Ryan Tower Apartments

I saw the poor reviews of Ryan Tower but gave it a chance—big mistake. Even if I could live there rent-free, I wouldn’t.
From day one, management misrepresented the unit's condition. What we got was uninabitable—nothing like the photos. Move-in was delayed nearly a month while we scrambled for temp housing and storage. After moving in, the building has persisting plumbing issues. The toilet in our guest room constantly leaked waste water. It was disgusting. The maintenance crew came no less... than 4 times and the issue was never resolved. We also had a leak from the ceiling that was never fixed -- after a few hours of heavy rain, water started leaking through the walls and from the ceiling of the bedroom. The maintenance team came to seal the ceiling with tapes, promising to return to fix the issue. They never did, and we had to remove the tapes ourselves after the rain stopped. Construction noise regularly disrupted work-from-home.

After move-out, it got worse. Management said they'd handle cleaning and deduct costs from our deposit. Instead, without warning, they sent us to collections—no emails, no bills. We only found out via a debt collector threatening our credit. This blindsided us and could delay our homeownership plans for years.

We stayed a year, hoping issues were one-offs. They weren’t. Ryan Tower is an aging building with systemic problems and a management team that overpromises, underdelivers, and treats tenants as disposable.

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Old, worn down building and units, built in the 50s with very little updating. The views, especially from the higher floors, are spectacular. Everything else was just so-so. We lived there for over a year. The management was fine but not terribly proactive. It changed a couple of months before we left, but the service level stayed about the same.

One huge pro is that it is a dog friendly building and there were lots of friendly dog owners. The lawn in front is an easy dog walking area, as well... as the block.

The unit itself was very worn down. Parquet floors that were well past their time and buckling in places. The kitchen is TINY with only two upper cabinets and one lower. Everything worked, just very old and low quality. Same goes for the bathrooms that are clearly original. We had two bathrooms and the shower stall in one was so small that you couldn't turn around when in it.

The owner proposed several changes while we were there, but none actually happened. These included replacing all the windows, which was sorely needed; improving the entry way - not sure why this was a priority; and adding a 'business center' - totally unnecessary.

We were warned by building staff that despite how clean we left out apartment, we would be charged for cleaning and painting. Which we were to the tune of $715.

We were in a time crunch when looking for apartments, with two pets, and this was the only place available. If you have more than two days to find an apartment, I strongly suggest you look elsewhere. Plenty of nicer looking buildings on 4th and 5th Street on the same block.

Also, if you are moving to this neighborhood for Baywood Elementary, you won't get in. When we went to register, we were informed of the heavily crowded San Mateo schools and assigned to a very low rating elementary in another part of town. After we had been there a year, we were given the option to switch to Baywood, but had already moved to another town. Read More