Chelsea Estates

Diamond in the rough… ok, so its a bit dated and there’s a few dents and dings. The first impression of Chelsea Estates is a little on the daunting side, especially having come from a lovely 5 bedroom house. However, there is another side to this quirky apartment building — some great people trying to make it home for me and my new two hundred neighbours. Things they are a change’n at the Chelsea and I for one am going to give our new managers and service people a chance to revive this well built and amazingly quiet building. Most of my encounters with tenants have been pleasant and given the sheer number of people coming and going things are pretty well maintained with promises of more goodness to come. Good people make good neighbourhoods — perhaps the renaissance of this building will come with a change of attitude from it’s tenants? Looking forward to be proven right!

Avoid this place like the plague. Lived here for while until this new assistant the to manager started working there.
She has problem doing simple math. The books are not well kept. They would call me every other month to ask me if they received my check and I would go online and show them they did cashed the check.
They can’t keep track of who has which parking stall. One day someone else was park in my stall. Found out the next morning that they gave away my parking stall to someone else.
Don“t get me started on the water leaks. Couple of time a month they would shut off the water to fix a water. And don’t let the lobby FOOL you, this place is a DUMP, the people that work their can’t run place. Except for Hugh Gordon that man is knows what he’s doing but he has literally no support at all.
Another time I had to call the maintenance guy 3 times to fix a backed up sink. All 3 attempt to fix the sink were failed. Until I went to work and it happened again. I come home to a flooded apartment so they had to call another contractor who finally resolved the problem. Cause of the problem «Neighbour installed a washer machine».
There are too many issues in this building starting with management.

I would like to begin this rambling review by saying, the staff of this building, while some a little surly, do seem like good people. But this building is horrible. I think what has happened, is that the building managers have bitten off more than they can chew. Chelsea Estates was built 30 years ago, and my good science, you can tell.
If you are looking for a new apartment, you may notice that the lobby looks pretty new. This was renovated (which took painfully long) this year, and that is why. Also renovated are the hallways, to trick you into thinking this building is more modern than it is. When I lived here, they ripped off all of our hallway’s wallpaper and started tearing off the 30 year old carpet in January. These renovations were brought almost to completion in June– they got lazy with painting after awhile on my floor. During this time, it was an absolute dump– to the point where I was embarrassed to bring my friends and family over. The paint jobs were sloppy, the flooring was not well done, and whoever takes this building on in the future will have to do it over. Also, as far as the hallways go– they are NOT cleaned on a regular basis. I noticed a creepy stain on our metal elevator door once (in October) that I brought up to the building manager. A quick swipe of windex would have done the trick. In May, it was still there… until it was painted over. The floors are really gross and rarely cleaned.
What really disgusts me about this building, is the apartment suites. My roommate lived in this building for two years and I joined her a year ago. Never once, were any immaculate repairs or basic maintenance requests addressed fully, despite the fact that management did raise the cost of rent, parking, laundry, etc substantially. We did not pay this amount as we had been renting for awhile, but now a two bedroom apartment here costs $ 1260 a month to rent. This is appalling. Flaws to our apartment I noticed during my year of living here included a broken screen door to the balcony, poor sliding finishings on the closet, and a broken dishwasher-​all of which were there and promised to be fixed before either of us moved into the suite. The appliances in our suite were an Admiral dishwasher, fridge, oven/​stove from the 80s. I started complaining that our dishwasher didn’t work over a year ago, and it has never been fixed to this day. The appliances all functioned so poorly they needed to be replaced-​especially for the cost of rent they ask. The carpets also looked like they hadn’t been replaced in years, and the countertops were that gross yellowing late 70s-​early 80s colour I’ved grown to despise. Perfectly matched to our yellowish beige appliances though. I am a firm believer that as it is 2012, every beige piece of technology needs to die. Seriously.
In January due to the cold, the pipes cracked in our building and my room was completely flooded. I appreciated the building management’s cooperation, but I really felt this wasn’t dealt with well. I was away at the time, and fans were simply left on my floor to dry it out. A carpet cleaner was eventually sent. However, from the smell that is still there, I can tell that this did substantial damage, and likely caused mold underneath my carpet, and probably in our downstairs neighbours ceiling. In other buildings of friends I’ve known where this has happened, carpet has been completely ripped out and replaced. Ventilation in bathroom also didn’t work, which will also cause mold on ceilings. This was addressed several times as well. I have also seen exterminators and pest control enter the building several times while living there, which gave me the creeps.
Additionally, in their rentfaster ads, hot tub and sauna are advertised. However, these dated contraptions have been shut down since probably the beginning of the year. So, I was paying rent for use of a hot tub, dishwasher, etc that I never got to use. A courtyard also exists there, but it is mostly used for homeless people to sleep (I have found mustard seed ID cards and bags of clothes walking through the courtyard on several occasions). There was also a shooting in this building in early fall last year, and security was not elevated at all to make tenants feel safer. Very low security– I never felt quite safe here.
We have moved out of our place this weekend, and as soon as we return the keys, new tenants will be moving in– not giving nearly enough time for building management to actually fix all the problems that had existed with our suite. I feel very sorry for them, which is why I write this review, in hopes no one else feels compelled to rent here when there are so many better options in the beltline. I visited a friend of a friend not long ago in an adjacent building on 15^th Ave, and I couldn’t believe how much cleaner and well maintained their building was.
Chelsea Estates cares more about first impressions and deception, than making their actual tenants happy.