Contempo NOVA Apartments — Local services in Alexandria

Nov. 5, 2023 New Update: Reducing my rating from a 2 star to a 1 star due to the following:

The service elevator was in operable for nearly 3 weeks in building two. In a busy building with 5 floors, it was a complete nightmare.  Note: This elevator has broken down in 2023 at least 3 other times.

The marijuana smoke is out of control. Supposedly we are a smoke-free community, but people smoke in the building and outside the exterior doors with no consequences.

Exterior lighting: 4 of the 6 exterior lamp posts on the side of building 1 (McConnell) have been out for several months. I reported to the office, and it has not been fixed. It is really dark and unsafe when walking on the sidewalk there.

650 Shillings Street front entry light sconces: the bulbs have been burned out for months, and no one has replaced, hard to see the building numbers after dark.

Pet waste: it is all over the place. Residents with pets do not regularly pickup after their dogs. It's really disgusting. In this situation the leasing office should have the waste picked up and not just have it sit out there. The office should deploy tactics in catching owners who do not pick up after their animals - surveillance cameras, and signage saying the area is being surveilled, and hefty fines for violators.

Smelly, stained, and filthy carpeting in the hallways of building-2. Needs to be shampooed to maintain appearance. Spot clean heavily soiled areas. Just plain nasty and embarrassing.

Can't believe I pay $2800+ to stay in a building with burned out exterior lighting, dirty hallway carpeting, weed smoke, poop filled lawns, and malfunctioning entry doors.

I do not understand why there is no regular walk through of the property to ensure things are in proper working order. The office and maintenance cannot just rely on residents reporting, they should be proactive and complete regular walk throughs especially when it comes to maintaining exterior lighting, proper functionality of side entry doors, excess pet waste on the grassy areas, etc.

**(old) Update: Wow and I thought things couldn’t get worse. Parking for retail people and guests now have to use the Pango parking app. There is no free guest parking. Huge inconvenience— as an amenity, residents should have free guest parking.

The side entrance door for building-2 has been broken for months.

And the coupe de grace is: Contempo Nova got rid of our night concierge. It was never announced — they did it without notice. I found out one night by trying to call the office and no one answered - so the following day I went to the office and was told by Stevie that they no longer would employee a night concierge.

Modera Tempo (now Contempo NOVA) has gone downhill. Noisy, poor traffic control, and lax enforcement of community rules. Residents pay for parking, however (garage) parking near your building entry point is not guaranteed. I have been forced to park the equivalent of 2 city blocks away from my building's entry. Heavy bags/groceries makes this a sad circumstance given residents are required to pay to park in the garage. Note retail customers pay NOTHING to park. Incidentally, a year ago w/out regard to residents, Mill Creek/Modera (now Sage Ventures/Contempo NOVA) decided to usurp 45 parking spaces closest to the North building entry point (via the garage) for retail parking. But hardly any retail customers park in the garage. They opt to park on the street in front of the buildings ..which causes traffic chaos. Those designated retail parking spaces sit for majority of the day un-used. Meanwhile I'm lugging my groceries ...

Only one working elevator is readily accessible to north building residents. The other elevator is designated for retail customers.

The old adage "you get what you pay for", does not apply with Modera. You pay A LOT, but you get...

We were the first ones to live in our room. For every positive there seemed to be a negative.

The Garage: multiple times (at least four or five) the garage doors wouldn't be working to park your car underground. Whether it was a mechanical issue or someone drove into it so it was closed off, you would either have to call the office for someone to come over and manually open it or you would have to use the other entrance.

Noise: the apartment I was in faced the bar across the street. The noise was honestly a problem, as though they wouldn't be open all night, all the drunk people would basically hang out and listen to loud music or sit on their motorcycles until 2 or 3am. Multiple times I would almost call the police to try to get them to shutup.

