I personally had an awful experience with this building. Let me start by saying that I have an…read moreextreme fear of bugs. The day I moved on July 12th, I believe, I saw 2 spiders in my apartment so I immediately placed a request for pest control at the front desk. The pest control did not come for over a month and a half on September 8th or 9th. Between then, I saw no less than 15-20 spiders mainly gathered on the corners of my ceiling. One night I woke up to a spider dangling over my head and another spider crawling on my ceiling so I called the front desk asking when pest control might come, and they said they were delayed because of COVID, which I understand.
The pest control came and cleared out the spiders for approximately two days and after they sprayed the ceilings and walls, there were two more spiders. A few days later, I saw about 5-6 more on the ceiling, and one day I saw a giant bug crawling in the same spot where they sprayed so I put in another pest request for September 28th, but they didn't come. I didn't make a big deal about it, because my cat killed the giant bug and I didn't see too many more and I have frankly learned to live with it. However, in mid-October, I saw a giant bug hanging from my ceiling and started considering breaking my lease. Around the same time, I had about 1-2 fruit flies also flying around my kitchen. I had a few oranges out, so I thought maybe that was the cause, even though I just bought them. I threw out the oranges and a few days later, I opened my freezer to I swear to God, like 20-30 flies. I opened my fridge and it was the same situation. I threw out all my food that was in my freezer and fridge and I have not used my fridge in about two weeks now. I contacted management about the situation, and to be fair, they did get someone to spray my place shortly after. Pics below are AFTER I cleaned it out, so it was way worse before.
They said that after someone comes to get the drains treated, and I still have the issue, they will consider other options like transferring to another apartment, which is fair. They said they were unable to terminate my lease, however. Honestly, I just want out of the building because I don't know what the root cause of the bugs is and I don't want to go through the hassle of moving for this to happen in another unit. The pest control service did not come on the day they were supposed to treat the drains and the issue with the fridge and fruit flies has not gotten any better. It is now two weeks without using the fridge and kitchen because flies would constantly fly into my food when I was cooking. I don't want to make unwarranted accusations, but sometimes I feel like they are drawing this process out.
I also feel insane paying rent when I can't use a big part of this apartment. I am going to be paying to cancel my lease because I want to get out of here sooner than later, but it has been such a nightmare. Maybe I'm a freak about bugs, but I feel like 30-40 spiders + the fruit fly infestation is a kind of a problem with any building. The problem has persisted despite getting the place sprayed twice now, and I just want to get out of this bug pit. I have included pictures below for reference.
I really hoped they would terminate the lease, but I was fine paying the cancellation fee to get out of here. I was hoping they would let me move out earlier without the 60-day notice, but I am paying $2500 for the cancellation fee, and then paying the full November and December rent because of the 60-day notice, despite not having access to the fridge and kitchen. I feel like there was definitely a lack of flexibility here, especially because I read other reviews where people were able to terminate their lease without consequence because of a pest problem.
I looked up some other places in the area with similar pricing and had good reviews for both the building AND the building management service:
450 West Melrose Apartments, 441 West Barry, 350 W Oakdale (A person saw roaches, but the management let them terminate their lease), 441 West Oakdale, Common Briar