person in line, rather rudely and haughtily. Noteworthy too is the fact that she seemed to be on rather good terms with the people behind us, while she seemed annoyed to deal with us. It took the intervention of yet another off-site leasing agent (just hired, I think) to handle the pick-up. During another incident, the man at the front desk sounded extremely annoyed when I asked him a question because I interrupted a conversation with his friends. Are you there to help me or sit and socialize?

        Speaking of social media, they ARE deleting comments/complaints/criticism/recommendations off their Facebook wall, if not in real-time then retroactively. They have barred an unknown number of people from posting (some people were never able to do so to begin with, it seems random at best and extremely prejudiced at worst), and regularly delete comments. Apparently they're not afraid to admit it either and will ban concerned residents partially or fully depending on frustration level, and send a nice courtesy message saying that the comments are bad for the marketing image, which is what the Facebook page is for. "Shut up and go away" is the operating principle. If you do make legitimate complaints and/or suggestions through either HardHatHeff or the Ramble Facebook page, the writer will direct you to the person in the next paragraph.

        The apartment manager, a certain Casey Barth, who also is the most regular maintainer of the HardHatHeff account is similarly disappointing. She doesn't do her job. In case of internet outage, she requests that RESIDENTS call the middleman ISP (not Comcast, but a company named Korcett, which also provides unreliable and spotty campus internet to Texas A&M) and attempt to have it fixed. Isn't that her job? For this rent, being treated like our time is as empty, free and useless as hers is frankly insulting. We aren't paid to fix this apartment complexes' problems, you are. So do it yourself. Saying that you are technologically inexperienced is NOT an excuse, which is what she has rolled out repeatedly over the course of all these debacles. Meanwhile, she schedules self-serving events that are a) bad for the environment and b) waste residents' rent. Don't buy the hype that apartments are 'green' or 'ecologically friendly'. Don't have a minute of it. Cooling/heating units are extremely inefficient. They may be Energy Star but they let residents run it however they like (as with all water and power usage) without letting us know how we're doing on usage (a feature promised before move-in but never delivered on because it messed with internet). Explanation upon demand.

        There is a REASON that we have not seen the promised LEED certifications. They DON'T HAVE ONE. It's not hard to see why. Even a ballpark calculation based on area of solar panels to actual power consumption will tell you that the Ramble is buying power off the grid, not the other way around.

        Many of the 'Ramble events' are scheduled at impossible times and are extremely difficult to get access to. They are a waste of money. If they could fix the few but significant issues with this apartment (delivering on promises, reliable internet, maintenance requests being fulfilled correctly (I have more on this too, but it's finals week), etc), it wouldn't be so bad. Except for the price. It's not worth the price. It will not be worth the price. Living here is annoying and inconvenient without a car (there is absolutely no local retail) and campus isn't as close as they make it seem. The bus, for example, is as long as the J or G to North Davis, because it takes an absolutely pointless and ridiculously long stop at Health Sciences (five minutes). Also, it's shadily inconsistent (too early most times, or extremely late). This isn't so much a comment about the Ramble as it is about the deception of convenience, but I thought I'd lump it in anyways.

        Another person of note is Terry, the leasing agent cum used car salesman. I have to tip my hat to him for being such a persuasive salesperson but if you read this before going, please beware! He is VERY CONVINCING, so make sure you get all the facts in order before you decide to sign. Question him persistently and be extra aware of what he is saying.

        I personally have had it with this place, after trying so hard to make it work out right with constructive criticism and waay more patience than the rent could justify, at least in my eyes. If you're lucky enough to hit it off right the first time, and have the pockets and conscience to stomach a lot of marketing untruth, you're good to go. Frankly there are a lot of people who have both traits, but this place isn't new, isn't sexy and isn't appealing any more. I am leaving.

        One more thing to add about the V: since they're expanding radically, the fact that the bus isn't as crowded as say, the J or W, is soon going to be a fond memory.

        (Provided their expansion attempts are successful, that is.)

        If you have any questions, post here and I will try to get to them.

        —BillClinton

          Obviously, you are not Bill Clinton but you seem to know enough about living here to be somewhat trustworthy. Regarding management there seems to have been some turnover recently. In the middle of some roommate disputes the manager I was dealing with mysteriously was no longer available. I found out weeks later that she had been fired. Unsurprisingly the next manager was even less helpful than the last... which, considering the last manager LEFT in the midst of the dispute, says nothing good about the situation as a whole.

          Quick note: the speed cap in place by Korcett seems to have been lifted (I was getting ~90mpbs download speeds sometime in the middle of the summer until I left. It may not last for long however; the next 'phase' includes a whole lot more people.

