«leftbraned

Prospective tenants would be well advised to read what other current and former tenants of The Colony House apartment building (New Brunswick, NJ) have to say about it.

Excerpted from apartmentratings.com, April 2004:

Despite the recent change of ownership and management, this building is still terrible. Don’t be fooled by the renovated lobby and smiles before you sign the lease.

They bill themselves as a “luxury” building, but don’t seem to realize what that really means. Forget about getting decent service here (except from three or four of the doormen), and get ready to fight fight fight with management over everything—ignored phone calls, idiotic statements by office employees, etc. (Mary in the front office once gave me a host of ridiculously stupid reasons for requiring guests to obtain parking passes with no longer than a single day’s duration.)

To serve as just one of many examples: they towed my [legally-parked] car last year. I notified management. Instead of apologizing, they acted like it was my fault (despite my proving that it was their mistake), and I was out $275 in towing fees. (Not to mention the damage to my power window mechanism, where they had to break into my car to disengage the parking brake.)

The management spuriously makes arbitrary decisions—like banning doormats—and then posts nasty memos (dozens of them) announcing their edicts. Unfortunately, some of the office staff is too dimwitted and/or pushy to even be able to argue intelligently with them.

The elevators fail regularly. I have been stuck in them twice (actually, it was no big deal; only lasted a couple of minutes), but the real problem is when I have to walk up to my apartment (18 flights) because the elevators aren’t working.

Until 2002, parking was literally a nightmare, though a recent parking lot makeover has largely alleviated that particular problem.

But a related problem is that they only give guests parking passes that are good for one day. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had overnight guests who have been annoyed at the prospect of getting up early and going downstairs (and outside) to get a new parking pass every day. And for what? No added benefit to the building; they just like being bureaucratic control freaks. But you have to listen–or they’ll have your (or your guest’s) car towed.

They spent thousands of dollars in mostly cosmetic improvements to the building over the past two years, and then tried raising tenants’ already-higher-than-market rates. The tenants had to hire a lawyer to fight them on this [illegal] attempt to raise rents.

The heating system is falling apart, despite new plumbing. We just met a woman in the elevator yesterday who said she hadn’t had heat for the past week (though, luckily, we do have heat).

Countless times, we’ve come home from work to find no running water; we’re lucky if the water returns that night. When it does return, we have to let it run for an hour until no more black crud comes out in the water. And we once went more than 24 hours without it.

Even when we do have water, there are periods (months) when the water pressure is horrible. Sometimes management denies that there’s a problem; other times, they acknowledge it and say that they’re “waiting for a part.” If I had a dime for all the parts they’ve waited for….

One time in particular, only the hot water pressure was terrible. We managed to get the handyman to come take a look, and his suggestion was to replace the shower head. I asked him how a shower head could affect only the hot water, and his answer made no sense (how could it?). Needless to say, that did not fix the problem. We were too tired from repeatedly calling the management to continue trying to get them to fix it; we just suffered though cold showers. Eventually (after 3 months), the problem went away. Maybe that part they were waiting for finally came in. :-/

They installed a brand new oven when I moved in to my apartment. It broke last year; still works, but not well. (Still not fixed, by the way.) What do you expect from the cheapest appliances one can find on the market?

I’ll close with a few of the good things about the Colony House. A few (but not all) of the doormen are very nice, and helpful. The view from my apartment is nice. The setting in general is very pleasant (what with the park). The apartment itself has a nice layout and is very spacious, including lots of closet space.

But that’s definitely not worth all the headaches we’ve had. And it’s CERTAINLY not worth paying “luxury” prices for. I would not even pay half of my current rent to live here.