1600 Pennsylvania Ave SE Apartments

First time moving in to DC and the experience has been wonderful. Mrs Grantham has been very helpful, responsive and given an incredibly warm welcome. Additionally, the living space is nice, area is pretty and convenient. Being a 5 min walk from the metro makes this place feel really connected to the rest of DC!

I did not end up leasing an apartment in the building, but I still had to leave a review for Tuleda. In my years of renting in DC, I have never worked with such a wonderful leasing agent. She was so helpful, communicative, and fought for us. We were heartbroken to tell her that we wouldn’t be signing a lease with her. Whatever Bernstein is paying her, it isn’t nearly enough.

Ms. Tuleda has made my move in experience great. When I first came and toured she made the experience great and was one of the main reasons I chose to move into this complex. She is such a friendly face every time you walk into the building, and really makes sure her residents are taken care of. She made the application and paperwork process easy and less stressful and even helps with the little things like ensuring the package room is organized for each resident. Love seeing her and building management helping the residents so much.

This is a good apartment to live in. The neighbors are nice and the apartment manager Tuleda is always looking out for the tenants. The rooms are small but newly renovated. It’s very close to the metro. It can be noisy at nights since it’s close to the street but it’s nothing you can’t get use to. Maintenance is quick to solve any issues. Overall, this is a good apartment.

This review is about Ms. Tuleda in our management office. She is a true gem, a person who truly cares for residents, and the building itself. I'm giving TULEDA, FIVE STARS. The building itself is a THREE. I've been at 1600 Penn for almost 4 years & this is my last month. Before her arrival the building was going downhill & long term residents like myself were planning on leaving. She single handedly was able to assist with removing homeless people who would break into the building, facilitated the assigned parking spaces - we pay for these & it never mattered before, people without a space would park in your space, she brought the building back to life by requesting new carpet, paint etc. It was clear that 1600 Penn was not a priority to BMC. She's the best thing to happen to 1600 Penn since Byron & Bri's departure.

I love love love my unit! It is the perfect amount of space for me. Very convenient to metro, grocery stores and restaurants. The gym and rooftop are my favorite amenities! I really enjoyed my move in process. Tuleda and Kyle were supportive and informative from start to finish. The unit was move in ready and I have had no issues!

I’ve been living in 1600 Penn SE for the over two years now — and I’ve really grown to love my apartment and this building, My studio apartment is excellent and the right size, and the building is 5-7 minutes away from the Potomac Avenue Metro. I’m happy to be living here, and it’s in Hill East, which is an awesome neighborhood with great places nearby like Safeway for groceries and The Roost food hall for a plethora of delicious food. Also, since Miss Tuleda has been working as a Property Manager — there haven’t been any problems in our building. She’s so helpful and nice, and even comes on the weekends to check on the building and make sure that everything is okay.

My boyfriend and I have been living at 1600 Penn for a year and at first we really liked it. I want to echo the reviews that mention how great Byron was and how helpful Robbie is with maintenance. However, since Byron left, the leasing/management office has been a revolving door of different Bernstein employees that do not care about addressing issues tenants are having. Bernstein employees are generally friendly when we raise our concerns, but never take any action. For example, we have been dealing with a cockroach problem in our apartment since March 2022 and Bernstein has been absolutely useless. Even though the building contracts with a pest company, management is rarely around on Fridays to let pest control into the building and does nothing to get to the root of the problem given that our apartment is not the source of the cockroaches . We’ve also run into an issue with our rent, because the person that was working in the office when we submitted renewal paperwork abruptly left the company and never updated our lease agreement. Since then, tracking down someone at Bernstein that can address this problem has been a nightmare. Had we known that these issues would be such a hassle and so prolonged, we never would have renewed our lease. If you have absolutely no problems while you are in the building, it is a decent place to live for a relatively affordable price, but the minute you have an issue, this place becomes a nightmare. I would also like to reiterate the issues brought up in Keena Harris’ review. The fire alarm has been pulled (apparently by teenagers messing around on the roof) a number of times over the last year, and there has been damage to locked rooms (storage, bike, utility rooms), damage to rooftop furniture, as well as bike thefts. It’s a city, some of these problems come with the territory. However, management could do so much more to help and they do not take any meaningful action. If you can afford to live somewhere else, I would recommend it.

Great building, great amenities. I love the rooftop with the grills for a cookout. The apartments are very clean, no insects of any kind! My apartment has really come together. I love the view of the bridge !

Current resident at 1600 Penn writing. The problems with this property all come down to a few key issues. The security at this location has been extremely poor. The primary reason is the inability to properly FOB all spaces. Several breakins, into my 2 years here and I have had to turn away miscreants scammers and drunk or high, high school kids that heard its easy to get into our penthouse. I have gone out of my way to try to make this apparent to BMC management and have been summarily ignored. The location is great and I really like the apartments themselves but what good is that if the building isn't secure. To their credit the management has finally made their first attempts to secure the building and hire night watchmen but the fact is that management not being present on site at regular intervals means that there are quite of few common sense measures that they refuse to take. A consistent pattern of ineptitude and mismanagement is all I can see from the property. Maintenance is great! The rents are low and the apartments themselves are nice (though awkwardly laid out) but simply poorly managed. I don't recommend that anyone tour or live here until it either changes ownership or fulltime experienced property manager is hired.