          —TheOneElectronic

          2012-05-06 00:08:56   I'll try to touch upon topics that haven't yet been addressed to keep this to a minimum, but it boils down to this: first impressions can be extremely deceiving. It's fairly evident that despite all the luxurious amenities and (claimed) minimal environmental impact, many residents no longer want to live here. I'm one of them. The novelty and appeal of brand new apartments close to campus has simply worn off.

          Many apartment complexes in Davis have a fixed pricing policy and limited promotions where deposits or application fees are waived. It might be due to excessive turnover or aggressive expansion (your call), but there have been a lot of promotional offers for both The Ramble Apartments and The Viridian where the monthly rent has been reduced. This is variable pricing at its best—a form of first degree price discrimination. The latest offering features 2B/2BA starting at $776/room, 3B/3BA starting at $710/room, and 4B/4BA starting at $677/room. To put that into perspective, filling a 2 bedroom, 3 bedroom, and 4 bedroom apartment would cost at least $1552/mo, $2130/mo, and $2708/mo, respectively. Keep in mind that these are promotional prices.

          Electrical utility monitoring via Sunpower has apparently been brought online, but they scheduled the training sessions in the midst of my exams. There doesn't seem to be an urgent need to inform residents of how to monitor and moderate their utility usage. Apparently you just need the inverter number to get the ball rolling, but there's no incentive to do this. It already takes ages to wash my hair or brush my teeth and my toilet often requires multiple flushes to dispose of the evidence. I waste enough time tolerating these counterproductive water-saving techniques. Attend an hour-long training session to read an electrical bill? No. friggin'. way.

          Onto the pluses: I feel rather safe here at night as it's brightly lit and there's an overnight security patrolman. The pool is a nice alternative on-campus Rec Pool, but future expansions may lead to overcrowding. The Internet connection is reliable and fast if you use your own wireless router. I love having a washer and dryer in my apartment. Package delivery is hit-or-miss: I don't order things online much, so my experience has been fairly positive—just go down to the front desk, tell them I'd like to pick something up, sign on the log and give my apartment number and name. The maintenance crew are pleasant to deal with and have resolved many issues in a timely manner. My bedroom ceiling fan works at hurricane forces.

          This may be redundant with all the other comments already posted, but other considerations/minuses: Cell phone coverage is pretty bad for Verizon/T-Mobile/AT&T in my apartment. Reception is decent, but not sufficient for sustained conversation. The garbage/recycling dumpsters might be an ungodly distance away from your apartment—they're all located near the parking lots. The printer in the office center always seems to be out of toner, paper, or both. Parking enforcement has always been a joke. Guest parking is non-existent. There is a concerning lack of storage space. I'd love to bring a vacuum cleaner, but there common area closet contains the washer/dryer and I've got other stuff in my bedroom closet already. Construction/landscaping noise is highly audible and very irritating. Kitchen odors go everywhere and linger for days. The circuit breaker for my bedroom is easily tripped. —GonnaGiveYouUp

          2012-05-26 14:36:43   I have to say I was surprised by the number of negative comments on this page. I currently live here and i love it. I have parking and it is what’s advertised. I don't have any problems with my guests and parking, there is plenty of two hour parking if you know where to look, and its not monitored on the weekend. The only problems I have had with parking I’ve been able to resolve with TAPS and the occasional help of Casey in the office.

          The amenities are awesome! While the pool and clubhouse get crowded sometimes I feel its to be expected.

          Nota bene: Have you seen the size of the expansion?! It's massive! How it's not going to be crowded all the damn time in the future is beyond me.

          —TheOneElectronic

            My internet works fine aside from slowing down every once in awhile in the middle of the night, but then again i have never had internet that didn’t do that.

            The staff itself has been helpful, with the acceptation of a few of the student workers. Anytime i have had to speak with the managers they have worked to get my problem resolved.

            The kitchen does not have a vent hood which is inconvenient, but not that big of a deal, I don’t burn my food that often...

            Construction was annoying when it was near me, but depending on where you live its not unbearable and im sure its only temporary. Water pressure was a problem when i moved in, but it has been fixed since.

            Overall, no the Ramble isn't perfect, but the good definitely outweighs the bad. Honestly has anyone complaining on this site ever lived in an apartment? Anywhere you go there are good and bad things about the apartment, the Ramble is no different. This complex is better than anywhere I have lived in Davis, even taking its negatives. Stop whining because your mommy and daddy aren’t here to take care of your problems anymore. The real world is a lot worse then these apartments, enjoy it while you can.

