Living with landis these past few years and it's been a good experience. Landlords in Berkeley can be a hit or miss but I haven't had a problem with our property manager or maintenance team. The rent isn't too bad either for being in Berkeley and close to campus. Everything is taken care of on time and the whole team is very accommodating. They usually address concerns within a day. I was locked out of my place at 1am and they were still able to come and open the door for me. read more

I lived in a building managed by Landis for just short of 10 years. I really don't think you can ask for much better from a landlord. Living in an old building means dealing with the annoyances of old heating, ventilation, and plumbing, but my apartment was large, quiet, very affordable, and in a great location. Leela and her husband are diligent about keeping the building in good condition and common areas clean. Maintenance issues were nearly always addressed within one day. In my interactions with them, I found Leela and her husband to be respectful and reasonable. Leela notices and values good tenants. If you are reliable, responsible, and assertive (just as in any business relationship) I think you will have an excellent experience renting from her. read more

Apartment going under construction right now (for soft story reinforcement that should've been done three years ago), and the noise is really bad. Apartment was also flooded with machine gas, and the manager claimed it's just "dust." Don't live here if you have any other choice, because these landlords don't care unless you die in their apartment. Every time I call the landlord goes "I'll talk to the contractors" and does nothing. Furthermore, the apartment is completely unhygienic. They don't bother cleaning it at all, and I attached some pictures of the floor before and after I cleaned it. Heat (water heaters) is controlled by the apartment manager, so during winter you freeze for a solid amount of time before the apartment manager deigns it cold enough to turn on heating. There is one washing machine and one dryer in the entire apartment complex, and it's on the roof (no elevators, four stories). Take your money elsewhere, don't support unethical landlords like them. read more

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If you have ANY other options to rent from, go with that instead. Landis Properties has been extremely difficult to deal with for the past two years I lived with them. The prime reason I first signed on was because of the Durant location, but I soon found that they price an exorbitant amount for the small size and old age of our studio when compared to nearby spots. When we first moved in, the kitchen floor had a layer of unremovable grime; the sink stained my roommate's shirt yellow when she leaned against it; the window was broken (which became a breathing hazard during wildfires); cabinets were sticky or broken; and it was just very evident that the studio suffered from years of wear and tear that were never addressed. When we first responded to this, they stated that this was an acceptable level of living... what gaslighting for first-time renters. Overall, management was not professional AT ALL. When my roommate told the manager Leela about the oven that appeared dangerously hot when used, she said "the last tenants never bothered us about it, so why should you?"--by the way, she also stated that the oven was 40 YEARS old and never replaced. This was the general attitude that management used to treat any problems we raised. The only thing they were ever urgent about was about collecting rent $$$. For some dubious reason, they refuse to use digital payment or email, so we had to run to the bank for a cashier's check or mail every check when we were living at home due to COVID. The owner of the place, Sheron Landis, is a whole different level of Karen herself. She is rude and assumes that she can take advantage of college students simply because they are first-timers. For instance, when it came time to move out, we scrubbed the place to be much cleaner than it originally was when we moved in (they admitted multiple times that they never used professional cleaning services on our unit before we moved in). Yet, she charged us a cleaning fee from our security deposit, thinking that we'd somehow be okay with paying out of pocket for a service they never used for us. This speaks to her overall mentality of giving tenants the worse/minimum they can get away with, and yet overcharging you like it's no big deal. When we were on the phone, she insulted me and my mother with ugly words. TL;DR If I could give negative stars to this management, I would. Find your business elsewhere, as this place is a money-hungry renter only afloat because of its desirable location. The unit old, dirty, and broken in ways you cannot imagine--basic needs were not met, and the people you deal with are unprofessional to the max. read more

I had a pretty great experience living at 2230 Haste. Leela was very responsive whenever I had issues, and all relevant repairs were done in a day or two. We also got some flexibility with our move-in and move-out dates, which I really appreciated. Security deposit was returned promptly as well. read more

Leela is an incredible housing manager! She's sweet, hard-working and most importantly, very responsive. Whenever I come across a housing problem/situation, I would immediately call Leela and she would always pick up, if not, return my calls within a few hours. I can honestly say that I had a great time living in her apartment for three years! read more

I really appreciate having Leela as a landlady. She has been really accommodating when it came to breaking my lease because of COVID. She provided me multiple options when it comes to alleviating the responsibilities of the apartment. I was able to get out of my lease and get my full refund thanks to her. We've rented from Landis Properties for about two years. Any issues with had in the property ei. plumbing, internet, clogging was fixed with in 24-48 hours. The maintenance was prompt and on time. I highly recommend renting with Leela!! read more

Lived in the 2411 Durant location. Building is old so its common for noise to bleed in from other rooms and also outside. Leela was really nice and would handle maintenance requests or noise complaints usually within a day. read more

Rude and unreasonable property managers. They operate in the grey consistently. Theres a reason they do not give our their email...