The level of unprofessionalism I received from this company is amazing. Tuesday of last week I called the apartment number listed on the website to schedule a tour. Amber was the individual who assisted me. I explained to her I am visiting from L.A and would like to view the property as I am relocating for work the beginning of July. Amber proceeded to schedule a tour at 12:00pm on Thursday, June 21st. Great! I am excited to see as they have a two bedroom I am interested in. On Thursday my meetings ended early so I decided to call the apartment to ask if I could come in at 11:30am. Once again Amber answered and said she was not at the location and provided me a different number to call to view. I called the number given and no one answered. I decided to head over anyway and wait. Upon arrival there is a note outside of the locked doors stating management is not on site and to call the same number no one answered. I am standing in an interview suit in 100 degree heat trying to locate someone for my appointment as it is now 11:45am. I call the management number again and someone else states I am not on the schedule at all! I am shocked I took a 15.00 Lyft ride from the other side of the city in 100 degree heat to show and and now they are telling me I am not on the schedule at all. I waited until 12pm for my scheduled time and no one arrived. Four days later I still have not received a phone call in regards to my missed appointment. If this is how the company runs and treats potential tenants I can only imagine how the experience will be living there.

Had I read these reviews I would not have bothered to try to tour. I tried requesting an appointment for a tour about fives times. I filled out the web form - no response. Then I called Bernstein Mgmt Co. and left four voicemails. It seems with the collective resources of BMC, not a single person is capable of answering the phone or responding to voicemails and emails. Then just for fun I decided to walk there since I live around block and of course no one at the lease office and no one answers the lease office phone (number is printed on the front door). If awards were given for incompetence, BMC would be a champion! Except they are not and so BMC is a dump just like McDonalds across the way!

I would not recommend living here. They have stolen money from me by not giving me my deposit back from my keys, because they either lost or forged records. They don't secure the building so random people come. They have roaches and super cheap paint, so the walls are dirty. The hallways smell like trash. Dogs pee on the carpet and they don't clean it. The walls are super thin. There is so much turnover in the leasing office that there isn't a reliable person to talk. Do yourself a favor and find somewhere else.

The location is great. You can walk to Anacostia Park or bike, walk to Eastern Market and close to a metro station. The apartments themselves are great a little small and pricey but you are paying for location and more updates. Why 3 stars? The roaches! I was the first person to occupy my apartment. After a week I saw roaches. When I brought it up to the leasing office they tried to make it appear as if i brought the roaches into my apartment. I mentioned maybe they were coming in under the door and a door sweep was placed. They came and sprayed I was told it would be sprayed several more times after that over a course of weeks. Well the second visit was someone placing sticky traps into my apartment. That was 6 months ago! I guess the roaches became worst and more tenants were complaining so recently in the last couple weeks the entire building was spayed. I have no clue who their exterminators are because it would make sense to have everyone in the building put down some form of baits or traps. Pet friendly ones of course. I have yet to hear when they may be returning. That email hasn't been answered If you don't mind bugs then it's the place for you. It's a great location Update: a new company has purchased the building and things have changed for the better. As for my unit the roach problem has improved.

I rarely write a bad review about anything, but potential tenants deserve a warning. You will hear everything outside on the street, an noise from other apartments. There are small bugs, an ongoing issue, and, we have had a flooding problem for nearly five months. Giant puddles appear out of the wall, and up through the floor every time it rains. It's not all the new management company's fault (the issues with the building's foundation were likely pre-existing before their purchase), but nothing has been done to resolve the problem (a caveat: one person came by to confirm flooding, and without any notice there was "water testing" which completely flooded the bedroom floor). My roommate's belongings are soaked any time it rains. I recommend that renters stay away until they completely fix the sound insulation between units, sound insulation for the plumbing (flushing toilets in other units are startling, and are best described as a sudden waterfall), figuring out how to lower the sound through the windows to block out some street noise, and finally, fixing the leaking foundation. Until these repairs are complete, they should lower the pricing of the apartments.

If you like noise this is the place for you. God help you if you land one of the units facing Penn Ave. You'll be listening to the sweet sounds of big rig construction vehicles, trucks, motorcycles, and metro buses, from sun up to sun down. And the windows won't help. They're not insulated at all. Keep in mind the location of the building is right off the major highway into the city. So every major construction vehicle uses the penn ave exit to come into the city. And they start as early as 4am. Yeayy! Not only traffic noise will be a problem. On days I worked from home the housekeeping and maintenance were constantly banging about in the hallways, neighbors are always playing their music too loud for shared walls, people in the streets screaming, every piece of trash down the trash chute can be heard, random banging and hammering at all hours of the day and night, etc. miscellaneously loud noises coming from everywhere. I wore ear plugs during the day just because. Probably one of the loudest places I've ever lived considering the quiet residential location. It's just a bad geographical location in good neighborhood.

The staff at the Avenue Apartments are always very helpful, and he maintenance are on point. I love the dog park for my little Snooky.

DONT LIVE HERE! You will never enjoy your apt or get a good night's sleep. The windows are thin and you hear every single thing outside. There's a big metal grate that makes a horrendous sound when cars drive over. Building is also not cleaned regularly! Trust me find anyplace else to live!

This is an awesome community! It is a bit pricey but the location is key. If you like the city night life you are in the right place. The management is on top of everything. If I have an issue I just send an email. They promptly respond with a solution or to let you know they are working on it. I'm giving the community 4 stars because in the last month I have seen more roaches than I have ever seen in my 30 years in Florida. Management has sent pest control in twice but it doesn't seem to be help, it's actually only getting worse. Overall, we are very pleased with the 1600 Penn apartments.