            —JamesSoma

              2012-06-10 17:04:31   @JamesSoma: Telling people that this is the real world and you're not living with "mommy and daddy" anymore? Mommy and Daddy are probably paying your tuition and exorbitant rent prices, so maybe you should think twice before insulting peoples' opinions, jerk. —LRonHubbard

              2012-08-18 21:00:00

              Really, guys? I cannot believe how immature your comments are, people. You make middle school school students look like they are the ones who deal with the real world. —Chelsea744

              2012-09-25 17:45:11   I’ve lived in this place for a year. The amenities and brand new equipment are really amazing. Don’t forget that this place has the newest housing buildings in Davis. The prices are so high, they are trying to reduce it each year maybe they can convince the students to go there. Internet connection was always a pain in the neck, they couldn’t fix it! You could never rely on their internet, although they always try to show themselves so supportive and say: “Comcast will fix it, just let us know or call them!”… I had problem with the internet till the day that I left. I’m not saying it was slow or disconnected “all the time” but I’m saying it’s not reliable at all.

              The thing that really bothered I during last year was the very poor management of this huge complex, they just built the place as nice as possible but don’t have any idea about managing it. I figured it out especially when I was moving out. They don’t have any idea about inspecting the unit, or pre-inspection or returning the deposit. They are running a business with your deposits and you will not see it returned. They have a very ridiculous cleaning instruction in a way that you should even clean the dust above the fans on clean water stains in the bathroom! It doesn’t matter if you clean as best as you can, they will not give back your deposit, they don’t want the place clean, they want it as new as you moved in! It’s the landlord responsibility to clean the place before the next tenant move in but they say you are responsible and I don’t think that they even wash the carpet or change the toilet seat for the new tenants, the things which are rights of the new tenants! For international students they want two month rents as the deposit, which is a lot of money and they don’t give you the interest that they get on that money, the thing which is also followed in other on campus housings. I don’t know why someone would want to leave $3000 in their pocket to live here?! Just because it’s brand new?! Before I move out I asked them to send their inspector to check the place because I didn’t want to lose my deposit if there is no damage and everything is clean. I sent several email and went to the office 2-3 times till finally they sent a student! who was just employed for that job! Seriously? She was just trying to follow the cleaning instruction which we had it. They also said they didn’t have any written plan for such an inspection and came up with the idea after several requests from the tenants who were leaving! This place looks awesome from the outside, but I will not recommend it to my friends due to lack of proper management and the deceptive way they are acting.

              —raha

                2012-09-29 16:26:34   Warning: You WILL NOT get your deposit back if you rent here. I was an apartment manager in LA for 8 years, also rented plenty of apartment myself. I know what is needed to clean an apartment, and I have always gotten total deposit back on every apartment I rented. So, after my son moved out, i thoroughly cleaned his room, bath, closet, and even cleaned the common area, even though the other roommates were not moving out. I even cleaned the fridge and freezer. Walls and floor were perfect. Ramble returned only a third of deposit. I wrote them a letter of dispute and they never responded. I doubt you can clean as well as I did, so just figure that you will not get any of your deposit back if you rent here. Better to rent across Russell, share a room (cheaper!) at the Sundance. They returned complete deposit. —CatherineHurd

                2012-09-29 16:44:54   RAMBLE NOISE PROBLEMS: If you want a quiet place to study, the Ramble may not be for you. My son was lucky enough to get a room that was not adjacent to another room, but two of his room mates were not so lucky. He was in a 4 bedroom, and lost 2 roommates because of one noisy neighbor who played loud music all the time. When you first apply, Ramble has you fill out a questionnaire asking if you would like quiet roommates or not. So, they put quiet people together with other people who want it quiet and noisy people together with people who like loud music and who like to party. However they seem unconcerned about whether the adjacent apartment has noisy people living in it. And when my son's roommates complained about the noise, Ramble refused to do anything about it. In both cases it was the same guy who drove both roommates out. But that didn't mean a thing to the Ramble. The quiet guys move while the noisy guy remains to drive out yet another roommate come Fall. So be careful if you rent here, and want a quiet place to study. You might not get it, and Ramble will not be on your side. —CatherineHurd

                2012-09-29 19:59:37   Something obviously has to be wrong when a *university-affiliated* apartment complex has career staff members working behind the veil of anonymity. But enough of that: I too, was only refunded a fraction of my security deposit and that’s what I’m here to comment on.

                Don’t waste your time tidying up the place before you leave.

