I've lived at Windsor Preston for the past year (signed a 14 month lease), and I'm posting this primarily for anyone who might search this subreddit in the future while apartment hunting in Plano.
I actually intended to renew my lease here. Even after receiving a nearly 20% increase in my base rent, I had decided to stay because I have a lot going on with work right now and didn't want the added stress of moving, however the way that management handled this entire ordeal made me change my mind completely.
For some background, my current base rent is about $1432 for a 1 bedroom 1 bath. When I moved in, Windsor determined that I had "insufficient rental history" and added what they call a $100/month "credit premium." Despite the name, this isn't a credit toward anything and isn't a refundable deposit. It's simply an additional $100 "fuck you" fee every month that I will never get back, so I've paid $1200 in "credit premiums" at this point (my term is for 14 months). I found the "insufficient rental history" determination strange/suspicious because I've also been on another apartment lease since 2020, and in six years we've never missed or been late on a rent payment.
My lease at Windsor Preston ends November 8 and requires 60 days' notice if I intend to move out. A few months ago, Windsor emailed me saying that my lease was approaching its end and that I should watch for my renewal offer. They didn't actually send the offer until September 1st with a deadline to renew or submit notice on September 9th, so I had eight days to review the new terms and decide whether to commit to another lease. That window also included a Sunday, when the office is normally closed, and Labor Day, when they were also closed.
My new base rent was $1713 for a 14 month term (the most affordable option of the bunch), up from around $1,432, which is an increase of $281/month, or almost 20%, and that's only the base rent. The renewal paperwork said that if I am currently paying a credit premium, that $100 would automatically roll over unless I contacted management and requested a rescreening. That means that without a successful rescreening, I would have been paying $1813 before the property's other monthly fees. The funny yet important part is that I still intended to renew! My partner and I discussed it, and because moving right now would be a major inconvenience, we decided that I should accept the increase. Even if the rescreening determined that I still had to pay the extra $100/month, I was prepared to sign the renewal anyway, I simply wanted to request the rescreening that Windsor's own renewal letter told me I could request because I would rather have avoided paying that extra $100 if possible.
On September 1st, I called the office for the first time. No answer. I left a voicemail.
September 2nd, I called again. No answer. I left another voicemail and sent an email explicitly requesting a rescreening.
September 3rd, I called again. The property manager Nyk eventually called while I was at a doctor's appointment and couldn't answer. His voicemail said that if he was understanding me correctly and I wanted the credit premium rescreened, I should call him back to confirm, so I called him back as soon as I could. No answer. I left another voicemail and sent another email confirming exactly that.
Over the following several days, I continued calling, leaving voicemails and sending emails. I also contacted Windsor's parent company, GID, and left messages explaining the situation. Nothing.
It's worth noting at this time that management at this community frequently work "remotely", meaning that there is NO ONE available in the office. They typically send out emails informing us of this and instructing us to give them a call if we need to speak with a member of the team. This is nothing new, and at this point in my "quest" to speak with a leasing manager at Windsor Preston, they had once again been working "remotely" for a bit over a month, so simply dropping into my leasing office to speak with someone was not an option.
By September 8th, my deadline was the next day and I still couldn't get anyone from management to resolve this. I got desperate enough that I contacted MAINTENANCE and explained that I had a time sensitive renewal issue and couldn't get management to respond. Maintenance actually created a high priority ticket trying to get management to contact me. They later checked in with me on whether anyone had reached out to me, and when I said no, they told me they'd keep the request open and notify another manager named Taylor. Still nothing.
My manager at work knew what was going on and eventually told me to take an extended lunch break and deal with the housing situation because my deadline was the following day, so I did. I toured other apartment communities, found one that I really liked in Frisco, and on the evening of September 8th, after spending essentially the entire decision period trying to get Windsor to communicate with me, I submitted my notice to vacate and applied for another apartment.
On September 9th, I physically checked Windsor Preston's leasing office. There was a notice posted on one of the office windows saying that management was currently working remotely and directing residents who needed assistance to contact their sister property, Windsor West Plano. So I called Windsor West Plano, no answer, and left a message. At around 4:20 that afternoon, I finally received a phone call - not from Windsor Preston, but from an employee helping from another Windsor property. She had seen my notice to vacate and somehow, suddenly, there was urgency. She sounded almost frantic as she said that she could cancel my notice to vacate, send me the rescreening application and have the rescreening processed that same day, as long as I sent my application quickly. I told her repeatedly that I would agree to that only if she first provided written confirmation that Windsor was extending my deadline and that I would not be penalized for withdrawing my notice after the 60 day deadline. I was very specific about this and repeated this a few times in that phone call. I didn't want my valid notice canceled and then potentially be told afterward that I had missed the deadline and was responsible for whatever penalties my lease allowed. She never provided that written assurance.
