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| - I lived for 6 years in their 5300 Fifth Ave building from 2008-2014.
It started with Rocco showing me the apartment when I was first searching for apartments. Prior to my viewing, I spent 2 full weeks full time extensively researching rentals near CMU and reading reviews of various management companies. I had an excel spreadsheet with maybe 150-200 rental houses and apartments on the market and had narrowed down to view around 8-10 of them.
THE MANAGEMENT
The management team is fantastic. Rocco is a sweet Italian type older man; Nick (Rocco's son, I believe) is also a great manager. In the office, Elizabeth Rockwel seemed to man the phones and emails, and she has always been very helpful and nice. She, for example, sends out lease renewal emails. It's a family run management company, and you deal with various Rockwell family members (in my case, 3).
I had maybe two maintenance requests: The bathroom sink was once slightly clogged from my own hair, and the lighting fixture in the bathroom eventually got burnt during my 6 years. Both were fixed within 24 hours. I didn't have anything else break or not work in the apartment. I was locked out couple of times. At some point, they communicated clearly and very nicely that I would be charged. So I got better about it.
They managed the entire apartment building very well. During my time there, they painted the hallway walls and replaced the carpets with tile floors. The hallways looked great after this. Residents, from what I can tell, were all grad students and seemed to be good residents. I didn't deal with a single cockroach while I was there. There were always 2 washers and dryers in the basement. Sometimes, I would see a sign that one of them is broken, but I don't recall a time not being able to do my laundry.
RENT or OTHER CHARGES
They would increase my rent either once a year or once in 2 years, and it was generally increasing with inflation. So I thought it was fair. I was paying more than what the market price was for a 1-br in Shady side, but I had one of the nicer units in the apartment and facing away from Fifth Ave traffic noise. I was happy with my apartment and the management company that I was ok paying the premium.
I put more nail holes from hanging photos than I would like admit, and the somewhat sharp ends of my chairs---that I had used for a while---put tiny dents on the parquet type wooden floor. I felt badly about it. I was worried they would take from my security deposit, but they did not. They took a cleaning fee though (even though I spent full day scrubbing the place).
APARTMENT ITSELF
What contributed a lot to my positive experience is that the apartment itself was nice. When I moved in, they had just installed new tile floors in the kitchen and the bathroom, new parquet wood floor, brand new sinks, kitchen appliances, and kitchen cabinets.
All in all, a really great experience. They are very fair about everything. All my friends in grad school always had one or another issue with their rental and would be moving every 2 years. I was the only one that had stayed put and was happy with my apartment. So thank you to the Rockwel team.
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