                It doesn’t seem like management does any inspection whatsoever, and instead outsources it to third-parties, evidenced by the documentation I received with my refund check. Everything was marked as dirty (and yes, I did clean up the place before I left).

                My theory: the cleaning/painting services saw a way to make a quick buck (multiplied by a couple hundred individual rooms, due to the astonishing turnover) and decided to bill the complex, regardless of actual condition. Since they don’t get to keep the deposit either way, management has absolutely no hesitation in paying the cleaning/painting charges outright, without questioning or hesitation, and afterwards, mailing you a piddly refund check.

                At least I didn’t get a bill, right? —Roarasaurus

                2012-10-10 18:05:08   The Ramble's management team is IMPOSSIBLY unreliable and disorganized and have made finding someone to take over my lease impossibly difficult. They won't even tell prospective residents that my room is available and vacant even though I've never even set foot in it. They also continue to gradually reveal fun stipulations about signing over the lease as time progresses (many of which have scared away all prospective leasers), rather than telling me about them before I went ahead and purchased advertisement space on the CHL website and made ads for craigslist and ULoop.

                Also my resident homepage on their website has broken several times and had to be rebooted under different usernames and passwords each of these times. This has just happened to me again, which is why my rent is now late.

                Even better is the fact that they continue to tell me my rent is late by posting notices on the apartment's front door... as in the apartment where I don't live and have never lived in.

                Thanks Ramble! —ButtToucher33

                • An apartment you "don't live and have never lived in"—yet your "resident homepage" is having issues???? Sorry this doesn't make sense. —PeteB

                2013-01-04 07:44:47   I've lived in the Ramble since September 2012 and it's definitely been an interesting experience. First off, the management is just horrible. My roommates and I were promised furniture, (since we'd signed up for it months earlier), and a few days before we moved in, the Ramble told us we wouldn't be getting any furniture, leaving us to scramble to find stuff. Amber, the head manager, is a liar and horrible to work with, and Terry, one of the leasing agents, misrepresents many aspects of living at the Ramble. The Ramble employees don't seem to communicate well with each other or any companies they work with, like PG&E or USPS. My roommates and I received a letter from PG&E recently saying our power was going to be shut off! We all pay our rent on time and since utilities are included in rent, we couldn't figure out what was going on. I finally got ahold of the Ramble and they said it was a mistake. They knew the letter was sent out to a lot of apartments, yet didn't take the time to notify those people of the mistake.

                The apartments themselves are nice. The walls are paper thin and there is no fan over the stove though. When my roommates and I first moved in, most things were aligned properly and working well. Now, half of our cabinets don't close because the building has shifted. My door was hung incorrectly and I've had it repaired 7 times now! The lock is still very temperamental so that is annoying. Overall, my room, bathroom, and closet are nice. The water is full of minerals and the dishwasher does an awful job, (probably because of the hard water), so invest in a water filter if you plan on drinking the water. The washer and dryer seem to work well.

                Getting mail is a pain. My address still doesn't even exist according to GoogleMaps and Amazon! Pretty much anything I order online, (like textbooks), has to go to my parents' or friends' houses! And don't be too drawn in by all the free events the Ramble holds in the clubhouse. For most events, supplies run out very quickly and people who don't even live in the complex come and take things. If they had some sort of ID system to stop people from other apartment complexes from free loading, it would be better.

                The only plus sides to living in this complex are the new apartments, how well lit everything is at night, how close it is to campus, and the bus stops at the complex that go directly to VetMed bldg's and the Silo. Avoid talking to management whenever possible and you may have a decent time living at the Ramble. The only things making me consider staying at the Ramble are the new apartments and not having to move all my stuff! —AnnaCarmen

                2013-01-07 20:09:31   The Ramble apartments have the WORST management I have ever dealt with in Davis. The facilities are very nice, but the management is unorganized and if you ever have a problem they claim they have no responsibility because of your lease. My roommates and I have had problems with mail, parking, and the lease overall. Even before I moved in, the Ramble's lack of communication almost led me to overpaying or my lease being revoked. I had contacted the Ramble multiple times to make sure I had done everything I needed to, and every time they said I had, until I got an email saying I had to pay my full year's rent up front if I still wanted to live here. When we moved in they promised us a free TV and they never followed through. The parking situation is HORRENDOUS! I went to the management multiple times to tell them that there was no where to park because people with the wrong permits or no permit are parking in my area. As a result I had to park in a different spot and got a $45 parking ticket. When I went to management AGAIN they told me there was nothing they could do. I don't understand how they think it's ok to charge me for an imaginary parking spot. I have had nothing but problems while living here. If you want to live here read EVERY word in your lease and have a lawyer in your family. —alissasadler

