I wanted to like it
Pros
Great location. Owned by a friendly small neighborhood landlord. Unit was renovated with a dishwasher. Layout is efficient. Neighbors are quiet.
Cons
The apartment is small and had mice. Stairway and downstairs area are filthy, saw a big rat jump out of the garbage can multiple times. Heat was inconsistent, too hot or too cold. Water pressure low. The ground floor is an intercity bus station and it gets loud whenever a bus pulls up (multiple times an hour). Intercom did not work.
Advice to the owners
Take care of the pests. Fix the intercom.
Bare bones older building with illegal tenants living in lobby
Pros
Accessible price, near a lot of the cool things happening in LES/Chinatown
Cons
This building was quite dirty, with non functional intercoms (you couldn't buzz people up, you needed to come downstairs) A family appeared to live in an illegal apartment on street level, with a divider up between the lobby and their 'apartment' Neighboring building on the back of the property had residents who would snort, spit and defecate early in the morning (not the best wake up call)