Expensive but great neighborhood
Pros
Location, apartments have NYC character but generally updated inside
Cons
Trash area outside constantly has rats, packages get stolen, doesn't have video intercom or cameras in building
The Rat's Village
Pros
Location is nice in an ideal, fantasy world. But rats and St Luke's is apparently where everyone takes their dogs to poo so the street and sidewalk is dirty and block always smells like pee. Also rats 24/7. Close to Hudson river but 7th avenue rush hour traffic and late night revelers are loud. We have a working fireplace but it has major structural issues.
Cons
Rats. Imagine opening a garbage can and seeing a family of rats....and the family of rats consists of 20 little rats. Rats ate tunnels through the backyard ground making the fence lean over and backyard tiles wobbly. You hear rats squeaking and fighting all night. At least once a week you have two or three dead rats in the yard. Rats also ate holes through the garbage cans. Eventually they ate into our bedroom walls. Ceiling paint or plaster was peeling off. Mini fridge not fit for adults. Apartment has mice and water bug infestations but they were good about monthly extermination. Tenants would often leave garbage in the hallway, possibly because the garbage area was full of rats night AND day. The perks of living near a subway line! Overheard landlords son Jake croman scream like a mad man to the super in our hallway. It was nuts. In my first month tenancy, real estate agents entered the apartment 3 times at least while I was home alone using a key. Scary. Shady characters have showed up to my door lurking around my back yard. One day I came home to find the property owner standing in my yard without any notice. Scary. It took another few weeks for someone to fix the broken gate that he was inspecting. Water boiler was louder than the subway and made the apartment vibrate. Apartment was cold in the winter, not enough heat. Fireplace worked but looked structurally unstable. There was steel wool sticking through every nook and crack in the walls AND THERE WERE MANY CRACKS AND HOLES where the baseboards should be sealed. Serious Mold problem in bathroom. And ceiling looked like it was about to cave in. I could see sunlight through the shower tile underneath the window. Strange ghost apartment 2 floors above us. Bed room was literally the size of a full size bed. Apartment is ridiculously small for a one bedroom apartment. It was also illegally destabilized. The next tenant should check rental records. Sometimes the front doors were left open unattended and strange people would wander in and out. One person walked through, opened our backyard fence and burglarized us. One washer dryer for the whole building. Yuck. Oh yeah rats. There was so much rat fecal matter that the fake green turf was partially black. Probably rat pee everywhere too. My neighbor got sick from rat fecal matter and her dog almost perished from rat poison. I got some kind of rash on my feet from tracking rat fecal matter into the apartment. Many more cons but that's all I remember at the moment.
Advice to the owners
Non plastic garbage cans of rat proof bins would be a start
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