Management is unresponsive
Pros
Monday - Friday building is cleaned well (garbage removed, floors mopped and vacuumed, etc.) However they are too cheap to hire a cleaning service for the weekend. Bathrooms are large. Rooftop has a nice view?
Cons
Management, management, management. Paying almost $3000 a month to be completely ignored about serious issues including packages being stolen, individuals who are not tenants 'hanging out' and smoking in the stairwells, homeless people living on the roof, appliances leaking, bugs infesting the in-building washer and dryer machines.
Not another year
Pros
I've never had rats in my apartment, just seen them in the basement.
Cons
I've lived in this building for a number of years and it consistently gets worse every year. The common area roof is a major issue, with illegal parties and tons of random people coming in from god knows where trashing the place. We've had ongoing issues with drug use in some common areas (not just weed but even harder stuff) and management ignores any reports about it. Stairwells have been tagged with graffiti for two years and they haven't even bothered to clean up. I have called 311, the FDNY, and HPD multiple times to file reports but it does nothing to resolve issues and HPD won't intervene unless it's a direct apartment issue. I called FDNY and filed a complaint with the fire commissioner because people were burning, as in setting on fire, the smoke alarms in the stairwell and FDNY and the police are regularly at the building at least once a month due to an issue with the building or tenants. I have issues with getting the heat on every year and I have other issues with my apartment that I've decided to forego because I don't want to deal with the frustration of never getting responses. You will never get a direct contact for the building for any issues and if you have been selected for this building by the lottery system the people who showed you the apartment are not going to intervene or help. Neighbors are really hit or miss. No one really talks to each other or is super friendly. Packages are constantly stolen and I highly believe it's other tenants who steal things. There's been issues with people coming in off the street and even homeless people living in the building periodically. As others have said there are issues with the storage units, which you pay additional for, including dead rats in the space. I purchased my own W/D for my unit because the machines are never serviced and your clothes smell like mold. This building is regularly trashed by tenants and other people and it's not because tenants are doing nothing to report the issues. This experience has entirely put me off the NY housing lottery experience and has made me never want to live in mixed-income housing again. There's a reason there's constant turnover and most people stay 1 year or less. OH also do not buy the whole offer of a free month or whatever. Make sure your lease is dated appropriately or they will screw you out of any free time you're supposed to be given, and the lease signing was about 100 pages so you don't even know what you're signing.
Advice to the owners
Listen to your tenants – more importantly tenants need to communicate to pressure management to make things better