I lived in 2230 Haste St for 2 years and had a great experience. Leela and her husband were very accommodating and took less than 2 days to fix whatever complaint my roommate and I had. I was able to knock on their door for help even on off hours and weekends. I am sorry to hear about others' poor experiences, but overall I would recommend this building. read more

I am really shocked at all the negative reviews here. To be fair, I didn't live in any of the Southside "student slum"-type buildings referenced in previous reviews, but my experience with Landis properties was nothing but pleasant (and that's nothing to sniff at in Berkeley, especially near campus). I rented from Landis for two years. My building was older, but was kept in good condition, and the common areas were always clean. There were a few inevitable little maintenance problems, but they were always dealt with the same day. The deposit was huge, but I got it all back without a fight, and I am not super crazy vigilant about taking care of my apartment or anything. I guess I didn't have that much interaction with Leela, but she was always super sweet - I'm very shocked to see anything different. The renters' market in Berkeley sucks - I'd take this over Raj any day. For whatever it's worth, I would (and probably will) rent from Landis again. read more

A truly terrible experience. Landis Properties treats tenants like 5-year-old children and cannot take feedback on their business. Over the duration of my one-year stay in the apartment, I had no issues with the landlord, mostly because my roommate dealt with the management. However, when it came time to move out, I was found it VERY difficult and frustrating to communicate with the landlord. She yelled at me over the phone, threatened to take all damages out of my deposit (instead of splitting with my roommate), and hung up on me before I could even apologize for questioning why she had not collected my keys during our final inspection (which I did not think was rude or offensive as she claims??). In general, the apartment complex that I lived in was dirty and old. The laundry room looks like a crime scene out of a movie, and the entire building perpetually smells of mold. The only upside is that it is close to the UC Berkeley campus, if you are a student. Otherwise, save the overly expensive rent and rent somewhere nicer - in terms of management and apartment's condition. Trust that I will never ever live in property managed by this group ever again. read more

Buildings are kept up well. Safe - good locks etc. - and managers actually fix stuff quickly, and aren't unreasonable about paint/wear/deposits. Flexible on rent if you get paid on a weird schedule, too, which is different from most property managers. Some people who write negative reviews here have unreasonable expectations of property managers and expect them to be like their parents, I think ... these are apartments that you rent, not a boarding house. They're professional, they do what they need to, and totally competent. Plus, the square-foot price is totally competitive with average rents, not overpriced at all given the size of the apartments and the fantastic location, so i have no complaints at all. read more

I had a terrible experience renting with Landis Properties! 1. The apartment was very very old and moldy. When we got the keys to the apartment it had not been cleaned at all, the carpet was disgusting and there was even a rotting butternut squash in one of the drawers in the kitchen. The windows were black with mold and dust and the bathroom looked like it had not been cleaned in a year. 2. Throughout the year the apartment was incredibly difficult to maintain even when cleaning every week. There were constantly spiders and bugs and there were leaks in the kitchen and constant electricity outages (for example two people using a hairdryer at the same time led to an outage). The walls are also very thin and you can hear everything from your neighbors upstairs and downstairs and across the hallway. As to the mold, by the end of the year, I was sick and coughing from the dust and mold accumulating in the apartment. 3. The washing machines were terrifying to go to it literally looks like a crime scene in the back of the underground garage and the dryers never worked.. my things always came out very wet (sometimes even torn). 4. Finally, when I tried to leave the apartment the landlord was extremely rude and told me the day before I was moving out that I needed to steam clean my carpet or receive a deduction from my security deposit. I had never heard of this before and all the steam cleaners were busy so I was not able to get this done. When I called the landlord to explain she yelled at me and hung up on me. She was extremely rude and I was not able to get the full deposit back which was really unacceptable. There was never a final check of the apartment and the landlord never called me to follow up with the move... she was only concerned about keeping some money. I know that Berkeley can be very expensive and it can be very difficult to find housing but renting from Landis properties was a terrible decision. I am not one to usually leave Yelp reviews but I just want to help you guys out. Please please save yourself from such an awful experience. read more

I had a very good experience with Landis Properties - Leela was fantastic! She's a really honest and hardworking person.

