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October 2023 by Edwin Jacobson
Their billing department is completely incompetent and doesn’t understand how to read their own ledger. Apartment was incredibly dirty upon move in and utility costs were very high. Raised the rent by 17% after our first year so we did not stay.
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August 2023 by Noah
I've had an awful experience so far with Local by Laramar. My garden unit began leaking through the floors severe water damage to the carpet in my bedroom. I have placed multiple maintenance requests and visited the office multiple times telling them of the issue. Maintenance came once and claimed to stop the leak but did not actually stop the leaking. They left my carpet soaking wet. It's been a week since I notified them of the issue and my bedroom has visible mold and a bad mildew smell and the effected areas continues to expand. I have not received any communication or updates and the office keeps saying "we'll check on it" without any action. This is just one of several issues I've had in less than 2 months living here.
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August 2023 by Courtney R.
If I could give them a zero, I would. I am not going into the fact they never pick up the phone when you call or give you a call back. Even when you call over 36 times and leave voicemails. I am not going into that fact that they charge you for water, sewage, and garbage. I am not going to get into the fact they keep allowing packages to be stolen, windows broken, and they don't care to even pretend to care. I won't get into any of that. But I had to break my lease. They needed 2 months of rent to do so. So, I paid them over +$4K to get out of the hell of living there. I got an email a month later saying I owed $133 for a move out fee. I told them normally I would pay it but since they had over $4K of money, to take it from there. Because they had already rented it and someone was moving in 7 days from when I left, easiest $4k they ever made. And I never heard from them until the other day I got a call from a Debt Collector saying I owed this $133. Well I saved all the emails so they are going to work with me on this, but these idiots at Local by Laramar shocker still have not returned my phone calls. You made an easy $4K and you had to come for $133 more??? Joao DaSilva, Romy Wider, and the rest of the crew, stop being the worst. Start actually doing a job and pick up the phone. I called over 36 times to get information on how to buy myself from the lease, left 32 voicemails and no one ever called me back. Yet you seem to have enough energy to send me to a debt collector over $133 when I paid you $4K? If you weren't going to do that why did you not respond to email saying that? Why did you literally just try and ding my credit over $133 when I paid over $4k and was never a day late on rent when I lived for over three years? Oh, and by the way, this place has MAJOR mold. It was coming through my bedroom walls. So if you are moving into 5427 N Broadway, you will get sick. Our neighbors had the same thing. What they do is just paint over it. I wasn't going to say anything, but you want to hurt my credit, I will write about the BLACK MOLD all throughout the wall by the El tracks. Try and scratch some of the paint off and see for yourself if you don't believe me. So don't move here because if the mold doesn't get you, these lazy, morons in the office will- your wallet anyway ;)
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June 2023 by Jessica W.
I've been a loyal tenant for over four years, and things have gone downhill very quickly. Someone in our building is being evicted (I'm assuming due to non-payment), and the renters in this building have made multiple calls to the police because of this tenant (noise violations at all hours of the night and drug deals happening around the building) and can no longer have packages delivered here since the tenant being evicted steals mail/packages. The management company has been incredibly hands-off. Refused to install cameras for our safety. They transferred our building to another management group with about two weeks notice, so suffice to say, they never cared about the tenants in this overpriced hellhole to begin with. If they still have a presence in Chicago, absolutely steer clear or be prepared for non responsiveness and living amongst criminals.
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June 2023 by Kelly Glass
I moved from out of town to Carriage House Lofts. I've been here 10 days and still have no working central air. I JUST got a working refrigerator after the freezer spoiled and wasted $70 worth of meat and food. And I have had parking for two days, since they assigned me a parking spot that belongs to someone else, which I've been paying for. I'm out of money behind paying for street parking, staying in a Marriott the two nights it was unbearably hot, and losing $70 of food. The worst part is management has ignored my emails and follow up emails. It makes me quite sad to be dealing with this and not be able to speak with anyone. They also don't answer their phones. As a new tenant, I can't believe this is happening to me.