Amenities: I honestly never used the pool, though they had two and they also had more such as a place to wash your dog, a (small) gym for working out and bathrooms/showers for the pool area. There is also a Starbucks in the complex, along with a Jimmy Johns, an eyeglass place, a pub and a dental place. You can look them up on Google.

Receiving Packages: Packages for the most part were nice to deal with. Most delivery people would drop them off with the person at the desk and you could pick your packages up at any time. At times there would be no one at the desk (maybe they were getting food or something) and that would be annoying to wait, but at least the packages were safe behind a locked door.

The apartment rooms: a) This I'm mixed on. Maybe it's because I was the first one to live in mine, but I had a lot of issues. First, within a week of moving in I noticed our fire sprinkler in the ceiling was leaking really bad. The office sent someone to replace it the next day and they had to fix the drywall in the ceiling and repaint everything. Well, they painted it the wrong shade of white, so I asked them to come again since I didn't want them to think I painted it and charged it and they did paint it the correct colors but they decided to use my own bathroom to clean their paintbrushes. Not even joking, they left a paintbrush drying in my sink. I through it away and that was the end of it. b) The dryer vent was never installed so a few months later they had to come and fix it. It wasn't horrible, just a hassle. c) There weren't many lights in the apartment. I know this is just a design choice, but both rooms and the living room had the light switches connected to outlets for using floor lamps for the rooms. Neither rooms had overhead lights (or fans). d) We had a lot of issues with our air conditioning unit constantly freezing over. When running it the entire thing would form as a block of ice and would have to run the heat during the summer. e) Someone always smoked weed in our building. I never complained about it because he was down the hall and I only passed the room while taking out trash but it always smelled like weed. f) The kitchen was really nice. The cabinets were the ones that shut silently, the microwave, dishwasher and fridge were new (though the freezer was small) and the bathrooms were nice as well. Both rooms also had really large walk-in closets.

In the end, it wasn't awful, it wasn't amazing... it was average. For the price we were paying though ($2,200 a month) it should have but...

I would give this apartment complex a 0 star if Google allowed me to.

Living in this apartment was a nightmare from day one. The first year was barely manageable as we tried to adjust, but the ongoing issues quickly outweighed any positives. Let me break down the misery:

The elevators? Always out of order. You're forced to lug groceries and heavy items up flights of stairs on a regular basis.

Supposedly smoke-free? Tell that to the marijuana and cigarette fumes wafting through the vents from neighboring apartments or seeping in from the hallway.

The garage doors? Broken for years. My car got broken into on Father's Day, and management's response? Call the police. No attempt to fix the security issue or even show a hint of concern. They finally fixed it after years and using that as their defense mechanism.

Noise? Endless. The unit above us might as well have been a circus. Yelling, fighting, throwing stuff and people running rampant. Good luck getting some sleep. Complaints were useless; they slapped a notice on the neighbors' door a couple of times and called it a day.

Communication? Forget about it. They only respond when they want something from you, otherwise, good luck getting a reply.

Safety? Non-existent. Shady people roaming at night make walking around the neighborhood and sometimes fighting and yelling. We had some resident yell from their windows telling them to shut up and they told the resident to “come down to see me”. a risky endeavor.

Parking? They scrapped the free guest spots, leaving everyone to fend for themselves against ruthless towing practices. Money-hungry management strikes again.

Package theft? Guaranteed. Amazon lockers aren't safe either. The door was busted at one point when we were still there. Some deliveries items like espresso will be stolen 100% guaranteed. Expect your deliveries to vanish like magic.

Trash? Everywhere. The stench of neglected carpets and poorly maintained trash rooms is nauseating. Sometimes you will see a dead mice and cockroaches for weeks.

Weekends? A nightmare thanks to the nearby lounge. Shouting matches and fights become the soundtrack of your evenings.

And the office staff? Absolutely rude and unhelpful. They embody everything wrong with customer service. I would said only person that was nice and helpful was Brit.

After enduring this circus, I finally cut my losses, and moved out. Best decision ever. This place never felt like home; it was a stress factory. My advice? Avoid this place...