I've been living in a 1-bedroom apartment at Key Towers for about a year & 1/2 now, and this was just going to be a overview of my experiences, but has since turned into an essay due to the idiocy of the office staff. Updated on 11/25/2005, 1/19/2005, June July August 2006. Was planning to move out on March 1st, but forced to sign a 6-month lease because of being unable to find anything else affordable in the area while saving to rent a townhouse. Finally moved out Sept. 1st

Location: Not horrible. Very close to I-395 and Duke Street, which makes it very easy to get to stores, but also gives an extreme amount of traffic noise. As someone else here has mentioned, the windows do an impressive job of controlling that, but open them, and there's enough to cause problems hearing someone talk in the same room.

Rent: For the size and the area, it's not bad. $850/month ($1059/month for 6-month lease as of 1/19/06) plus electricty, trash & water. If you want a cat, $200 non-refundable fee, and $20/month extra rent. After spending several weeks looking, I can almost guarantee you won't find anything else in this same price range that isn't income restricted, in a bad neighborhood, or a complete hellhole like the EOS-21 apt. complex on Van Dorn.

The $200 electricity bill quoted in another review here is very confusing - our bill has not been more than $115 so far, and that's with having 2 computers on 24/7 and at least one of the AC wall units running 8 hours a day, along with the normal lights, fridge, dishwasher, TV, etc.

Other Residents: Not really a problem, if you're just standing out in the hallway or taking a quick trip down to the office.

However, many of the families that live here seem to have a habit of letting their children have free reign to run around the parking lot and public areas of the building - for example, almost being trampled by an unattended group of small children sprinting into the elevator, seeing kids throwing rocks and pine cones around in the parking lot, seeing the same kids racing stolen shopping carts around the lot, and so on.

Noise: Apart from the traffic noise from 395, not too bad. The only time i've ever heard anything from a neighbor is when they were nailing something into their wall, or a somewhat random hammering sound from somewhere above. Floors and ceilings seem to be concrete, but the walls are thinner.

Maintenance: Decent (mostly) for stuff inside the apartment, not so good for the building in general. Water has leaked through our ceiling in both the kitchen and bathroom due issues in the apartment(s) directly above us. There have been "emergencies" involving shutoff of all or part of the water supply at least 3 times through April-June 2006, and for a while during last fall and spring, one of the elevators was breaking down at least once or twice a month. Their idea of fixing the aforementioned driping ceiling was to nail up a piece of carboard over it, and then wait 4 days to send a painter - this was especially fun a few weeks later when the real problem (a failing pipe) broke and started pouring water out of the bathroom ceiling and light fixture, as well as flooding the bathroom above us. Had my wife and I already left for work and not been around to try and control it, probably most of the apartment would have been seriously damaged by water, not to mention putting our cat in danger and most likely destroying our computers and starting an electrical fire.

Security: Not so good - the entrance doors to the building are kept locked, but stand around long enough for another resident to pass by, and you can get yourself let in, no questions asked, or people often prop the doors open with stones. Also, the doors themselves have had the glass broken deliberately by someone with a rock or brick more than once.

The actual apartment doors do have deadbolts and chains, however.

Parking: No real problems, although getting a space near the building is impossible if you're not home before 3 PM or so. Used to be a free-for-all, but the management recently decided that all cars must be registered and display a parking pass by August 1st 05' to use the lot.

Grounds/Cleanliness: Standard stuff for living in a city this size, nothing very special. Landscaping is very spartan, and a few cleaning staff move through the building every day. Not uncommon to find random smells in the elevators and hallways, though, often as if someone has been smoking, or mysterious dark patches on the hallway carpet. I've seen no mold and only one bug since i've been here.

Safety: Have seen suspicious-looking people in the lot a few times, but have not heard of anything happening. A city police officer seems to be living in the complex and leaving their car parked out front, but other residents still let young children run around unattended everywhere.

Supposedly the complex was going to hire a security officer, but there has been absolutely no visible evidence of this beyond the police crusier parked out front.

The child situation in particular has not really gotten better, with it being a common sight to see 6-7 young children riding to various floors alone, or seeing a child in the hallway with a blank stare deer-in-the-headlights look that sprints onto the next arriving elevator.

