Yacht Club at Brickell Apartments — Local services in Miami

Did live at this location for two years. Before I moved out the maintenance did a good job. These are many problems. 1. Construction Noise is high and on some days of the week you have fireworks that take place in the back of building. You can not get in touch with the Front Desk , Leasing office, residence relations, when you call from your unit you get options to select one. No one picks up you must leave a message or go downstairs to try to see someone in the office. 2. You smell marijuana at times if you sit out in the balcony or open your window for air. 3rd You are not told that with your rent you also have to pay for Trash Service fee, cooling charge,cooling service fee, pest control fee, parking fee 75.00 dollars for each vehicle these fee's are every month together with your rent add about 200.00 dollars more to your rent amount for these fee's. 4th Sometimes you will find cigars or cigarettes that land on the balcony. You have 3hour elevator time for move in or move out even if the moving truck is late due to traffic 5th Before your lease is up they want to know if you are going to renew or not before telling you what the rent increase amount is that is illegal in my opinion. You suppose to get the rent increase amount in a letter before your lease is up with the new rent amount. Rent increase amounts are 200- 300 dollars upon a new lease .6th You have to signup for your packages with Luxer credit card or debit needed. If you leave your packages in the locker over three days you get charge ten dollars. 7th The clubhouse area where you play pool or watch TV or relax in is rented out to people that don't live there for parties and events. Dog owners let the dog run loose without leash in the back of building. 8th Air conditioning goes down sometimes 1 or 2 days but the east side of the building always gets fix first. You we get emails for air conditioning problems to let you know or anything else. 9th If you want to update your stove or fridge a monthly charge will be added to your rent. 10th Balcony rails need to be painted.11th Visitor are charge to park in the valet. No 30minute free time for visitors. 12th Front desk runs people up to your unit without calling you first. I had someone come up asking for a person that no longer lived in the unit. 13th You are charge for things like painting and other charges once you move out to give you less on your security deposit many other reviews state the same thing happen to them. I lived for two years no paint or anything updated in the unit unless you paid. They lack of good management and good customer service for the residence. Corporate runs this place terribly which results in high move outs. You have people leaving every time a lease is complete. Very old building trying to be high class with high prices. You can get better somewhere else clearly would not recommend this...

The apartments are big and spacious. The people that work at the building are very nice. They come to assist you whenever a service request is made. Generally, there is a kind environment, friendly staff and good neighbors!

However, I work from home and basically I was looking for a place where I can use the business center. The problem here is that they haven’t paid the internet for the common areas since December 2015. Every time I go to the main office to talk about it, they said “there is nothing we can do, because corporate is taking care of this issue”.

Also, there are two constructions on site. There is one in front where they have a special permit to work nights (starting 1am) and weekends. The other construction is at “The Mark” the building right next to this one. The work is not at night or weekends but before we moved they assured us that the work would be done by October 2015. It´s almost a year since then and the work on the Mark is not complete yet.

Moreover, I´ve been renting for other companies like Pinnacle- Stuart Co. If you move to a property within the same Company building, the transfer is automatic. However, for Aimco if you want to move to another unit within the same building, you have to apply again and pay the application fees AGAIN. It does not count that you made your monthly rent payments on time or the fact that there are cero complains regarding your behavior in the building. This just seems like another excuse to take money from you.

Also, beware if you want to leave you need to give 60 days’ in advance notice. If not, they will charge an extra month plus the increase on rent for the unit and around $400 for the month to month lease. This does not count that you give the 60 day’s notice on time, considering moving to other unit within the building away from the construction, until learning about the reapplication process thus we decided to cancel. Here in Miami, realtors suggest no more than 30 days to run a search because the market moves very fast, this makes it crazy to give a 60 day notice if you don’t know were you will move!

Therefore, despite the old appliances, construction work and noise that doesn’t stop on weekends and nights, the balcony is covered with cement and dust all the time, but still they will increase $130 of rent for the next year. The staff is great and try to help; however, the Company and its policies are not clear and sadly it feels like they are focused in taking advantage of the renters.

Beware before moving, the staff is not clear regarding a lot of the situations going on here. The balcony is a useless space that you would be paying extra for… sound and air contamination are terrible.

We would have expected more consideration from the Company but money seems to be their...

I rarely post reviews but have no choice but to do so now considering the circumstances. Taking away all the emotion out of it, here is my take on The Yacht Club at Brickell Apartmenets after having lived here 6 years. Here's the good, the bad, and the ugly with this AIMCO property:

THE GOOD The property is managed quite well The staff is friendly, for the most part Maintenance is timely Great location Uninhibited bay views

THE BAD The units are older for Brickell standards. Moldy tiled bathrooms and bathroom door frames. Even though I have lived here for 6 years, they still want to charge me to replace the moldy and crusty door. Across the street, the tallest skyscraper in Miami is currently being built. They have a 24-hour construction permit! Luckily, they don’t go 24 hours but they do pretty much work from 6am – 9pm. Very loud and the traffic can be a mess since it narrows down to one lane. Employee turnover in the common areas is high. Always seems to be someone new at the front desk. Air conditioning in the building seems to break down monthly. They are always doing repairs to the cooling tower. Not fun during the summer!

THE UGLY My rent has been increased by 40% over the past 5 years! INCREDIBLE!!!!!! In particular, over the past 3 years, they tried to increase my rent hundreds of dollars. They’ve met in the middle the past few years but this year, they were pretty much firm. How is one supposed to budget for such an increase? Even worse, the response was so slow over the 2 month period that I only had less than 2 weeks to scramble to make moving arrangements. In other words, I felt I was pushed in the corner to renew my lease since I simply don’t have time to coordinate a move right now with my busy schedule. They charge for any apartment upgrades…such as laminate wood flooring, or upgraded kitchen countertops. They started charging for the 1st parking spot, which used to be a part of the rent. They charge even more for the 2nd parking spot. They now make all residents split the utility costs in the common areas! Think of it as a homeowners association fee…even though you own nothing and are just renting. And did I mention my rent increasing 40%??? They try to say that they are just keeping up with the market. However, given the aforementioned, rental increases of that amount YOY are definitely not warranted. There's no considerations for loyalty and a tenant that always pays on time. They will look at you as dispensable come renewal time...their famous line is "If you don't renew, we'll easily find someone else that will take your apartment and pay...