Expo at Forest Park — Attraction in St. Louis

Update posted 6/26: 3 out of 5 stars

Management clearly took note of my and other residents' feedback. Shortly after my initial review we received another update giving a timeline for AC repairs (starting the week of 6/23, or about 6 weeks post-tornado), noting that the repairs required a crane and building permit. Another update came before the crane arrived, and sure enough, there is now a crane outside with construction staff working on the building. I'm grateful for the updates and I'm grateful for the workers making repairs, especially during this heat wave. My apartment has been reaching up to 92 F in the bedroom so I have been sleeping in my living room where my portable AC can bring it down to 80 F. Some other residents have been staying in hotels.

Importantly, management has provided rent abatements for affected units covering last month and through until our units have AC repaired. I didn't expect this, and it will definitely help with the associated costs of cooling. I never expected I'd appreciate air conditioning so much.

Original review posted 6/10: 2 out of 5 stars

Was management... Blown away by the tornado?

I moved in in the summer of 2023. This is relevant later. I’ve had intermittent issues like drains clogging that were fixed quickly. Standard apartment building issues also got fixed quickly. After all, I had picked the Expo specifically because management was reputable, responsive, and communicative.

Then the May 16th tornado happened. We were hit directly and our building was damaged. My AC was destroyed and within days the damaged rooftop units were removed. I was grateful that only my AC was damaged. Management was again communicating and on top of it. Electricians were coming out to take down our damaged AC units; units were ordered.

Then... Radio silence. We got another email a week later saying that there was no ETA on the AC units. Either they or their contractors (unclear which) had ordered replacement units. It’s now 3 weeks post-tornado with no updates on the AC in 80-90 degree weather, with it being a sweltering 5 degrees hotter in the apartment. Management got us fans 2 weeks post-tornado, by which time I and others had already resorted to buying portable AC units because we had no idea when our AC was going to be repaired.

In those 3 weeks, everything has gone downhill. The trash chutes have been clogged for 3-4 days. The garage door to the gated parking lot we pay $100/mo for has been broken for almost a week. The AC is still out without an ETA. Worst of all, management sent out an email at 10:20 PM last night notifying us that they had upgraded our key cards, rendering them useless, so we (working people) would have to go to their office between 9:30 AM and 5:00 PM (working hours) to get them fixed so we could access our apartments for which we pay rent. Either that, or trust the phone app that broke during the update to fix itself (for which it is now past 5 PM and I do not have any updates). Luckily my parents were in town and waited an hour in line…. Just to learn that anyone who moved in before June 2023 didn’t need to go to management. Our access was fine. However, my parents would need to wait in line again for another hour if they wanted to renew garage access for my car.

I give an extra star because I know management is overwhelmed. I’m sure contractors are backed up across the city. But I don’t know why communication has also completely broken down like my air conditioning. I don’t know why the decision was made to disable our key cards at 10 PM on a week night. I don’t know why our trash chutes are clogged, or why the garage broke, or when any of this is going to be fixed. And while I know these are small complaints, for a luxury apartment commanding a luxury price, I really...

Like many others have written here, I share the same bad experience. As you can tell by the responses written by the property, they keep saying they are working diligently and doing everything they can. That's just not true. There is no weekly updates, repairs are taking way too long and there is no willingness from management to be nice or offer anything for the absolute horrible issues that have happened.

My apartment was damaged in the tornado, broken window. I reported it twice and had full understanding that the first few days were chaotic for everyone. But by day 5, no one had come by to even board up my window. Instead I got a condescending email about how we're all suffering in this together and they will get to it when they can. I'm pretty sure I actually saw the same paragraph that was in my email, written here as well as a response to someone's review.

By day 8 after the tornado, I physically had to go to the management office, ask where the repair people were and they had to physically go find the foreman. Turns out they forgot to tell the repair crew that they have 2 buildings, the crew went to the south building, the apartment sharing my number was not damaged, the crew reported it as fine and my complaints kept being brushed off. And because it was 8 days with a broken window, the crew that does disaster recovery found moisture in the walls and part of my walls had to be removed and dried out.