I have lived in many places and I have to say that this is by far the worst experience I have ever had. Landis (and Leela) in a few words: unprofessional, greedy, lazy, emotional, unsophisticated, blaming, unresponsive, threatening, rude, hysterical, untrustworthy. Though I did pay a pretty low rent, the BS you need to deal with on account of the management (if they can be called that) ensures that the frustration is not worth it. The land lady loses her composure quite easily, yelling, screaming and threatening to take out "damages." If there are ever any issues that are not explicitly laid out by the law for her to cover, you can bet that her response will be "that is not my responsibility." the apartment complex its self sucks. dirty, smelly, dark, dingy, with appliances and hinges that are all broken. Bad security, faulty washing machines, and creepy tenants ensure that females may not feel so safe here (I felt very uncomfortable on account of some of the looks I received when entering and exiting the complex). I promise you that this is a place you will regret living in. 2514 piedmont have berkeley, ca 94704 read more

I would advise against renting at 2525 Durant for any reason except for its location and proximity to campus. The landlord (Leela) deliberately takes advantage of the tenants and tends to make things more difficult than they need to be. She is not very polite and seems to care only about "her responsibilities" and was not very helpful when I was moving in. Moving in was more difficult than it needed to be. I called her and simply asked what to do about delivery of packages and she screamed on the phone that "this is not my responsibility" instead of simply telling me that the building manager (Jerry Cornelius) would be able to help. I had my bed, desk, chair, and bed frame shipped to the apartment and was out of town when they delivered and she did not provide me with any sort of information. When she misplaced a roommate's rent check (who dropped it off in this makeshift box in the hallway), she called me and yelled at me as if it was my fault and problem. I was not involved in the situation at all. The apartment itself is extremely old, dirty and musty with the hallways smelling and looking like an old motel. The toilet was not properly cleaned upon my arrival at the apartment with mold growing on the inside. A water pipe leaks through a moldy patch on the ceiling above our toilet and it is disgusting. A guy came in and redid the ceiling but that didn't last long. The pilot light for our oven kept going out at least once a week and I would get home from class to find the whole unit reeking of gas. Windows on the first floor are so flimsy I could easily break though without any tools if I wanted to. There are no bars or other safety features on the windows and I have seen homeless people walking around in the back. The laundry room is poorly lit and it smells of mold. Oh and one small thing: half of the building didn't have hot water for SIX MONTHS. I was fortunate enough to be on the other half of the building but who knows, I could have been the next unfortunate tenant. People I know had to go to Unit 3 or their friend's place to shower every single day for six months. Construction workers kept entering our unit unannounced and the landlord is absolutely horrible about providing decent apartment entry notice. She gives you a range of days when people might enter the unit instead of giving a strict 24 hour notice (which is what she is supposed to do). So I would come home after class and to my surprise, I would find construction workers all over my apartment unit with the front door wide open and my belongings (including laptop, headphones, iPod, etc) completely on display for anyone to potentially grab. If anything had been stolen and I had gone to court, I would most likely have lost the case because I would have too much to prove: I would need a receipt proving I actually owned the item, proof it was there before the construction workers, and proof that it happened while they were working. This is just an example of how her unwillingness to obey law could make your life difficult. Also, when it came to moving out, she kept nagging us to let her know in February that we were moving when many places only have a 30 day notice. I did not see anything in her contract about providing her with notice earlier than 30 days but she bullies you into making a decision early so that she can rent the unit to someone else. Not knowing my rights, I eventually capitulated and gave her the "moving out" form and I am currently stuck in a limbo where I do not know where I will be living next year simply because she refuses to comply with common practice. I have to hope that apartments with 30 day notices (most of them) will open up in May so that I can move out of this place. She also does not allow subletting (clearly stated in the contract)! The two good things about this place other than location: 1) the apartment is well heated for the most part and heat is included in the rent so we do not have to pay extra for that and 2) if you are polite and she is in a good mood, Leela will fix most issues in the apartment (most likely due to fear of lawsuit). My one piece of advice to anyone still willing to rent here: KNOW YOUR RIGHTS. Do not let her bully you into doing what she wants and do only what is required by law and your contract. UPDATE: Also, Landis Properties (or Leela) read Yelp and both her and her husband have been giving me the cold shoulder ever since I posted this review and so I have bumped my rating back down to 1 star. read more

absolutely atrocious. Landis Properties (Leela) is rude, disrespectful, impatient, and self centered. She only cares about her money and will make excuses upon excuses to not fix problems or will only make minor superficial repairs when the problem could easily be fixed the right way with the right tools and a little bit of effort. I would not rent with her again. read more