                2013-01-16   You cannot beat the amenities you receive, although it is still a bit over-priced. The Rambles residents' service is terrible and have horrible PR. Visitor parking is nearly impossible now that UCD TAPS has started cracking down. You cannot buy a UCD Campus Parking Permit if you live in the Rambles. Because it is in partnership with the university, you are still technically living 'on campus' and residents of 'on campus' cannot purchase parking permits. There are many reasons why residents are not renewing their leases, and financial issues are only a small part of the problem. —JennieDavis

                2013-03-11 23:19:51

                When I first come to the Rambles, I am quite concerned about the fact that I can't buy a parking permit from UC Davis and therefore I can't park at school. I asked a staff there and was told that there is a bus every 7 MINUTES, the truth is that there is a bus every HALF AN HOUR. Why do they have to freaking lie to me????

                The parking manager there, Amber, is highly MANIPULATIVE and IRRESPONSIBLE. I was assigned a spot that is VERY FAR from my apartment. I am very concerned because I feel it is unsafe for me to walk from my assigned parking to my apartment at night. Therefore, I ask Amber to change my parking from ASSIGNED parking ($30/month) to UNASSIGNED parking ($15/month). She told me that THERE ARE NO MORE AVAILABLE SPACES and I have to be put on a waiting list.

                My friend Cheryl is now currently applying for a parking permit next quarter - She was given the assigned parking in the beginning of the lease and rejected it, & now she applied for an UNASSIGNED parking spot for the spring quarter. Amber replies that THERE ARE UNASSIGNED SPOT AVAILABLE. WTH? Just because of an extra of $15 per month, you are not changing my parking permit, even though it is UNSAFE for me to walk such a far distance?????

                In the beginning, I choose the reserved assigned because there's a roof over the parking spot. But the roof does not do any good. It could not cover your car at all when the rain comes, and it even makes the car more dirty.

                P/s: Carlene from the headquarter in Colorado has met me in person as of today April 3rd 2013 and resolved the problem for me, after seeing my complaint on DavisWiki. I deeply appreciate it. For that, I would give some bonus points for the Rambles. HOWEVER, I WON'T DELETE MY POST LIKE CARLENE SUGGESTS BECAUSE EVERYTHING I SAID HERE IS TRUE!

                I have been communicating with Amber since December 2012, posted a complaint on wikidavis in March 2013 and get my problem resolved in April. Maybe I should have posted the complaint sooner and get my problem resolved sooner. Now it's April and my graduation is in June, just 2 more months at the Rambles.

                To the poster above:

                First off, congrats on graduating!

                Disclaimer: My boyfriend lives here, I don't (but I plan to live in West Village when I move to Davis, and I've spent quite a bit of time in the complex). I'll be using both his experiences as well as mine in this response.

                I won't disagree with you about the management issues. I have to say, some of the employees seem pretty shady and everyone I've met seems indifferent. (If your career relies on keeping tenants happy, it seems intuitive to actually give a shit about their happiness.)

                However, your concerns about parking seem like a gross overreaction. As I said, I have spent maaaany nights (;D) in the complex. The complex is hardly "unsafe." One of the reasons I plan on living in West Village next year is because of how safe I feel there at night. Have you seen how damn bright it is? I come from a rural area and night in that complex is more like some bizarre extended twilight compared to what I'm used to. It's somewhat obnoxious, but bright outdoor lighting prevents nighttime crime and as a somewhat easy target (woman, long hair, average height & build) I'll be thankful for it when I live there. If you're that worried, carry pepper spray (and I mean "really" carry it in a pocket or something - don't just toss it in the mess at the bottom of your purse and let it be lost forever) and stay alert.

                Furthermore, my boyfriend renewed his lease and needed to add a parking spot. The Ramble doesn't seem to assign parking based on convenience; instead, they seem to be filling from the south end of the lot toward the north end. This should be addressed, as it seems like a lot of tenants are unsatisfied with the parking. Like you, my boyfriend didn't want a spot that far away, since he's located at the south end of the complex - so he requested an unassigned spot. He was also told they were unavailable. Your complex was not trying to rob you; but a lot of your neighbors had the idea to switch before you. Getting on a waitlist worked for my boyfriend, and it may have worked for you. (Congrats, though, on getting management to sort it out directly. I guess we all know how to get stuff taken care of with this particular leasing company now.)

