WORST EXPERIENCE EVER! Not even worth 1 star! Awful housing service. would definitely not recommend, did not fix any problems. After leaving the room in top condition I was charged for a cracked window, and this was 3 months after I left. There are plenty of other rentals available, use them do not go through Domus, customer service is nonexistent! read more

terrible in more ways to count. terrible wifi, it goes it at least twice a day especially when you need it most. there was mice and roaches even when no food was left out and the apartment stays tidy. Theres absolutely no parking and not to mention there's no dumpster so all the trash just sits their for 2 weeks. read more

In my 3rd year I had the misfortune of living at 81 Colombia. I've lived with almost every student housing company in the area and Domus may be the worst I have ever encountered. Here's why: 1. Let's start with move in process. My roommate picks up all the keys for us since the office is literally in the most inaccessible place ever (probably on purpose so they won't have as many tenants come in person to complain). The rest of us start unloading and after climbing 4 gruelling flights of stairs, we get to our unit (which was left unlocked aka security issue). We each get a set of keys in an envelope and surprise, none of them match the appropriate bedroom. We have to go back to the office and have someone come back with us to unlock the bedrooms. Fast forward 2 months, we finally get new sets of keys and of course none of the mailbox keys work except for 1 but at this point we don't care. 2. Next is the bugs. Since day one we had silverfish. 2 of us previously lived at Luxe so we know it is a common problem in Waterloo. I would say we are very patient since we dealt with the bugs and waited for pest control, which eventually came after 4 maintenance requests and 6 phone calls to the office and 3 wasted days of us sitting in our apartment waiting for the maintenance crew to come in on the days they said they would. 3. Slow/No maintenance. Besides the bugs, we had many more issues. To start we had to fill in a move in inspection sheet and give it back to Domus. We recorded 1 broken coffee table, 1 chair without a seat, a bed without a leg and a straight up HOLE in the ceiling....none of these would ever be fixed except the broken bed. We filed to have all these fixed cause where tf is my roommate gonna sleep. OF COURSE they're not open on weekends so my friend is just gonna have to sleep on the couch for a few days, which isn't even the worst part. In the end, he ends up waiting around 8 nights to get a new bed.....I mean they obviously have a lot of properties to manage but 8 nights??? 4. Having already lived with KW4Rent, Luxe and RezOne, we knew what kinds of amenities we want and questions to ask. I distinctly remember asking our agent about central heating and cooling since we are in charge of hydro. The agent tells us that the temperature is all controlled from our apartment and we decide on what settings etc. They must've trained their agents to be straight up con artists because come end of September, when half the time it's cold and half the time it's hot, we can't seem to get the AC to work. OF COURSE, Domus has turned off the cooling option for the entire building since "it has been quite cold this week and this hot weather should only last another 3-4 days or so". Like don't lie to your tenants and tell us we have control over our thermostat when we clearly do not. Obviously they are just a bunch of cheapos. 5. Warning about low rises. Most of the properties that Domus manages are houses or low rise apartments consisting of 4/5 floors. Beware of signing of signing to an apartment of less than 5 floors because there will not be an elevator. Always ask if there is an elevator, garbage chute and where the laundry facilities are located. 6. Now let me tell you about the utter disgust that is the rest of the building. Domus literally bites off 3x what they can chew. How can you sign on to manage other companies' properties when you can barely manage the ones you own. The stair wells were always dirty and dark. I remember distinctly that someone spilled some dirt from a plant and the dirt was just there for 3 weeks....you'd think with so much money they could afford to hire some cleaners to come in and cleaning the building once a week. EVEN KW4RENT HAS CLEANERS COME IN EVERY DAY! 7. Complete disorganization. Their sales agents are completely useless even though they're the only ones to answer the phone. With so many properties to manage maybe try opening a maintenance office?? Treat this review as both a warning when inquiring about Domus and a reminder of what to look for in other companies. read more

I'm a resident in a Marshall St apartment managed by Domus. It's a hot summer day at 11:45pm. The power of our building had been out for more than 12 hours. There is no emergency back-up generator, and the hallways were pitch dark. A few of us called management during the day to inform them the problem, but nothing was done. Someone in the building called the police at around 11pm and that was when Waterloo hydro arrived. It took Waterloo hydro 10 minutes to get the power back. I called Domus emergency maintenance line in the afternoon to inform them the problem. I was simply turned away and was told to call Waterloo hydro. Basically I was told to do the building managers job. I tried calling Domus again at 9pm, and was told that they had contacted Waterloo hydro, and there was nothing else they could do. Waterloo Hydro came at around 11:30pm, they did not get any call from the management. Someone in the building just called the police and that's how they know about it. Like I said, the problem took them 10 minutes to fix. The incompetence of the management can be found in many other places: - my internet was down a few times over my stay, I was told to call Rogers. Even though the account is under Domus' name. Rogers cannot help and asked management to call instead. - the area near the garbage room stinks terribly all summer and no one did anything. - the constant requests to enter the apartment for apartment viewing, changing locks, and inspections. If Domus is not capable to handle a small emergency power outage like this, I simply do not feel safe staying here any more. If you're a student and thinking about renting with them, avoid them at all cost. If you're currently renting with Domus, leave, before any real emergency happens and they drop you like a hot brick. read more