Renting from Landis properties was my only truly negative experience at Berkeley. My roommate and I lived in a Landis Property apartment, and disliked it tremendously. We leased a 1 bed/1bath apartment, and initially loved the floor plan since the living room was private and had a door which blocked the entrance, so we made it into a bedroom, and we each had our own rooms. But we had no clue at the time about the numerous problems with the unit that we faced. The buildings are extremely poorly maintained. There are no elevators since the building is very old. We were living on the 3rd floor, which included climbing 6 flights of stairs to get to the apartment. It was so exhausting because we lived on a property which was on Piedmont Avenue and Dwight Way, so we already had to climb a huge hill to get back home. Who wants to climb 6 flights of stairs after that? The apartment itself was incredibly subpar. We had hardwood floors which were so old they had scratches and black marks all over them. There were heaters in the bedroom and the living room which you might think is a plus, but they only worked when Leela turned them on which was....practically never, so unless you had your own portable heater you'd have to freeze to death in the evenings. However, whenever the heat was running, our hardwood floors would magically lift up forming bumps on the floor which made it very difficult to walk. The floor in my bedroom lifted up so much, I couldn't open my door all the way, and the maintenance person (Clark who was super nice!) had to cut out the wood and replace it with a new patch. What my roommate and I hated about the heaters the most was that you could only have 1 heater on at a time. So if the heater was on in my roommate's room, I couldn't put the heater on in my room or else there would be a short circuit, and a blackout would happen. Even if a hair straightening iron or a hair dryer was being used you couldn't have more than 1 heating device on or else a blackout would never fail to occur. The mold was the worst part about this apartment. There were large patches of black mold all over the bathroom ceiling, on the windows, and even inside the toilet and sinks. There is no exhaust in the bathroom, there is a window though. My roommate and I kept our window open for ventilation and in spite of that the mold grew bigger and bigger. And when you keep the windows open, huge bugs flew into the apartment because there were no screens, which was something my roommate and I really hated. We called Leela numerous times to fix this problem, and she always blamed it on the fact that our windows were closed, when they were actually open. I guess nothing can really stop mold from growing in these units, the landlords just don't want to accept that. There was so much mold, it was honestly terrifying. When maintenance finally came to "fix" our mold problem, they scrubbed off the mold while patches were still present, and then painted over those patches. So it was still there, just covered in paint, hidden. And then it grew again and we had to deal with Leela again to have maintenance come and they repainted it. So our ceilings and windows were covered in layers of paint and mold... how incredibly gross and toxic. The laundry room was in the garage, and the garage literally looked like two caves. I watched cars struggle to pull out of the garage every day, and occasionally their cars would hit the wall on the side because it was so narrow and low. But, the laundry room looks like a crime scene. The walls are white with huge patches of rust and black mold. And there are creepy dirty carts in the middle, so you really want to get there in time to pick up your laundry or else another resident will come and put your laundry in those carts, which will make you want to do laundry all over again. The management is very difficult to deal with. Leela is extremely inconsiderate, and difficult to talk to. My roommate and I struggled the most with having her understand the extent of our apartment problems...and I don't think we were ever successful with that. She also increased rent for an already overpriced place. So please do yourself a favor, and DO NOT lease with Landis Properties! read more

I did not even rent an apartment from Landis properties but my experience even up to the point of rental was absolutely terrible. I am not someone who actually makes an effort to write a review on yelp but my experience was so bad that i absolutely had to. Leela the lady i spoke to was rude, disrespectful, un-professional and also racist. I am an international student from Pakistan and she was extremely rude to me. She did not give me the time of day nor did she answer my questions appropriately where as the Americans renting from her were treated much nicely. By supporting Landis properties, you were supporting a business that thrives on racism and impoliteness. It is not unreasonable to ask for someone to answer you with respect? Just because I'm not American does not mean that I can be treated the way I was. There was a point in which she called me and I called her back and she was like "stop calling me again and again, I have more important stuff to do." I thought that was extremely obnoxious on her part as I was just returning her call and not only that, as I started to say that I did not know that I could not call after a specific time, she blatantly hung up on me. Yes, this company does have some decent property but it not only supports bad business but it also supports racism and I just thought that I should let people know that. I was extremely distressed today and I am so far away from home, the last thing I deserved was someone treating me rudely because of the color of my skin. read more