3.5 Stars - Great for families and young singles alike

Reviewed by Jerry on Fri, 08/06/2010 - 10:57
Jerry's picture Jerry
Jerry
Joined: Jan 12, 2006
Posts: 178
Review of Pingod Apartments
3

Been living here for two plus years and am generally satisfied with this compound just south of Guomao.

The Pros:
- Great green space, the best compound garden I've seen in Beijing. Our kid loves it.
- Apt layouts are well designed. We live in a 3 bed, 2 bath that's very efficient with space. The 2 bedroom, 1 bath and the 4 bedroom 3 bath layouts (with big kitchen) we've seen are also well designed with minimal wasted space.
- The built in furbishings are relatively inoffensive (save for the crappy sinks, which we replaced)
- The surroundings keep getting better: Today Art Museum, 22 Art Street with its cafes, restaurants, the nearby Carrefour (convenient, although I avoid like plague because of the crowds), the Jinkelong store, the adjacent kindergarten, BCIS next door (which we could never afford, but still nice to have in neighbood), Landgent Center within walking distance, Viva Shopping Mall short 10-min walk away as well, etc.
- Guomao is 2 min by cab, Sanlitun is 15 min by cab (in good traffic)
- Compound is filled with convenience stores, hair salons, foot massage places, nail salons, pet supply stores and even clothing stores.
- Surrounding development means property value will continue going up

The Cons:
- Furbishings, while inoffensive, are still crappy in that Beijing apartment kind of way (i.e. 偷工减料）- pipes smell awful on muggy days, electricity goes out when too many people run AC
- Baiziwan Lu is cabbie central for cheap eats in dives, creating a traffic nightmare at night
- The adjacent lot is being built into airforce housing, causing construction noise - though that should end at some point
- Area north of Baiziwan Lu is a hellhole, making a walk to Soho/Wanda as depressing as it is disgusting
- Even though it is cabbie central, it is nearly impossible to catch a cab here at rush-hour
- Subways (Shuangjing and Guomao stations) are just located a bit too far to be considered close
- Property managers can be spotty in service
- Hallways have no ventilation, so they are extremely stuffy
- East side of compound is a mess - rubble, rusty barbed wire and an abandoned building that was supposed to be a gym but the management has failed to develop

All in all, the pros outweigh the cons, so I'm still into living here and feel we have made a good investment.

Comments

kkpc2206's picture kkpc2206 Submitted by Guest on Sat, 08/07/2010 - 00:13

So you basically have the same pros and cons as someone who lives in a non-expat apartment complex, but pay a lot more? You have a family so the improved cleanliness is important for sure, but all the other problems you can't moan about because they happen anywhere here but the most ridiculously expensive building as things aren't built properly.

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