AVA 55 Ninth

Disclaimer: I have not actually lived here, but my boyfriend's roommates would tell you differently. I'm so glad I was introduced to the Avalon family, because now I feel like I'll never live anywhere else! My boyfriend and I just moved into Avalon Mission Bay, but it's worth looking back and writing a few notes about AVA 55 Ninth for those considering this as a place of residence.

First and foremost, it's NOT in the best neighborhood. I'll try to convince friends that it's NOT the Tenderloin, but many of them know better. Homeless people right around the corner. Smelly, gross streets. BUT it's so close to the Civic Center BART station. Convenient, yet I wouldn't want to go out for a leisure walk. This is the primary reason we chose not to renew a lease here.

The actual apartments are fantastic. Great amenities, including a spacious kitchen and in-unit washer and dryer. The restrooms for my boyfriend's apartment had sliding wooden doors. Not ideal, but they had great ventilation, on the bright side. Mirrors miraculously didn't fog up during hot showers. Also, plenty of storage/shelve space around the apartment, namely the bathroom and kitchen.

Depending on your apartment, beautiful views of city hall. The sunsets and sunrises are incredible. Back to amenities, there's a well-equipped 2nd floor gym, enough for what I need, though my boyfriend wishes there was more variety in equipment. Next door to the gym, there's an awesome indoor common space (with two small offices) and outdoor picnic and BBQ areas that can be used for friend get-togethers. No reservations allowed or needed for the most part.

The biggest annoyance is the slow elevators, which services the whole building. The biggest blessing, however, is how wonderful the staff members are. Even when I'm working from the 2nd floor common space, the staff members taking out the trash will say hello. It's a wonderful community and a journey I look forward to continuing at Avalon Mission Bay!

I'm a new resident here at the Ava apartments in San Francisco I'm amazed of the view my space I have and the amenities that they have

What is the deal with this place? You can't get ahold of anyone in the office, they don't return calls, they don't keep appointments, they don't answer emails, they don't answer FB messages. It's crazy. I always thought Avalon was high up there in customer service but this particular property (maybe because the neighborhood it's in) is completely void. There is nobody to talk to.

This review is about visiting Ava 55 Ninth on a self guided tour. I was a walk-in and I told the security guard I was there to look at the apartments. The security guard went to get David and David was wonderful from the beginning. He was very personable, honest and just super easy to vibe with. I could immediately tell from how he was speaking to me and another resident who he was helping before me that he really is the best reason to live there!

PROs
- APARTMENT SQ FT The size and sq ft of the two bedroom apartments are spacious and good for being in the middle of downtown
- SELF GUIDED TOUR The self guided tour is nice because you really can walk around and stay for as long or short as you want (tip bring ID because you give them your id and you get a key fob in return)
- EXERCISE AREA I liked the exercise area but that was my personal taste most of these places have some type of exercise area but this one was a good size.
- DESIGN LOOK AND FEEL The design look and feel of the building is definitely something you will personally have to vibe with or not. I'm putting it as a pro because the hallways are not boring or hotel corporate style. It's going for a hip trendy kind of look which is something you're down with or not. Personally I thought it was cool but mileage will definitely vary depending on if you're into it.
- MANAGER Once again, I talked to David before and after looking at the apartments and if I did choose that apartment one of the reasons would have David. David was awesome.

CONs
- AREA This has nothing to do with the building or apartments but the outside is pretty sketch. I work in the city and the entire downtown is unfortunately going down hill but some areas are more concentrated with problems and this area seems to be one of them. I really hope the city does something about this soon because it's hurting the entire city.

Pros:
- in unit washer and dryer
- gym on site

Cons:
- The mail room is locked by staff so you have to try and track someone down when they forget to unlock it during the day. I've had more than one package go missing and no solution was provided which is extremely frustrating and cost me money.
- The security guards are often "roving" and are nowhere to be found when you need them
- At least one of the three elevators will be broken every day, if not all three of them, so be prepared to take the stairs.
- There's no AC or fans in the units, only heating.
- The curtains in the units block absolutely none of the sunlight.
- On occasions where I've tried to contact the office through email, phone calls, or the resident app no one has responded to me. I had reached out about a lost set of keys as well as missing packages and received no response and overall when I physically tracked somebody down they typically provided no solution.
- Having food delivered or guests let in is a hassle.
- The neighborhood isn't the best with many homeless people and open drug use.

Overall I would not recommend living here at all unless you're ok with paying excessive amounts of money for the list of things mentioned above.

Pros:
There's minimal sound transfer between apartments. Maintenance cares and is fast & efficient. They did leave me hanging on an issue with the ceiling crumbling over my shower. They agreed it needed a repair and then never followed up.

Convenient location. Good space for money. In-unit laundry. Strange, but large closets.

The front desk folks are nice, but have zero followthrough and seem to avoid issues rather than drive them to resolution.

Cons:
Everything is run down and broken. You don't realize how much you rely on good maintenance until you don't have it. The biggest issues are the constantly broken hot water and elevators. Particularly galling when you can't use the loading dock to move in/out. My move in had movers carrying my couch and entertainment center up the narrow staircase because all elevators were broken. My move out had them waiting a long time (because two of the three elevators were broken). The hot water is a terrible surprise when you're getting ready for work. Usually lukewarm, but sometimes ice cold. They're constantly working on it but never get it fixed. The garage door breaks. Keep in mind that this is a really bad neighborhood and people like to smash car windows. I didn't enjoy coming home at 11PM to find my parking spot was taken by another car while paying $520/mo for parking. Also not a peep when Blink bought the Semaconnect car chargers and botched the transition. Suddenly it required a phone call to Blink (with a 1/2hr to 1 hr hold time) to get charging started on my car.

