V1488 Apartments

Moved into this building July 1st, 2020 and loved every second of it UNTIL September 10th when the commercial space under our unit was leased to TFA Gym. Since that day we have been woken up every single morning, 7 days a week at 6am to constant banging from weights being dropped. The noise has been reported to be heard up to the 4th floor. Devon Properties continues to ignore this major issue and leaves tenants with no options.

Having lived in this building for close to two years (and thankfully moving out) I’ve compiled a list of pros and cons for people thinking of renting here... Cons: - Too expensive for what you pay for. - Incredibly poor soundproofing unless you’re on the top floor. Pray that you have even mildly considerate upstairs neighbors, because you’ll hear everything they do albeit the building being comprised mostly of concrete. The open-concept style of the building also adds to this being a very, very noisy place to live. - Poorly insulated; hydro bills run abnormally high in the wintertime. - Poor building upkeep by property management. The entrance-stairs on the Pandora side of the building at the time of writing this review are looking quite post-apocalyptic. - Tenants in the building often allow their pets/animals to urinate and defecate in the elevators, parking garage and stairwells of the building. - Comically small kitchens and bedrooms. - No storage. - Expensive "secured" underground parking, with no solid guarantee that your vehicle wont get broken into. There are constant break-ins, as of writing this review on October 22nd, 2019, there has already been one break-in this month. Property management expects tenants to fend off anyone who may bum-rush the parking gate while you wait for it to close upon entering the parking area, as well. Hardly secure. - Gentrified area with a large amount of mentally ill and homeless people around the building constantly. - Entrance to the building typically smells strongly of urine. A charming experience for your guests when using the buzzer to be let in. - Weird two-story tall chalk board on 1st floor that the builder thought resident "artists" would "decorate"; has turned into more of a community-grievance-board where tenants typically engage in calling each other out, or make fun of one another with chalk-drawn messages. Gives the building a strange unfriendly vibe and is more often than not a complete eye sore. - Appliances that look sort of nice but aren’t of very good quality. Washer / dryer stack combo have destroyed some of my clothing. - Electrical wiring is an absolute joke, as noted in a previous review by another tenant. Pros: - Pets allowed (but with a $1000 pet deposit).

Save yourself the headache. Unreasonably high rent with little access to common space as it's been given to commercial businesses. Hydro is high. Devon Properties is terrible. The units are poor quality, our kitchen sink fell out twice in 2 years. Continuous break-ins in both the building and parkade. The daycare has access to all common space all day long and can be heard throughout the building. Weights can be heard dropping morning to evening from the gym below. Cox Development has absolutely no respect for tenants.

Don't weight these negative reviews too highly. They are likely out of date, or written by chronic complainers. Hydro bill was fine for me - the most expensive one I had over winter for a 2 bedroom suite was $50 for the month, and I use a lot of electricity. Sound proofing is quite good for how many suites are in the building. When you're in an apartment, there's going to be some noise sometimes, that's a part of the apartment lifestyle. The exposed concrete in suites makes for an awesome asthetic, and the open air walkways are a unique architectural feature. The people I have met in the building are fantastic! It has generously sized balconies compared to most other buildings, and allows pets of all sizes, which is not easy to find. It's not the cheapest rental in the world, but then again, it's Victoria, nowhere is cheap. The biggest drawback is a lack of storage space, both in suite and out. However there's lots of things you can do to make the space work more efficiently for storage.

I would like to say that, despite some of the older reviews being less than ideal, my partner and I are happy to call this building home. We love the location, the kids at the daycare are adorable and we have not heard any noise to bother us. The industrial design of the suites are on point, and the property management team (Jordan you’re awesome!) has been the loveliest. We are grateful that we made the decision to move in here and love how much sound privacy we get with the concrete build. Come see it for yourself!

This is both the most expensive and the worst apartment building I've ever lived in. Two people have described my "luxury" suite as "jail-like" and I've had to get around people smoking crack to enter the building multiple times. It's in a terrible area, because the builder thought "gentrification" was as simple as "build an apartment building where poor people live and charge high rents because you installed some cheap washer/dryer sets in the suites." You hear constant screaming fights and people having mental breakdowns; our dog has tried to eat the used needles, crack pipes, and human feces left around the building. The week we moved in, a man was crushed to death in a dumpster a block away. People are constantly having their cars broken into--even in the "secure" underground parking the company charges extortionate prices for. $150 a month for a parking stall where someone might take a dump (this has actually happened). Management was abruptly fired and replaced last month, but unfortunately the real problem is the building itself. See attached photo from a neighbour's front door--when it snows, the INDOOR of the building ices up so you get to potentially slip and fall on your way to the elevator (which usually takes forever because people are constantly moving out). There are no amenities aside from a rooftop patio, as "pack 'em and stack 'em" was clearly the driving force when planning this place. It's clear in the layout of the suites, which have comically small bedrooms that can fit a queen bed and not much else. The kitchen is appropriate for a single person whose diet consists mostly of takeout--we had to put a bookcase in the kitchen to store extravagances like flour and coffee mugs. Storage is lacking throughout, and there are no storage lockers in the building. Of special note are the windows--in some suites, they open up onto the semi-outdoor "hallway" area, but in every suite, they're slit-like and make the place feel like a bunker, with the one exception being the front of the living room (which gives us a beautiful view of the Pandora McDonalds and the blinding white 24/7 lights of the Mazda dealership next door, soon to be replaced with several years of all-day construction). The wiring in this building deserves its own paragraph. For one, the bedroom outlets are on the same circuit so regardless of whether you and another person have your own bedrooms or use one room as a bedroom and one as an office, if you both plug in a desktop computer and use them at the same time you'll trip the circuit breaker, shutting off everything and losing your work. If that weren't bad enough, the electric bills for this building are staggering, and an uproar on the building's Facebook group hasn't managed to get anything done. I've included a snapshot of our own hydro bill for the winter--as you can see, it's often double what nearby homes are paying. It's several times what we've paid in other apartments. It's really unfortunate, because there aren't a ton of places that allow full-size dogs (the frequent smell of urine in the front door from irresponsible pet owners might have something to do with that). Still, we're leaving as soon as our lease is up.

My roommates and I moved into V1488 a couple of months ago and have not had the same negative experience described in several of the older reviews. Being on one of the upper floors, we don't hear noise from the surrounding area and have never heard noise from the daycare despite working from home right next to the shared space on the 11th floor. Our unit is spacious and modern with beautiful views of the ocean and mountains. The proximity to a brand new Save on Foods and the amenities of Cook St Village are ideal for tenants without a car. The Leasing Associate Jordan Black is accommodating and professional, and made the application process very smooth for us. Overall, would recommend!

The apartment building is great, I really like the open concept and easy access to my bike in the morning. The building is pet friendly and my neighbours are awesome. The move in was difficult, there is no easy access to the front door, to move in you have to park on the other right side of the building, so walking around the block and up stairs is a pain. There is only 1 onsite manager for the entire building and I think they need at least 2, the on-site manager was stressed and that stress was then transferred to me. The building management could improve the move-in and move-out process for their clients, so it is not so stressful for everyone.