Uptown Living (apartment complex, renting, storage)

[Radical_Car]

Originally Posted by Thegonagle

Their own website is not going to tell you how much they suck. But other websites will. The Fox 9 news story about "no heat" in the building on Emerson, for example happened during a brutal cold snap in February; outside temperatures barely reached above 0, and the heat wasn't working properly for over a week. A friend of mine was living there at the time.

There were other issues, starting with the cleanliness of the first unit they gave him the keys to. They showed him a clean unit on the third floor, and said his unit on the first floor would "be the same." When he got the keys, the unit was filthy, including the fridge, the oven door appeared to be broken, and it needed to be repainted. You have to understand that he's a neat freak, and he wasn't going to bait-and-switched into accepting and living in a rat hole. He told them he wasn't going to move in to that unit, but that he would take the clean 3rd floor unit they had shown him, or he would stop the check. Luckily, they agreed after some hemming and hawing.

The next February, the heat went completely out in his building for almost three days, the legal limit for heat complaints at the time; now it's 24 hours, partially thanks to self-centered money grubbing freaks like Spiros Zorbalas, owner of UPI. They half-fixed something, which allowed the building to heat up a little bit (into the 50's), but it took another several days of complaining, and one resident's call to Fox 9 news (they love to trash this guy, but he deserves it), before the building was finally brought back up to temp.

I've seen a lot of his other buildings, and one can see that this guy just doesn't want to pay to maintain them. It's sad, really, because a lot of the buildings are cool classics from the 20's and 30's, but they are clearly not maintained to the same standards as other buildings of similar vintage. Some of the buildings are ugly ducklings from the 50's and 60's, and him owning them does not help them look any prettier.

There are plenty of other horror stories about UPI that you can find on the apartment review sites. I know that those sites skew toward the horrible, but the maintenance and building heat issues (especially late turn on and early shutoff) seem particularly pervasive for UPI.

Thank you for all this, I enjoy researching apartments and apartment owners and such, you might think its a strange habit for a 17 almost 18 year old guy, but whatever

[gweilo845]

There was a pretty big article about Spiros Zorbalas/UPI in City Pages about a year back that you might be interested in.

The Slumlord of South Minneapolis - Page 1 - Feature - Minneapolis - City Pages

I know a couple of people that lived in a UPI building and it was terrible. It looked decent on the outside, but once you got in the building, you got hit with some combonation stink of urine/garbage/weed. Everything was faded and stained, drains were clogged, heat didn't work. You could hear people getting into violent domestic fights in the hallway, and there was obvious drug dealing in the half-plowed parking lot. All of this was in a decent part of Uptown where you would not expect those sorts of things.

[yuppa12]

Originally Posted by gweilo845

There was a pretty big article about Spiros Zorbalas/UPI in City Pages about a year back that you might be interested in.

The Slumlord of South Minneapolis - Page 1 - Feature - Minneapolis - City Pages

I know a couple of people that lived in a UPI building and it was terrible. It looked decent on the outside, but once you got in the building, you got hit with some combonation stink of urine/garbage/weed. Everything was faded and stained, drains were clogged, heat didn't work. You could hear people getting into violent domestic fights in the hallway, and there was obvious drug dealing in the half-plowed parking lot. All of this was in a decent part of Uptown where you would not expect those sorts of things.

I think that's the way most management companies operate. Make everything look good on the outside, but it takes a while to see how bad everything really is.

[Drewcifer]

I've heard nothing good about UPI.

I live in a building in Whittier that is owned by KMS management, they are actually really good about fixing things and keep their buildings well maintained. I pay $715 a month for a 800 sq ft 1br with hardwood floors in an older brick building. The only thing I don't like is that I have to pay for garbage but it is only $20 a month so I guess I can't complain too much. Also they allow pets. They own a number of buildings in greater Uptown so it may be worth checking out their website, they are one of the better landlords I have had.

[Radical_Car]

Originally Posted by Drewcifer

I've heard nothing good about UPI.

I live in a building in Whittier that is owned by KMS management, they are actually really good about fixing things and keep their buildings well maintained. I pay $715 a month for a 800 sq ft 1br with hardwood floors in an older brick building. The only thing I don't like is that I have to pay for garbage but it is only $20 a month so I guess I can't complain too much. Also they allow pets. They own a number of buildings in greater Uptown so it may be worth checking out their website, they are one of the better landlords I have had.

I used to live in a KMS apartment in the st cloud area and while the building was ancient and appliances were old and the floors had holes burnt in it from cigarette butts being dropped by previous tenants, the managers were fantastic and incredibly nice. The caretakers, meh, but the 2 people who worked in the office were great and incredibly nice and friendly. We did leave because we weren't satisfied with the apartment and we are in a nicer and cheaper place now, but the managers were fantastic.

[Drewcifer]

Maybe they vary building by building, the one I am in is in very good shape. I had plumbing issues twice, they had someone there within a couple hours both times.

[Radical_Car]

Originally Posted by Drewcifer

Maybe they vary building by building, the one I am in is in very good shape. I had plumbing issues twice, they had someone there within a couple hours both times.

Well ya, buildings will always vary, but the managers in the office who worked there were fantastic.

[Thegonagle]

Yuppa12, I don't think "most" apartment management teams are anything like UPI.

I lived in a Copenhagen building for 6 years and while their buildings are old, and the kitchens and bathrooms were dated, the heat worked (in fact, I was too warm if I didn't shut off one of the three radiators in my unit), the management was great, and maintenance requests were handled promptly.

The after-hours emergency maintenance number was the landlord's (and landlady's--husband and wife) personal home phone number. He even came out in the middle of the night once to let me in my home because my key broke. (He wasn't happy about it, but he did it, and didn't charge any bogus fees, because it wasn't my fault the key broke; the key had one really deep cut in it--looked a little like this: @==_== , a weak spot in the key, if you will--and it was just worn out from being so many years old, so it decided to break in the middle of the night.)

Aside from that, they went above and beyond for me in other ways. They installed a two-bulb light fixture in my bathroom because the existing one-bulb fixture was too dim for my liking, and get this--they installed a ceiling fan in my bedroom for me, no extra charge, just because I mentioned in the office (at a lease renewal signing) that I wished I had one.

I live in my own house now, but if I need to rent again someday, I'd rent from them again in a heartbeat.

[Radical_Car]

Originally Posted by Thegonagle

I lived in a Copenhagen building for 6 years and while their buildings are old, and the kitchens and bathrooms were dated, the heat worked (in fact, I was too warm if I didn't shut off one of the three radiators in my unit), the management was great, and maintenance requests were handled promptly.

This was my experience at the KMS property i lived in Waite Park, except the place was quite outdated and was filthy, but maintenance requests were taken care of promptly and management was wonderful. The worst thing is the caretaker didn't clean it and the caretaker eventually got fired, and they apologized to us about it not being cleaned, so even though the apartment was a little pricy(pricy in the st cloud area though it probably would be considered pretty cheap in the twin cities) and outdated, the management was fantastic.

[tcarter8158]

I'm a girl haha. Just finished college in May and started my first job up here. Feel free to shoot me an email tac3h9@mail.missouri.edu