Consistently horrible service. They 'accidentally' kicked me out of my room despite having received no notice that I was moving out. They generally try to scam your money like in the 'included electricity' you can opt into. It costs double what the actual electricity bill is. They constantly lose emails I send them. They do respond quickly to maintenance requests though so that's something. Still only a one star place with the kind of attitude they gave me after kicking me out of my unit. I definitely don't recommend. read more

Not even want to give 1 star. Worst company ever. Given that they are very careless about their clients, I am just writing this comment to warn whoever wants to rent from it. Here's the story. After the contract end, this company sent email to all tenants to charge over $500 for a broken microwave (only handle) which is more than 8 yrs old. We brought up the concern regarding this is only normal use given the age and the part that breaks, but they replied nothing and set payment deadline unilaterally. In case they missed previous emails, we sent email again asking for the answer, but then this becomes the last email between us. After around one week, they hired a money collection company to collect an "overdue" payment. This company keeps being ridiculous and very unprofessional when provide services (e.g: no routine inspection/cleaning - spoiled food and garbage everywhere when tenants moving in) and dealing with issues (e.g avoid replying concerns and all they did is asking for money). They are taking advantages of the student group as they know we just take whatever they give. There is no way we let them treat students like that. I know housing resources in Waterloo is very limited, but please do not rent from this company!! read more

Would not recommend living here. The laundry machines never work and the elevator smells like piss. Management is extremely unprofessional.

Awful awful company. They LIE about everything. Don't rent from them. When you move out, they'll claim PHONEY damages that don't exist and then threaten legal action if you don't pay. There are so many other good companies to rent from. STAY AWAY FROM DOMUS. You will regret it! read more

Domus housing is the worst housing experience ever. Pros: - the absolute middle in terms of pricing Cons: - room had rat droppings upon arrival (domus pretended as if they were not there) - unit hat lots of holes in the walls upon arrival (domus tried to charge us for that) - turtle slow response to problems - manager was drunk on the job - manager would swear and intimidate people who lived there - management showed our unit to customers and we were not aware of this ( your supposed to let the unit know with 24 hr notice of the scheduling, and we did not agree to have our unit shown ) read more

Domus has been highly unprofessional all 3 years I have been living with them and after moving out, still creating difficulties. There is a high lack of communication of when contractors will be coming to do work on the house, as well as the high quantity of unnecessary charges without reason. Such charges include $300 to remove only a few food items from a freezer post-move out and $200 for a key deposit. I highly do not recommend living with this unprofessional company. read more

I lived in a house that was previously managed by a different company. They were great. However, due to circumstances that were out of his control, the landlord had to hand over management of the property to Domus. And that's when it all went downhill. The house had its problems, absolutely. But I could call the old property manager any time and they were right over to fix the place up. Any time it had flooded, they let us borrow their dehumidifier and Shop Vac. They moved the pipe for the sump pump so that it wouldn't back up into the house again. Shortly after Domus took over, the pipe was put back in the position it was in before. Domus and I disagreed on whether or not water damage should be taken seriously. The caulk on our bathtub tore in August. The kitchen sink started leaking in August. Some rain had seeped into one of the bedroom walls in August. My roommate was there when it all started. She called them right away. Nothing happened. I asked them again a few weeks later. Still nothing. My landlord (at the time, anyway; this was years ago but it still makes me mad) lived in Pickering and had some personal issues going on, but I decided he ought to know about issues pertaining to the long-term security of his investments and I notified him that months had passed since the first complaint and Domus was allowing significant damage to be done to the place. Finally, in January, their maintenance team decided to pay a visit. In spite of our diligent use of clear packing tape, so much water had fallen between the bathtub and the wall that the plumbing access door was rusted shut. The bedroom wall had dried months ago at this point, so they didn't even bother with it. The entire pipe under the kitchen sink needed to be replaced. The cabinet underneath stunk of mold, but any time I said mold in their presence, they looked at me like I had just said Voldemort. And if this wasn't stupid enough, when they replaced our water heater with an electric one after the gas heater failed, they plugged it in with an extension cord that was fed under two doors. Better yet, one of their employees had moved into one of the other units and kept leaving a bowl of cat food right outside our door that attracted skunks and groundhogs to the yard. read more

