23 St Marks Avenue,

Brooklyn, NY 11217

Charming space, convenient location

1st floor unit has extremely inadequate heat due to old windows and sharing a wall with the house entrance. Thermostat for the building is located in this apartment, which tenants are disallowed from touching, so expect to have the building manager enter to “fiddle” with it seasonally (and set the temp exactly at state-mandated minimums). I was told to use blankets when I mentioned being freezing and questioned about my use of a space heater.

Loud on all sides: one neighbor has removed their insulation, so prepare for that noise, as well as the noise from the street (b/c the windows need replacing), the noise from continuous construction in the lot behind the house, and the noise of other building occupants having conversations next to both the front and back doors of the apartment.

While I’m unaware of the condition of other apartments, the unit I inhabited wasn’t painted in over 9 years of tenancy, poorly-executed renovations caused damage to my personal property, renovations done prior to my tenancy had to be repeatedly revisited yet remained problematic, and multiple no-fault damage reports went unaddressed - and the owner/landlord attempted to withhold my security deposit, claiming I was responsible for them. I did get my full security deposit back - by asserting tenants’ rights.

Inconsistent communication and safety concerns: my schedule was rarely given consideration when unit needed to be accessed for repairs; rarely informed when the exterminator would be treating the unit and was excluded from the service altogether for the majority of 2021, although I could clearly hear him working throughout the rest of the building. Main door of the house needs replacement and one of the locks was consistently malfunctioning, which somehow kept being addressed as tenant error rather than the hardware issue it was.