                In conclusion - yeah, The Ramble has its share of flaws and sleazy characters, but it's not some apartment complex borne from the loins of Satan that you make it out to be. Every complex will have its pros & cons - you just have to find the one that works best for you. (Although it's challenging with these crummy 12-month leases!)

                Oh, and je-SUS the walls are thin. That has led to a few annoying and somewhat uncomfortable occasions, as I'm sure many residents (and their partners, and their roommates, and their neighbors) can attest to. I hope Solstice is built with a little more privacy in mind, although I don't have high hopes.

                —CaseyM

                2013-04-03 18:25:26   I have a sublease available from May 17th-August. Rent is $600 ($300 less than what I pay) for a private bedroom/bathroom and personal parking space.

                Email me at [email protected] for more information! Have a happy spring quarter! —CelticsGirl

                2013-06-23 12:04:50

                Hello Everyone,

                So after reading such intense reviews, I figure I would try something new. I have signed a lease for the new Solstice Apartments being built and haven't lived at Ramble at all. However, I have had a tour of the Ramble, and Solstice shares similar facilities. So I will list all the things I have been promised during my tour, and come back at the end of the year to see what was true and what wasn't:

                I was promised that:

                - Apartment would be furnished with pots and pans and I would get own bed and own bathroom (No pots and pans but own bed and bathroom) - Apartment complex would be constructed a month in advance of the move-in date of Sept 1, 2013 (it was constructed on-time for move-in) - Wifi, electricity, etc. are all included however there is an energy cap that only two people have ever reached (True except wifi broke down twice in beginning causing our apartment to decide to get comcast internet on the side) - 4 Unitrans buses come every hour (However, after checking online, it looks like only two come per hour) - If signing up for roommate matching, you can sign a lease with 2,3, or 4-bedroom and change to a different floorplan depending on the roommates you get (I was told this during the tour and over the phone with the front desk. However, I have signed up for a 3-bed but found roommates for a 4-bedroom and they are telling me I can't switch so I now need to find roommates who are also signed up for a 3 bedroom) - And I quote exactly "Internet speed will be around 13 megabits per second." (Ya it ranges from 6 to 13 usually) - Told during my tour that you can not hear anyone walking on the floors above you unless they are doing, and I quote, "Zumba" or exercises. (not true, I can hear footsteps of everyone upstairs, doesn't bother me too much though) - Completely Zero-net living (but other posts above say otherwise, being an engineer myself, I was amazed when I heard that it runs completely on solar panels as I have done many projects on solar power and don't see how this could be true) - During tour, I saw that the closet was facing the bedroom, however in the floorplans online it seems that the closet will be a part of the bathroom which might suck if someone is in the shower and you need to grab something. (I had the bigger room in the 3-bedroom so my closet was separate but my roomates weren't so lucky). - Wifi/power outages only occured about twice last quarter and all residents were give prior warning

                Let's see how it all turns out! :] -JSaini

                Update: Everything has gone by really well. Brand new and really good looking place. My only complaint is that the internet is sometimes slow and cut out twice last quarter when I really needed it for an assignment. We even bought separate Comcast internet service but it is just as slow.

                Two or more of the following comments comefrom the same IP address and may be the same person.

                2013-07-02 13:56:06   My time at Ramble has been positive. It’s been a great place to live which is why I have renewed for next year. There are a lot of negative things said about Ramble most of which are over the top. Not everything is perfect to be sure which is why I have made a Pro/Con list of my experience here.

                Pro

                Own bedroom and bathroom (Privacy is a huge deal to me so this is probably my favorite part)

                  Roommate matching (I found my first roommate but was matched with the second and it worked out great)

                  Maintenance is very responsive and usually completes my request within a day or two

                  Brand new (I’ve lived in places that are pretty run down so this is a nice change

                  The clubhouse ( I don’t use it a whole lot except for the printing)

                  One bill for everything

                  Washer and Dryer in the apartment (Doesn’t seem like a big deal until you live somewhere where this isn’t included)

                  Con

                  Internet (The internet can be extremely frustrating and it seems to act up at the most inconvenient times, like finals. Korcett can be a headache to deal with. Plugging into the Ethernet port seems to solve this issue for the most part but I still experience problems every once in a while.)

                  Price (Not a huge deal either you can afford it or you can’t. Just read the Pro’s and decide if those make it worth the price. It did for me.)

                  —JKautz

                    Two or more of the following comments comefrom the same IP address and may be the same person.

