Maybe go elsewhere…
Pros
Affordable rent, all utilities included. close proximity to 74th St/Roosevelt station. Lots of great restaurants in the area
Cons
My apartment was without an oven (they got a convection toaster oven before move-in). Walls are paper thin. I could hear my neighbor taking on the phone or even stirring his morning coffee. My apartment front door was a hollow core interior door that didn’t feel secure nor block any sound (my bedroom was in the back of the building, and I could hear when people came & went through the front door). When Covid happened, the landlord closed their office without any communication about how we should handle paying rent. Months later they sent a letter to tenants with instructions, threatening late fees (even though they were not legally allowed to collect late fees at the time). That was the only communication we had during the entire lockdown. My kitchen cabinets had lots of holes that led to the basement - roaches would come through, and it was not uncommon for me to find them in my cutlery drawer, but more often they were in my sink and running around the bathroom. There was an old apartment in the basement (not rented), but when there was a heavy rain, management would turn on the kitchen fan, which was right under my living room and made my entire apartment hum. They would leave it on for hours or days, and I had to figure out what the noise was and turn it off so not to lose my mind. There were also tons of dead roaches down there - the exterminator would come and spray, but no one would ever clean up the carcasses (everyone knows dead roaches attract more roaches). When I went to sign the lease, they sprung it on me that the rent was a one year concession (this was not advertised), and that the legal rent was hundreds of dollars more a month. The next year, they sent my renewal lease after the legal period, and back dated it, so it would look like I returned it late. They also included the concession paperwork again, even though the laws had changed during that year and their given rate was no longer the legal rent. There’s also no record of the rental history with the city/state, so they could charge whatever they want and no one would ever know. The one time I reached out about maintenance, it was because my carbon monoxide detector was going off. I figured out on my own that the detector had expired (it was around 15 years old… well past needing to be replaced) and contacted management about getting a new one. I was given the run around because she didn’t want to order a new one in case it was just the battery… eventually she dropped off a new one, which was a combo fire/CO detector and needed to be installed in the ceiling. The apartment had 12’ ceilings and no ladder in the building. I had to figure out how to get it installed on my own. Hi
Advice to the owners
Communicate clearly with your tenants when policies/procedures are changing. Stay up on the laws and act accordingly. Stop trying to bank on your tenants not knowing their rights. Record the rent stabilization with the city. Check on basic maintenance/codes in between tenants and as needed during their lease, make updates as necessary.
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