Tomorrow is 3 months since it happened. I still live in the same condition as it looked 10 days after the tornado hit. No offer of reducing rent, no offer for any compensation because I still had my AC. Well they turned that off on Monday and we're now in a heat advisory over the weekend, my apartment is in the 90ies because no AC and a gigantic whole in the window is not a good combination. And there is not information. They sent out the email for someone coming into my apartment to turn off the AC at noon on Monday, the same day they the shut them off.

Today, Friday 8/15, instead of writing an email updating us about the lack of AC for this weekend, they decided to tell us that there are too many packages in the mail room. I'm sorry, but people might have actually left the building and are living at hotels, due to the heat and they are not going to come pick up their packages, that's minor problem when you're struggling to function in apartments that are 90 degrees plus.

The default answer from management has been to call your renters insurance, we're 3 months into this, we're all running of funds from our insurances. and it seems like the only time we're getting any response is if we write a review here, so that's what I'm doing too.

I like the unit, the location, bathroom is great. Everything else, not so much.

I could literally do the communications job with my eyes closed so I'm not sure how they can fail so spectacularly at keeping their tenants informed of simple things. I have had to ask the crew working on the building about updates because apparently that's not something management can be bothered to do.

They also sell this as a great place to work from home, I do work from home normally, but because nothing is being fixed and there is no timeline provided, I've been unable to fully set up and do my work from home.

And lastly, I'm impressed by the audacity and utter lack of feeling shame from the companies side, by still asking me to pay full rent when I'm not getting a fully functioning apartment for the past 3 months and moving forward for who knows how long?

That's just my 2 cents as I'm melting away with 93 degrees in...

Update 06/11: The fob system is now down for all tenants, meaning that none of the tenants right now can enter the building/unit freely, and all of us who needs to access our own apartment after 5pm now have to email them to "make arrangement". The management team sent out a mass email this morning telling us to come down to the office to re-activate our key cards after the recent system upgrade, only to have us waiting for over an hour and then dismissed because the system is actually down, and nobody could get hold of a functional card. We are told to visit the office again tomorrow between 9:30 to 5. Hopefully things gets sorted out by then.

The units without ACs are over 93F degrees.

Update 06/10: A temporary fob has been issued to us for freely accessing the building. The AC situation is still being worked on, and management has been distributing free fans to help with ventilation in the units.

Really frustrating experience here lately.

Lots of the units still don’t have working AC, and this has been going on since mid-May (it’s now early June). Understandable that maintenance problems take time to resolve, but there hasn’t been any clear communication or timeline on when it will be fixed. First I was told that it's gonna be fixed in one week and it just keeps on getting longer. In the meantime, many of us are dealing with units that are way too hot to live in comfortably — even at night. With STL summers, it’s hard not to worry about how bad it’ll get in July and August if this remains unresolved. Management says some units have working AC, but they haven’t been able to tell us which ones — which just adds to the confusion.

On top of that, the system for activating new fobs is also down. If you’re just moving in (or need a new fob), you don't get your own fob to the building and your own unit. You have to really beg and persuade them only to borrow a temporary fob from the front desk that's to be returned by the end of the day. I get that tech issues happen, but when access to your own home depends on staff availability, it becomes a serious inconvenience. Similar to the AC situation, there's no communication from the management on when the system's gonna be up again.

I don’t doubt that the staff are doing what they can and are probably overwhelmed, but from a resident’s perspective, it really feels like we’re stuck waiting with no clear answers or support. For a place that’s advertised as “luxury living,” it just feels like even asking for livable temperatures and building access is too much.

EDIT: I understand from the owner’s response that the fob issue is described as affecting “garage access,” but I think it’s important to clarify that it's beyond that. Per the lease, you are getting 0 physical metal key and only a fob to access to your unit, the building, and all common areas. This means that without a working fob, you effectively cannot enter your own apartment. In our case, we were not informed about the fob issue at all until arriving on our move-in date with all of our belongings while being told that the system "is probably still down". Had we received even a brief notice earlier that day, we could have planned accordingly and avoided a great deal of stress and logistical difficulty. While this issue remains unresolved, I hope future communication around system outages or similar issues can be more proactive so that other tenants aren't put in the...