                    2013-07-02 14:07:54   I have been a Ramble resident for nearly two years now and here is the breakdown of the living situation according to me: -Internet has gone down a handful of times the first year I moved in. I expect that is was because the building were new as well as the network. This second year I have experienced only one internet outage that was due to a comcast issue and had nothing to due with the complex. Overall Korcett has considerably increased their response to internet issues and management has been able to narrow down options for us. -Management. My first year here the management was quite concerning, lots of misinformation and confusion. Since the new managers have moved into place in nearly all positions I feel like their response times and communication has improved. -My physical apartments have been wonderful. Way nicer than any previous apartments that I have lived at. The common area feels small at first but you adjust quickly and the room sizes and individual bathrooms are a luxary. -The furniture package is sturdy and extremely hard to damage. Stacked washer dryer is pretty freakin awesome too. -The gym is pretty good, almost a full gym although some things such as a barbell and heavy free wight lifting stations are missing. There is also no room for that equipment so I guess that is why. -I loathe the fact that shippers, other than fedex, will not deliver packages directly to our doors. Instead UPS and other only will deliver to the office.

                    Overall my experience has been extremely good and I reccomend living there if you can afford it! Great place to live and they are working out the kinks constantly! Solstice looks legit too! —rmicnew

                    2013-12-08 17:30:31   COMPLETE SHIT HOLE! Absolute scam its ridiculous! They are constantly turning off the internet, water and power in the viridian due to nonstop construction and no compensation for the renters. We pay a ridiculous amount to live in what they try to sell you as "Top of the line" student living but in reality your shower doesn't get hot, your internet is iffy, the staff doesn't answer the phones when you call for any maintenance request. The online portal does not work. The interiors are completely cheap, as if they ran out of money after building the rambles. The floors are not insulated for noise so it sounds as if two giantly obese people walking around in heels live above you. The car traffic is incredibly noisy due to all the rice rockets. The equipment in the gym half the time is broken or out of service. Parking is hard to come by. and I'm sure theres more I'm forgetting, and its just ABSURDLY EXPENSIVE!! for what? a cold shower, noisy nights, no staff help, no parking, broken gym equipment, barely working wifi. Complete joke, DONT waste your money here. and when you think you're ready to move out they charge you an arm and leg to "repaint" bc why? the walls are perfect but they'll charge you an additional 500$ just to leave haha complete scammers don't get hooked into their leases. —KristinaK

                    2014-02-23 18:43:08   I have been a Ramble resident for a year and a half now. I could not be more unhappy. I have had two illegal tenants living in my apartment since September 2013 and it is now February 2014. What has Ramble management done? Nothing but talk. No action. No evictions. I will not renew my lease. I will not encourage people to live here. The exact opposite in fact. Do not live here. The Ramble experience has been an extremely disappointing one for me. The ethical/moral thing for Ramble to do would be to allow me to break my lease. Instead, I am forced to live with illegal, disrespectful, and disgusting tenants. Thanks. —HilTool

                    2014-03-19 00:07:18   To add on the note of unprofessionalism... My maintenance request had been delayed for two whole months (a fallen lamp cover. i know... so much preparation) and the cable had been cut off. A staff member whom I won't name has basically told me to f*** off about the cable because they don't provide the service (not like we have a choice). The best part of it all was that after asking and getting a little aggressive/pushy (Ramble staff is known to only act upon issues once firmly intimidated), I'm told by the staff to watch my tone, to be more professional, and that my claims were "grossly out of line in my approach and rhetoric" (nice try) If the level of "decent" professionalism is that of your staff, then I will take that as a strong compliment given the shadiness complex. Just my 2 cents on a day with the customer service :P —NikolaiWun

                    2014-03-19 00:13:30   Oh another great one: the $500 gift card promotions. Upon moving into the Ramble, we awaited the gift cards. With each email we sent we received the reply that it was going to be "next week" (about 10 times). I received mine after a pleasant meeting and paperwork. The next day, I accompany my roommate to the office so he can get his card. But the staff member tells us that he has not handed out any cards ever and that they didn't have any (we were helped by another member). This time the meeting was interspersed with periods of the staff member leaving our desk for 10-20 minutes at a time and going to some back room. I had been tired of this kind of situation so when he returned, I pulled out the card and placed it on his desk, asking how I'd have that then. He stared at the card for a while but maintained that he couldn't give out a card. Too much pride. —NikolaiWun

                    2014-04-21 15:10:28   After living here for 2 years I have to review it honestly. This place was on the higher end rent side of Davis. Now with the new rents they charge for the 2014-2015 year it is way off balance, try a $1500 increase in one year (they got rid of the 1.5 months free and a bit of the gift card deal). The outside of this place is nice but the inner workings of this appt. complex is a nightmare, namely the management (JD, Erica, Amber to name a few of the culprits). Once you sign the lease you are screwed, since you are locked in and no one cares about your needs be it parking, internet or maintenance. I had internet out for over a month and no one cared about it. It took going into the office everyday to harass them to fix the issue for it to get it resolved in a month's time. In addition, the internet service is hired out to a third party, Korcett, which they try and make you deal with when there are internet issues. The funny part is that you have no power, Korcett doesn't care about loosing you as a customer since you don't pay them (West Village does) and they have a contract with West Village. Sometimes internet is slow, as in dial up speeds.

