building at 55 West 17th Street

For those looking to buy into 55 West 17th Street, be forewarned! This "review" is based on my terrible experience since purchasing in this building. This is a cheap, poorly constructed Toll Brothers building both in the apts and the common areas. The apt floors aren't even real wood; it's a cheapo, poorly constructed composite which leaves spaces in between the planks as well as glue smeared on the actual floor. The marble in the kitchens and bathrooms often need significant work to "fix". No one in the building can believe that they were so cheap that they didn't even bother to install lighting electrical outlets in the center of the bedroom and LR ceilings. So if you want to put a lighting fixture in the ceiling, you have to have an electrician break thru the walls. The bathtubs are deeper than anyone wants. And for those people who are older, under 5'8" or have any kind of disability, the tubs are a recipe for disaster. Toll replaced 1 apartment's tub for $1,000 but told me it would cost $12-14,000 to have my tub replaced. Imagine that? Toll is making money on replacing these unusable fixtures which they never informed buyers about. What customer service. The hallway floors are a disaster. Sticky all over with some sort of adhesive which became apparent after Toll removed the plastic covering. Did they replace the defective flooring? Of course not. Cheapo. Leave it for the owners to replace at a later time. The front doors of majority of apts have scuff marks on them. Have you ever heard of a new condo with multimillion $ apts where the developer is too cheap to paint apt front doors? Unreal. There's always something wrong with at least 1 elevator which leaves 1 remaining elevator for 53 apts. Who minds waiting 10 minutes for an elevator? The exercise room is full of the cheapest equipment I've ever seen. Unusable, so I just renewed my gym membership. The keyword for 55 West 17th Street, and for Toll Brothers, is cheap, cheap, cheap. Build a new development as quickly and cheaply as possible and then.....move on to the next development. Amen.

Ethan, Congratulations on buying. You should talk to Toll and they will fix most of the issues. Floors are likely engineered and due to them being wide plank, they will have small gaps for expansion or contraction. I think they should be able to address cosmetic issues with no charge to you. Front door painting etc is simple.

300_mercer, I have never seen such poor customer service in my life. Trying to get Toll to do anything is like pulling all your teeth out. I and many other new owners regret our decision to buy into this building and Toll does a great job of ensuring that buyers will never buy from them again.

Write to their ceo. You will get action. Not sure they will change bathtub (you can put a nice step) but other issues they can address. Apt front door is truly annoying even though it would cost $300 to paint it yourself. They are generally known for good service.

Write to their ceo. You will get action. Not sure they will change bathtub (you can put a nice step) but other issues they can address. Apt front door is truly annoying even though it would cost $300 to paint it yourself. They are generally known for good service.

By the way, deep bathtubs are very desirable as you can soak in there. Of course, if you are not tall enough you can lie down fully. There is stuff available which goes under your legs to prevent that - kind of a wedge. They will certainly clean the hallway sticky stuff. It is easy.

Believe me, letters and emails have been sent and countless hours wasted over things that a competent builder would have taken care of.

A long time ago a prominent RE investor said to me "You buy quality, you own quality. You buy crap, you own crap".

Note this was the building pointed out here as "Well priced apartments sell fast". But sometimes there is a reason things are priced low. The builder here has a fairly long history of building things where the shine wears off quickly.