10 buildings in this apartment complex, and this one is the worse. I made the mistake of moving here and was so glad when my year lease was finally over. My experience:

--Building was ALWAYS DIRTY. There were 3 extremely lazy janitorial staff, who never did anything. Dirty carpet in the hallway, dirty laundry room, dirty trash room, dirty elevators, trash on the floor in the lobby all the time. Trashy building and lots of trashy people that live there too.

--TERRIBLE management. The people in the management office are rude and very unprofessional. And to get something fixed in your apartment, you are at the mercy of the shiftless building maintenance staff who will do anything to avoid working. The head superintendent guy Roy lives in the building and it still looks like s.h.i.t.

--UNSAFE. There are some really sketchy people that live in these apartments. It's about 90% A.F.R.I.C.A.N. - A.M.E.R.I.C.A.N. The rest are mostly Indian students from IIT. Most of the people are either elderly and retired, working professionals, or students. But there's a significant number of people who don't fit into any of those categories who you do not want to have as neighbors.

--Leasing office tells you all kind of LIES to get you to move in. They told me there were going to be lots of improvements in the area soon but neglected to tell me the entire apartment complex is going to be torn down to build a new neighborhood. They also lied about the safety--it's NOT safe, the air conditioning--there is none, you have to buy a window unit if you want AC, and the security deposit--I never got mine back despite leaving the apartment spotless when I left.

--Pest control. The basement has traps to catch mice, and there are all kinds of critters that get into your apartment, particularly spiders and roaches.

Bottom line: The grass outside is pretty, but it's a whole different story once you move in. Don't.

User Responses
From: Anonymous	Date: 08/08/2008
I live in the 533 E. 33rd building and I have not had any of the problems above. The building seems to always be clean, the trash from the trash room is taken out every day monday through sat. New carpet was just put in all of the hallways the end of last year. The first floors carpet has since gotten a little dirty because it is a high traffic area, but there is a long rug to catch that dirt. I have only had one problem with my apt. and when I called it was fixed that very day. I live on one of the top three floors of the building so most my neighbors are professionals. I am a professional as well and when I get home my neighbors are quiet. I have never had a roach in my apt., but when I first moved in last year I did have a few spiders. Down falls- You get free heat, but you don't control it so it gets very hot on the upper floors. In turn, I open the windows to get air in (since there is no AC) and you hear the buses run non-stop all night long. Over all the people are very polite in the building, at the leasing and management offices. I would recommend Lake Meadows to anyone.
From: anish60616	Date: 08/08/2008
Clean, are you kidding? You must be blind. It doesn't take much effort to spot clean the carpet, and that huge black dirty spot has been on the first floor carpet for months. Do you even notice how the janitors are always standing and LOITERING outside on the ramp that leads to the basement? How much effort would it take to come inside and do a little work? If you called and had something fixed, you really got lucky. Maybe it was someone from another building that got the call. The guys in charge of fixing stuff in this building do very shoddy work and they usually work so slowly that they space the repair job over more than one day. Your apartment can either be quiet or noisy depending on who lives next door. When I first moved in it was pretty quiet, but then someone else moved in next door and I can hear her stereo, telephone conversations, and ummmmm...night time activities. The walls are paper thin. The heat comes from old radiators that make loud clanging noises and I too have to open the windows when it's 20 degrees outside in the winter because it gets too hot. But I've been to a couple of my neighbors places during the winter and their places were really cold with the heat on. So it's a crapshoot. You can open your windows in the summer, but when it's 80 degrees or hotter and there's a lot of humidity, it is really torture. The only way I'd ever recommend lake meadows to anyone was if I was hard up for cash and wanted the $200 referral commission they give you if you get a friend to move in. No I take that back, whenever I even have friends over now, they think I live in the projects!
From: Anonymous	Date: 08/13/2008
The only reason they put the new carpet down was so you wouldn't be able to see the dirt and they could save money by not having to clean it often. This didn't work out too well since you can still tell when it gets dirty. The other hall carpeting was only a few years old, and was higher quality and more stylish (similar to what's in the other D & K properties). But it was a much lighter color and they let it get so dirty that it looked aweful. The new carpet is dark brown, now with random large black spots due to it not being cleaned.
From: madeinchina	Date: 08/24/2008
I live in this building, and for the last 3 days, the lobby has smelled like dead rats. My guess is that some of the mice in the building ate some of the poison and died in a hard to reach place. The janitors' solution was to keep the front door open and spray some air freshner. So now there's a stench that completely turns your stomach. Roy, the lazy f-ck of a building engineer lives in the building and acts completely oblivious to the problem (the same way he responds to all the other problems). Do not, I repeat, do not move here.
From: Anonymous	Date: 08/31/2008
building engineer, Roy, is awful--completely incompetent and extremely lazy. it's very evident to anyone who lives in this building.

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