Aerie Apartments

I stayed at the Aerie apartments for about 40 days. There are lot of good things to say about it, and some negatives as well. POSITIVES: [1] Excellent location: only 5-6 miles drive from the Miami South Beach. I had rental car half the time, and used public transport rest of the time, in either case it's a great location. There is free parking in street, which I think hard to get anywhere closer to the beach. Walk towards west across the river - there is a bus and metro hub (Government center) with transit connections everywhere, and during my stay all transports were free. [2] Newly constructed building, regularly serviced, equipped with latest technology in security and laundry. Clean minimalistic interior, full kitchen (fridge, microwave, induction cooktop, utensils, bowls, cutleries, pans etc). [3] High speed and stable internet connection, I never had an issue working remotely from here, doing meetings over the internet or streaming any content etc. NEGATIVES: [1] The one thing I hate most about this apartment is their app-based lock. They use "SALTO KS" app to manage the main entrance and unit's door. So you have to use your smartphone either remotely or at proximity to the lock to unlock both. In general, when you don't have access to your key (either lost of left inside room) your first help is your phone, now imagine your phone itself is the key - you can land into a very stressful situations if you are not always super-cautious. And it happened twice with me. On 2 different occasions I was locked out. The 1st incident happened when I returned late one night and my phone was out of charge, I had to wait for someone to open the main entrance and had to ask to allow me to "tailgate" through the building entrance, and for the unit luckily there was another roommate inside who opened the door of the unit for me after knocking. The 2nd incident on Jan-13: I just stepped outside the unit to dispose trash (within the same corridor) and left my phone inside by mistake and was locked out, it was about 10 am, there was no other roommate. I had to roam around for about 5-6 hours outside the area waiting for someone to help me get back my access. The cleaning lady could not help. It was about 4 or 5pm when I finally found some guy from the management team who escorted me to the unit. The doorbox had some emergency call button but that was getting repeatedly disconnected. I think one experience like this is enough for a 1-star review. [2] Laundry in 2nd and 3rd floors - while they boast the concept of app-based payment and not having to deal with quarters is nice, but the app as it is not pay-per-use, you have to reload funds, with a minimum reload amount of $10. After my last use I had few dollar of credits left on the app, and I requested refund back to my credit card. It's been 9 weeks since I moved out and the request is still not processed, and I cannot uninstall the app until it is done. A laundry app doesn't need to hold a deposit of $10, if you use the washer and dryer once ($1.5 + $1.0), the rest of your fund (approx $7.5) will be held indefinitely. Too bad. [3] Insufficient supply of trash bags cause overflown trash and smelling, especially when everyone is cooking, and cockroaches roaming in the common area (see the pictures).On some days I had to drive them out of the unit using their decorative twig tree in the vase as a broomstick.

Great place to stay at. Daniel and Alex were very attentive, helpful, polite and professional. I really enjoyed my stay there. Highly recommended.