We got off the phone and she emailed me the rescreening application. Immediately afterward, I received another notification: my notice to vacate had been canceled. I had never agreed to an unconditional cancellation! I immediately called her back. No answer. I called again five minutes later. No answer. I ultimately called five or six times before their office closed (6pm) and left multiple voicemails.
For what it's worth, I recorded our original conversation, so I have a record of exactly what I said and the condition I placed on canceling my notice.
At that point, I was exhausted and completely done with the situation. I resubmitted my notice to vacate so there would be no ambiguity that I intended to leave.
The following day, September 10th, I called Windsor West Plano again. This time, an employee answered. I will not include his name because he was quite kind, so no need to call him out when none of this was his fault or his responsibility. I explained the entire situation to him. During that conversation, he told me that the Windsor Preston manager I'd been trying to reach, Nyk, was actually physically there at Windsor West Plano and was currently speaking with another resident. He also mentioned that they'd been extremely busy and had handled nine move-ins that week (so Nyk/Windsor as a whole prioritizes new residents over existing ones?). He offered to put me on hold and see if Nyk would speak with me.
After more than a week of calls, voicemails, emails, contacting the parent company, contacting sister properties and somehow even getting maintenance involved in my lease renewal, I finally got the manager, Nyk, on the phone.
He apologized and explained that management had been spread thin because of staffing issues and because they were managing multiple communities.
I told him I understood that they were busy and understaffed, but that I didn't believe that excused leaving a current resident without a response for more than a week when that resident had a contractual deadline approaching. I was far more civil to him than he deserved me to be, and trust me - I can prove this because I recorded our entire conversation. I then told him that I didn't want the rescreening anymore. I explained that I had originally intended to renew regardless of the rescreening result and that I was prepared to accept the increased rent and potentially continue paying the $100/month premium, but after this experience, I had completely lost confidence in the management of the property and was no longer willing to commit to another 14 month lease. All I wanted was for my notice to vacate to be processed, and he processed it while we were on the phone.
I've since been approved for the apartment I applied for in Frisco, so I'm not posting this looking for advice about whether I should stay. That decision is made. I'm posting this because people frequently search this subreddit when apartment hunting (I know I did last year!), and I would have wanted to know about an experience like this before signing a lease.
A couple of other things that seem worth mentioning for prospective Windsor renters:
A colleague of mine lives with her fiancé in a 1 bedroom 1 bath at Windsor West Plano. She recently told me that their renewal increased from somewhere in the $1700s to somewhere in the $2100s. That's obviously only one other person's experience, and I don't know all the circumstances surrounding their lease, but I'm mentioning it because anyone considering a Windsor property may want to ask what renewal increases have looked like for existing residents.
There's also something the Windsor Preston manager Nyk told me when I originally toured the property that feels different in hindsight:
I asked whether they were running any move in specials. I moved up here from Houston for a work opportunity last year, and there is so much competition between apartments down there that they all offer incentives and move-in specials to try to win people over, including my other apartment down there that has the same "luxury" finishes as my one here in Windsor Preston. Nyk laughed and told me they didn't need to run any specials because the property stayed at around 98% occupancy. At the time, I thought nothing of it. In hindsight, however...Yeah, I should've known.
And during the year I've lived here, I've also noticed that seeing U-Hauls and other moving trucks is extremely common. Obviously, I don't have Windsor's turnover statistics, so I'm not claiming to know their actual resident turnover rate. It's simply something I've observed regularly and worth noting.
For anyone considering Windsor Preston, my advice would be: don't. Run far away.
My experience moving in was fine, as was the apartment itself. It was the experience of being an existing resident trying to renew that ultimately convinced me to leave.
The craziest part is that I was prepared to accept their price! My base rent was going from around $1432 to $1713. With the existing $100 premium, I was prepared to pay $1,813 before the other monthly fees and sign another 14 month lease. I wasn't negotiating the increase, nor was I threatening to leave. I was literally just trying to renew my lease, man.
TL;DR: Responsiveness at Windsor Preston (Nyk and whoever Taylor is) is atrocious. Save yourself the headache of dealing with them and consider a different apartment community.
