White Bear Terrace

1. Maintenance is a joke. Took weeks to get any maintenance response, and when they did show up, the fixes were completely ineffective. They replaced our window screens with ones that didn’t fit, leaving huge gaps we had to duct tape shut just to open the windows.

The laundry situation? Awful. There’s not a laundry room on every floor—just one washer and one dryer per room, and they’re usually broken or constantly in use.

The building’s intercom system never worked. Management admitted it was… too expensive to fix and never replaced it. Instead, residents passed around a universal entry code that was never changed, so anyone could walk in. Not that it mattered—the locks were broken half the time anyway.

2. Flooding.
Our unit flooded. Water came up through the floor. We lost half our furniture. Management refused to help, saying that’s what renters insurance is for. Insurance didn’t cover it because there was no structural damage from a storm. We came home after a weekend away to standing water. Their “solution”? Pull up the carpet padding and barely shampoo the carpet. It was crunchy forever. We had industrial dryers running 24/7 for a week—guess who paid that electric bill? Us.

Mold? Absolutely. A leak from the unit above came through our bathroom ceiling fan. They “fixed” the leak but ignored the water damage. A month later, the paint was bubbling. More mold.

3. Security? Because the entry system didn’t work, random people wandered in all the time. We had squatters, solicitors, and strangers knocking on doors.

4. Bugs. Thanks to poor maintenance and lack of inspections, we had cockroaches and ants. They eventually got rid of the roaches, but the ants never left. They came out of the walls, onto the counters, and into every room. Pest control came every two weeks—still didn’t help.

5. If you love the smell of stale cigarettes and pot, you’ll feel right at home. The building reeked.

6. Cops were at the building regularly for domestic disputes. It never felt safe.

7. You can hear everything your neighbors do. I know it’s an apartment, but this was the worst noise insulation I’ve ever experienced. Read More