Taking a Gamble
Pros
I have lived in 298 Schaefer for three years. When we first moved in we were drawn to the big windows, somewhat livable space compared to what we had before, ok sized rooms, modern appliances and fixtures in the kitchen and bathroom. The brick wall seemed quaint, and there's a roof and fire escape access. It was a good deal at the time. We ended up befriending a lot of our neighbors and building community. They keep the hallways clean. There was a lot to love about this place and it does hold a special place in my heart.
Cons
The first thing we noticed upon moving in immediately was how thin the walls are. You will hear EVERYTHING. Be besties with your roommates or you will be miserable. There is no privacy here. You will even hear your downstairs neighbors talking. They also play loud music a lot and it's hard to sleep. There is a dog in the backyard that cries all night. You will never wake up in the morning on your own accord, something WILL wake you up. Every. Single. Day. The next thing we noticed was mold in the ac. There were some broken cabinets, faulty outlets, holes in the foundation cracks on the walls and peeling in the bathroom and living room ceilings. They did not paint our rooms from the previous tenants or seem to have done any repair or cleaning moving in. The ceiling fan in the bathroom was broken. Lightbulbs were out. But nothing seriously terrible. The super came and addressed minor repairs. If you submit a ticket for something small, even if they ignore you at first if you keep reaching out they will typically respond quickly and fix it (missing cabinets, broken handles, caulking issues. However, they only offer band-aid approaches. They ignored our concerns about the AC units. When we had a mouse infestation, we had to have an exterminator come back 4 times. In between his visits a mouse died in the living room and another in my bedroom next to my bed. We saw a mouse 2 and a half years later and realized the original problem had never been fixed. We see roaches occasionally, usually just in the hallway and roof, but SO MANY bugs of all kinds come through the cracks in the foundations on the windows and brick. Ants infested next to my bed all summer last year, I'm constantly killing bugs and it makes me feel like my bed is dirty, paranoid about things crawling on me all the time. Sometimes there is a homeless man who sleeps on the roof, do not interact with him. Roof is infested with bees flies and so many lantern flies, they will terrorize you. There is an exterminator but he is inadequate and hard to get to show up. They also added a bunch of crazy clauses to the lease that basically allow them to evade any responsibility for basically anything a landlord / management should take care of. They do not always deal with trash and they have gotten fines before they try to push on tenants. The real problems came in Fall of 2024. There is a lot of structural damages that they don't want to / can't afford to take responsibility of. There is a lot of water damage throughout the apartment. Our friends in 1B started to experience a nightmare mold situation in fall of 2024. They had severe toxic mold and it was infiltrating all of their belongings. It got on their clothes, their furniture, their sheets, their beds. Slugs were coming inside the apartment?! I went to their house one time and it was straight up a horror movie. It was affecting their health physically and mentally. They attempted to withhold rent to negotiate remediation and management forced them to move out. The day after they were evicted management started showing the apartment to new people. Someone moved in there the end of that month. We started experiencing problems on the top floor after that. My hairdressers assistant's boyfriend (so random) used to live in the floor below me and she said he was getting mold on his stuff and had to move out. He played music and it even got in his amp?! People on the second floor were getting it on their clothes. I started to notice it on my clothes too. There was a spot in the living room and the bathroom that had water damage and looked worse every month. It started getting on everything. It's still on the bathroom door. It got on my mattress which was such a dark moment for me. It made me feel so unsafe.
Advice to the owners
Jonathan from management literally is the worst. He made my life hell. He would scream at me on the phone, gaslight me, ignored me for months at a time. We had to threaten withholding rent and starting a tenant union to get them to address the problem in the living room. Management conducted theft of services on the hardworking men who helped us. We had to get all of our belongings personally cleaned, and fought them to reimburse us for it. They cleaned out the ACs but did not fix the problem so they still smell like mold. Mine rattles a lot and it's really irritating. If you decide to live here. You are taking a gamble. There were problems in the bathroom they painted over and didn't fix. There is the beginning of water damage in the kitchen. Water pools and gets in from the roof in all corners of the apartment. If it holds up during your time here, it will be okay. But if anything goes wrong you are totally fucked. It's up to you if you want to take that risk, but if you've ever dealt with anything like this before and it scarred you like it did to me, i would suggest you run. 🏃
weaponized incompetence from management
Pros
Cute space, love the roof, love the neighborhood
Cons
Would duel management if I could, either out of malice or incompetence made our lives incredibly difficult through piss poor mold management that never got fixed and still continues to be an issue, pests, and lease issues (and included insanely illegal clauses in leases we were made to agree to at the 11th hour)
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