Save your money and try any of the other properties in JC, but avoid Portside Towers and Hudson Pointe, Equity's other buildings in Jersey City. Read the rest of the reviews and see if you see some common threads (and try to guess who from management posted their OMG THIS IS THE BEST BUILDING EVR reviews.)

The Pier is run on a few basic principles. Charge a ton of money, charge 15% to 30% more at each lease renewal (and $500 extra for month to month) and let the building fall apart in the meantime. I just gave notice for my apartment after 3 years of being too lazy to move and because I liked the view. The third time my AC broke and they tried to raise my rent 15% again, I said enough. Expect the following at the Pier which I have had to endure:

1. Broken fire alarms: Alarm sounded for hours about 3 days last year. Once at about 4AM on a work day; the entire building had to evacuate and even the fire department couldn't turn the alarm off. then again the next day; then again a day after that. apparently the fire suppression system was empty of water. whoops.

2. Elevators that break once per month and even when working move before the doors shut. They always have to order "a part" for the elevators, and yet the elevators keep breaking. The parts they need must be made out of butter. if you are lucky you won't get stuck in one of them. Cracked tile on the floors of the elevator and broken buttons and lights.

3. Filthy carpets in the hall, bits of trash, bones and other filth in the garbage rooms. Don't wear open toed shoes if you go to take the trash out. You might come back with leprosy. The carpets are "currently being replaced" on the most expensive floors we are told, no doubt to give hope to those people who are considering leaving on the less expensive floors. We were told 2 years ago the carpet was "in the process of being replaced."

4. Air conditioning and heating failures. AC broken in the gym, and equity refused to repair because they wanted the initial contractor to pay for the repairs. any other company would have repaired it at their own expense and then sued. Not Equity. Reducing cash outflow is their one and only goal, and that means no maintenance. AC and Heat will also inevitably fail in your apartment at some point, and when it is working it is loud as hell.

5. Parking garage noise. broken seams in the concrete cause extremely loud noise of cars speeding through the lot which resonates through the building.

6. Terrible customer service: ------- in the leasing office, who treat residents like crap, ignore their requests, and spend most of their time out at lunch or writing up flyers with excuses for the latest debacle (e.g. attention residents: the reason the fire alarm went off a 4AM and didn't stop for 3 hours was not due to a malfunction but due to the fact that the water tank was empty.) instead of providing an apology or an estimate of when the problem will be fixed.

7. Concierges: Useless "concierges" in the lobby who are basically temps who play solitaire and surf the web all day while anyone walks into the building unmolested. They are supposed to be collecting dry cleaning, maintaining security, and posting notices for packages, but often completely ignore this task. You'll miss your packages, your dry cleaning, and your taxis. Forget about using them for anything useful.

7. Rooftop furniture (to be replaced July 7th, according to today's fairy tale flyer from management-- I'm guessing it might take a little longer to buy it at target). Current furniture is made of wood, gives you splinters, and has no cushions, at least ones you wouldn't want to sit on.

If u haven't shot yourself by now, here are the positives: the view is nice on the northwest side of the building, the PATH is a 2 min walk.

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