1/8/2006: Friday night, I was treated around 12 AM to someone twice running up and down the hallways on our floor (and at least the floors above and below) literally slamming on doors hard enough to make things shake inside the apartment. Wasn't able to get to the door fast enough to see who it was, but I can only assume it was someone's child/teenanger from elsewhere in the building. No sign of the supposed courtesy officer anywhere, nor is there any easy way to contact him - was ready to call the city police dept. if it happened again.

Not sure if the other reviewer talking about car break-ins is just very unlucky or not - neither mine nor my wife's car has been touched in any way. At this point it wouldn't suprise me a bit, though.

Office Staff: Very so-so, and that's if you can catch them. They have a nasty habit of leaving for 1-2 hours shortly after the office opens for the day, or getting to the office 1-2 hours late in the morning. Also, they will leave the office unstaffed almost at random for 15 minutes at times, or leave to show apartments with no regard whatsoever for the time of day or the actual residents of the building. At least one of the girls that takes shifts in the office seems to think that, since she lives in the building, she can leave whenever, and for whatever she wants.

I have come down on a Saturday morning to get a package, only to have one of them walk out of and lock the office without letting me get my package, and be informed that I will have to wait 15 minutes while she goes to get a snack from upstairs.

A laundry list of my experiences follows:

Spent a good chunk of time working after being told by the staff that all cabinets and counters had to be cleared off for exterminators to come through...Only to come home that night and find that the company explicitly said none of that was required.

Somehow lost the renewal lease my wife and I signed, had to ask me to provide the copy I kept.

Got scared by a couple inches of of snow the day we were supposed to move in, leaving for home an hour early without warning, breaking a promise to be there and forcing us to waste money eating out and staying in a hotel for the night.

Further, just today have to wait another 3 days for an overnighted UPS package that the staff was not in the office to receive, 1 hour after they should have been there. The staff member claimed she had been there all morning and not seen the deliveryperson, and yet they had to leave a notice on the front door at 10 AM (the office opens at 9) because nobody was there to let them in.

4/21/2006 - Yet more money wasted on shipping, thanks to nobody being in the office at 2 PM to recieve a UPS package.

6/06/2006 - Even more waste, as the girls in the office decided to go home 15 minutes early, literally 3 minutes after package was delivered. UPS driver had not left the lot or even gotten back in her truck yet before they disappeared. No sign on the door, no apology, nothing. Waited 20 minutes hoping they'd come back with no luck, as several other people came by trying to get packages.

The next day, I got home at the same time before the official closing time of 6 PM - nobody there, office locked. Two young men who wanted to look at an apartment were also there, and ended up leaving in semi-disgust, partially due to me explaining the uselessness of the office staff. At this point, I called AIMCO's customer service, and got an assurance that this would not happen again, but i'm through....From now until we move in 3 months i'll just get any packages delievered to my wife's workplace, where at least I know someone will be available to get it to me.

7/3/2006 - one of the girls in the office has been replaced, by someone that is much friendlier, but who doesn't seem to have authority to actually do anything useful. My wife and I were initially hoping to transfer to a 2-bedroom apt. when our lease was up, but no luck.

No guaranteed openings for when we needed it, no offers to transfer our lease to the one that was open at the time, no offers of a break on the rent until one came open, no sincere attempts to get us to stay at all. Two phone messages left by my wife about the situation were completely ignored. The end result was only an attempt to get us to stay in our current 1-bedroom apt. month-to-month at a rate of $1300/month (i.e the price for the 2-bedroom) with no guarantee of when one would come open.

AIMCO's Resident Relations answered my email after 3 days with pretty much "hurry up and wait", but it was moot at that point, as we found a very nice place in a quiet, wooded, non-highrise community.

Thanks so much for lying to my face, being lazy, and wasting my money, guys! Enjoy the rent you won't be getting!

Overall: Used to think this was not a bad place to live, but the continuing lazy attitudes and poor service of the office staff combined with the apathy of the managing company have changed my mind. Would have moved out last March if I had found somewhere decent, and will definately be moving out in Sept. Thankfully they only decided to keep about $40 of our security deposit.

User Responses
From: apprehensiverenter	Date: 02/23/2007
Thank you for your comprehensive review of Key Towers. It's quite useful.

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