                    If you do go into the office to raise issues, most of the time you get treated like an idiot, since they think you are a stupid student. Amber is especially the culprit when this stuff goes down as well as Erica. Usually the Facebook posts on their page will show complaints, which I believe they now hide, especially the posting to their page area. Don't buy into their "off-the-grid-solar-power" since a recent article in the Sacramento Bee (linked below) has shown they don't produce all they consume. There is no active regulation of water or power usage so as you can assume people waste a lot more than if the power bill was out of pocket.

                    The cost of parking has been jacked up even more so this year (14'-15'), most places in Davis pay no parking fees. You can now spend over 40*12=$480 a year for BASIC parking. This is in addition to rent.

                    After living here two years, honestly probably one too many, I would not come back if I was not graduating. There are many cheaper, management friendly appt complexes in Davis that are just as close to campus. My suggestion if you tour the place go up and talk to a resident walking around and you will have most of what has been said on Davis Wiki confirmed. Here is the link to the Sac Bee article.

                    http://www.sacbee.com/2013/11/26/5949323/uc-davis-west-village-progresses.html —samsmith789

                    2014-09-02 22:38:18   Ramble/Solstice have many fantastic amenities but my overall experience there was beyond frustrating. Construction was delayed 3 months and the apartment was dirty and unfinished in many places. The ceilings are incredibly thin, making it easy to hear the apartment above. Many of the people in charge treated residents poorly and often spoke with a condescending tone. At move out, residents are expected to spend hours upon hours detailing and intensely cleaning the entirety of the apartment without much of a chance of even getting back money from the security deposit. It was also near impossible to be present for the final walk through which, through contract, the residents are supposed to have the right to do. The entire moving out process was incredibly stressful, making all the perks of this expensive complex completely worthless. If you can afford to throw away money, then Ramble is a somewhat luxurious place to live, but in my opinion, it is not worth the money. —JordanCostello

                    2014-09-03 16:13:39   I lived here for approx. 6 months, after I had some roommate issues and had to vacate my old place. Here is my review:

                    Good:

                    Apartments are brand new, so you don't need to worry about anything breaking.

                    Washer/Dryer in each apartment is super convenient. In addition, there's a TV

                    Private bathrooms are great as well. Bathrooms are spacious, with a big closet.

                    Utilities are provided, so you don't need to worry about setting up a PG&E account or anything.

                    Distance to campus. It's about as far away from campus as Cuarto is. V line runs constantly.

                    Awesome community center with state-of-the-art equipment and a large pool.

                    Big windows, lots of natural light.

                    24 hour security, so it's very safe.

                    Ample visitor parking.

                    Individual leases shield you from deadbeat roommates who are late on rent.

                    Bad:

                    Rooms are tiny. My old apartment complex (Adobe) offered a 10x10 private bedroom + bath in a 3 bed for $750. The bathroom is bigger than the bedroom, though most of that space is not often used. This is likely because they want to disincentivize rooms from being shared.

                    On that note, why can't you share? It would be infinitely more environmentally friendly.

                    Noise. If you're as unlucky as I am and get the room located right next to the TV, be aware that there is little soundproofing in the walls. You will be able to hear what's on TV. This year, the TV is wall-mounted. I weep for the person who took my room. In addition, if you want to watch TV during the day, the glare will prevent that.

                    Management is not always honest. Example: I needed a parking permit. They said that they were only able to tell me their parking availability after I signed. That makes no sense, especially as my roommates told me there was plenty of empty parking available. Management told me to look into getting a C class permit, but TAPS does not allow Ramble, Colleges, or dorm residents to have one. They had to have known. Other places that I have lived in have been honest with me re: parking, and how many spaces they have available.

                    The dishwasher, though eco-friendly, does not actually clean the dishes.

                    The price is honestly too much for what you're getting. It may make sense if you use all of the amenities, but I rarely did, because I was too busy with school.

                    While this place is nice, unless you absolutely need an individual lease, I would not live here. —chandru

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