This is probably the worst housing company i have ever encountered. They only care about money so the rentals and student housing line basically always tell you about how many things are not their responsibility. In the lease it states that all tenants need to pay for hydro & my family and i had this one tenant who refuses to answer our many emails and it's been months now. The person still owes us hydro and domus basically says how it's not their responsibility and it's the tenants responsibility to pay their part. However they keep moving diff tenants in and out (again only caring for money) so it's hard to follow up with tenants you don't know regarding paying my family back for hydro. They say the hydro is run by waterloo north hydro and waterloo north hydro say that they only supply hydro and don't do anything regarding tenant and roommate issues. Nobody is taking responsibility and for a company who advertises themselves as student housing, it def is NOT student friendly. The attitude is also poor on the customer service end as i was trying to speak the guy kept talking over me and wouldn't let me speak until he was completely done talking. Like they just expect me to lose out on the money. And live on spruce st (ensuite and it's filthy and outdated) we pay over $600 for it monthly so youd think they'd at least include hydro or hold some tenants accountable but NO. They honestly give you the poorly maintained buildings and do the absolute minimum (just the house and room- bare) to maximize profits. WE DEF DID NOT RENEW THE LEASE. read more

45 Columbia: There is no wifi, the Internet is very unstable, and there are a lot of spams with malwares present. The maintenance is really slow and sometimes they don't come at all upon your request. The dyer takes 2 cycles to dry your clothes properly. They also charge you additional fees for painting (when they didn't even paint your suite before you moved in) and admin (for inspections and communication). Make sure you check out the place before hand as the images online are very misleading. There are better prices and better conditions at competitor agencies. read more

Things do go wrong; but one thing is for sure Domus Student Housing will make it right. Thank you so much Katherine for going above and beyond to make it right. Quick turnaround with emails, great customer service and I really felt like I was the only one you were taking care of. Now this was awesome. Thank you Katherine. read more

I've lived in Domus Student Housing for two years now. At first I was shocked at how a company of this size is able to conduct itself so improperly, and unprofessionally. After two years of living in their apartment on Albert I advise all students to NEVER move into any domus housing.The entire apartment was clearly made with very cheap materials, and haphazardly. My friend was sitting on the dining room chair, and the legs collapsed, the AC works when it wants to work, and the dishwasher has never once worked (even after they claimed to have fixed the problems). The floorboards started coming apart, rising into each other, so that there was a literal hole in the middle of our floor, my roommates had to jump over said hole every time they needed to get to their rooms, or leave their rooms. We sent out three requests to get it fixed, and it took 3 weeks for them to finally send a contractor, who took an additional week to fix the problem. The elevator in the building permanently smells like pee. Permanently. I left for the summer, and received an email that they were coming through the building to clean the bathroom and common area. I came back, and they had thrown out all of my shampoo, conditioner, face products, toothbrush, toothpaste, etc.. I complained and they say they will only compensate a fraction of this cost. This is the last straw. I'm so disgusted by this company. I thoroughly advise any new students to ignore the convenience of their locations, and to not lease with any Domus housing as they are unprofessional, and cheaply made. read more

I would give 0 stars if it was an option. Other reviews may talk about extenuating circumstances such as hydro outages but that isn't the only time Domus provides terrible service. 365 days a year they provide, at a hefty charge, a terrible living experience. You send a maintenance request in? They provide an excuse and don't fix anything. Seconding another review, they very much scam you on the "included electricity" you can "opt-into" which really means they force you into by illegally withholding your keys when you have already paid rent because they say you haven't paid electricity for the WHOLE year up front which is illegal to request. You can inform them that it is illegal and they will respond it is "within their rights" despite the law professional you just called to verify. They make up whatever story suits their needs. I would not tell my worst enemy to rent with Domus because I wish this on nobody. I could write a masters paper on how terrible Domus treats their tenants. Don't be fooled into renting with Domus unless you savour the feeling of injustice. read more

The building has no lock on the front door. ANYONE can walk in as they please. Have found crack pipes and needles in the stairwell as a result. Told Domus on multiple occasions to please have a key entry on the front door. They said they'll "Ask" the owner of the building if he wants to install one. One time I came back with my kid and the building was filled with fire extinguisher chemicals. Couldn't even see. Came into my apartment to find the particles all over my living room. I had to cover my child's mouth and eyes so he wouldn't ingest the chemicals. We later found out that some crackhead tried to kick down someone's door and was the one who sprayed the fire extinguisher everywhere within our building and Domus did NOTHING about it. Even after all of that, still no secure entry. The apartments are nice but Domus staff are a bunch of unprofessional kids. The owners should be ashamed. read more

i'd like to solicit feedback from the landlord's perspective ; should you are a landlord and having your property managed thru this company. please leave your feedback and private message me. read more