The package room is a disaster. It's also the space where they rent storage. They lock it when the front office is not occupied (though they also manage to forget to unlock it so you have to chase someone down). Good luck finding your package if it ends up in that mess. If you need something from storage, then you need to get it during standard business hours, and probably clear away a pile of packages to get to it.

My bicycle was stolen from the secure bike storage. Understand that we have a 24hr 'security guard' (one of them seemed effective), a secure and locked bike storage room, and cameras. My bike was locked with a beefy chain under a camera. Somehow they stole it from that room, with the guard, in front of a camera. The building said they would investigate and let me know what they found, including pulling the footage. I had an AirTag on the bike, so I knew almost exactly when it was taken. Nothing. I followed up several times and they never pulled the footage. Never provided an explanation.

The neighborhood is, of course, not good. This stretch of 9th street is particularly bad with a homeless shelter and a store that caters to them. This isn't management's fault, but it is something to be aware of if considering this building.

Pros:
The people are friendly. They are honestly the nicest apartment managers I've had.
The delivery lockers are convenient (if your delivery is lucky enough to make it into one).
Convenient location

Cons:
The windows are paper thin. You will hear every outside noise, even on the higher floors.
There is a gap under every apartment's front door. You will hear every noise and smell every smell that enters the hallway.
The appliances and fixtures are the cheapest they could get.
The elevators are constantly breaking down. Be prepared to wait or take the stairs.
The trash system hasn't worked properly since 2020.
The guest parking garage/loading zone has been out of service for months.
The lease renewal process is a pain. You don't go month to month at the end of your lease, instead, you have to negotiate a new lease. But it isn't a negotiation. Their algorithm will come up with a number, and you can either take it or leave.
Pet owners in the building don't clean up after their pets.

Overall, the building isn't worth the price.

Really unbelievable year of amazement at AVA 55 Ninth. The warmth, consistency, and professionalism is such a necessity and it's an everyday thing here. So staying busy with our own lives, being mindful of our neighbors, getting invited to community activities, the cleanliness, it makes it all worth it. With Ms Blair and David at the helm, I can't see myself living anywhere else. Am very grateful for the maintenance team as well. Prompt service and they seem considerate of our personal space as residents. So it's a great feeling all around.

Michael, the Main Tech III did a wonderful job and understood the problem at-hand! I have lived at 55 NINTH for over a year and have had a leaky shower stall door from day 1.
Previously I had service to fix the leaky situation, daily having to use a hand towel to soak up the substantial mess, but having Mike on the spot, it was remedied and dry...cheers to MIKE!

From the beginning of the move-in process (down to the initial call) to today, I couldn't have asked for a better experience. I moved in March of 2021 (so about 5 months to today) and I can confidently say that moving to AVA 55 Ninth has been overwhelmingly positive. Shoutout to Lina and the AVA team for making the move to SF such a breeze.

Here's my story: in March, my current housemate and I moved from San Jose to the city, taking tours at a few different places but hadn't found anything yet that was "the one." That is, until we received a call from Lina saying they received our inquiry. One more unit left at a special they were running (which evidently was at the top of our list), and despite the fact that getting to SF would've meant that we would arrive a bit right before the leasing office closed(!), Lina encouraged us to come up that day and check out the unit. So on a whim, my housemate and took the drive, got the tour, and loved it so much that we applied that day!

Since then, the moving experience was quite smooth. Reservation dock was booked as expected, and the garage made it easy for us to park the U-Haul and load our things up in a few trips. And now, if there's ever anything that does come up - whether a general question, packages, maintenance, etc. - the team is always quick to answer and is super personable/approachable.
Apartments are modern, clean, and the views makes it all worth it. Gym is huge, and being right on Ninth and Market is incredibly convenient: BART across the block, the Market (groceries, and Whole Foods coming soon), and F train / L bus that can take you up and down Market St. And Bill Graham / Audio / DNA / Bergerac / Halcyon / etc. is right here if you like the live music scene as much as I do.

Only notes for anyone reading: have some street smarts (not that bad but probably don't cruise around Mission St too late at night / avoid street parking there), be prepared for a waitlist for the downstairs garage (however monthly parking is readily available at Trinity Place), and the rooms might be a bit tight depending on how much stuff you have (at least compared to our old townhouse in SJ :) )

So, again, wanted to say thanks to Lina and the team here for making leasing process the smoothest it can be. Looking forward to staying as long as I can here!

Just wanted to start off my saying- my overall living experience at the Ava was decent, this review is for what happened after!

My roommate and I moved out in September 2021, I stayed in the city and she moved out of state. We received our security deposit in a timely manner but I was unable to cash the check without her present because the check was written to both of us, using "and" instead of "or" between our names. I contacted Ava directly asking if they could rewrite the check so I was able to cash it and send my roommate her half. They said no, but she can sign a form to forfeit her rights to the deposit, have it notarized, and send it back. Oh and pay a $35 fee to do so. My roommate did that exactly, but we didn't hear back for weeks. When we had followed up they claimed to have not received the form. So again, my roommate had it notarized and sent it again. Weeks go by again and no response. We followed up, still no response.

It's been almost 9 months since moving out and we have not received our deposit back. People move out of state all of the time, so I'm sure this isn't an unusual request and i am very surprised such a large company with many rental properties has such poor customer service.

If you are planning to live here with a roommate- I would request separate security deposit checks in advance so you don't go through this.

Update: 14 more days have gone by-still no response back and no security deposit.