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May 2023 by Dan Thelen
While there are some aspects of Laramar that I appreciate, like their pretty quick response to maintenance issues, the major issue I have with them is how they approach lease renewals. They just provided a couple renewal options to me and it was a 25% increase from what I pay right now. Are they trying to get rid of me? Do they not acknowledge having a good, clean, on-time-paying renter as a good thing? My jaw literally dropped when I saw the $360 increase proposal. This puts the unit's price WAY out of line with the market.
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May 2023 by Jeremy Kellum
I worked for this company for a brief second...you know how they always say, "if they hire you on the spot, it's a red flag"?Working for this company really made me value customer service. Being the office manager, there was countless times I would receive calls from annoyed residents and prospects. Bottom line there were too many hands in the pot that did not communicate - why have a 3rd party broker company rent our apartments when the entire office has state issued leasing licenses?Obviously, the buildings were a tad bit old, so there was constant maintenance work needed. The company would take cheap routes and get their personal friends to work on buildings. Also, when things went left, instead of mgmt. communicating with residents, they would avoid them at all costs. They would then reach out to the residents giving some sad fabricated apology.Also, there was just a lack of common sense. If one signs their lease April 1st to move in on June 1st....why are you sending the resident their move-in letter with all info, pricing, location, utility setup (ComEd, People's Gas instruction) 2-3 days before move in? How do you expect people to have movers? Why are you fumbling to send this letter to residents which ultimately turns into you forgetting to send it, so now you're scrambling to get a response from a resident to pay their prorate because you failed to send a welcome letter weeks in advance.The apartments look nice and the locations are fair. However, this mgmt. company is horrible! I guess this is why they are throwing in the towel and bringing in a 3rd party company to take over the mgmt.
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May 2023 by Megan Hartley
The staff I've interacted with have always been great- from the leasing office to maintenance. Bob who runs maintenance for the building is great- he is responsive and really nice. The apartment at 1818 N Halsted has been good as well- the countertops in the kitchen are my favorite amenity for sure.Update in 2023: Jeremy from the front office is fantastic!
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April 2023 by Jessie B
Rolex from the maintenance team at Local by Laramar is absolutely fantastic. Reliable, friendly, quick, efficient!
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April 2023 by Melissa Fernandez
The five stars are for Francisco, from maintenance. He is a great maintenance man. He’s very respectful and quick. The efficiency of the maintenance team has been the highlight of my time with local.
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April 2023 by Ted Neubauer
The maintenance was really fast and extremely helpful. Francisco came by the next day and fixed the sink. He made sure everything was clean and in order it was awesome. Thanks Francisco!
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April 2023 by Sarah Mungai
While the building might not be the newest, it gets the job done. Management is easy to get in touch with, and is responsive on top of that. Maintenance is also quick to fix any issues I might have - usually within a couple days - and there is also an after-hours number to call. I don’t mind living in an older building, I just really appreciate that maintenance and management are quick and responsive. :) I also live near a grocery store, cvs, and multiple forms of transit, all which mean more to me than living in a “fancy” building!
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April 2023 by Justin n
Local by Laramar is by far the best management company I have been associated with! Their office is very responsive and workorders are handily quickly and efficiently.I can rest assured when I see Francisco at my door he’s going to get the job done! Give that man a raise!!!
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April 2023 by Ariel Kattan
The maintenance tech, Francisco has been amazing. He has fixed any and all issues in my apartment so quickly. He is always courteous and helpful!
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April 2023 by Savannah C.
We were good tenants that paid rent on time every month for six years. Laramar thanked us by charging us frivolous charges after we moved out and sending those charges to collections without notifying us, damaging our credit scores. We literally paid them close to $150,000 over six years but I guess that wasn't enough. This is a very predatory property management company -- renters beware and look elsewhere if you can!
