Pam A.
Yelp
I have been living at the Whitney going on 13 years now. I've seen many changes over the years. Most changes have been great. The best part about living here is the community we have. I have so many friends in the building, not just acquaintances but real friends. We get together often and go places together on a regular basis. And what helps our community is the fact that the Whitney staff takes such great care of us.
Since the new property manager, Jessica Hendrix came on last year she has been the best one yet since I've lived here. That's not to say previous managers were not great. It's just that Jessica far exceeds the others. First, she really listens to you about anything you need to tell her. Speaking from personal experience, I was going through a bad time personally and was extremely angry over what were really small issues and took it out on Jessica. Not only did she respond immediately to my concerns, she remained calm and caring and listened. I was wrong to be so angry and apologized. She gave me the time to explain to her where my anger was coming from and she understood and she didn't get angry back at me at any time. She just wanted to make sure I was okay and she did whatever she could do to correct the issues I had with the problems that came about to begin with. I didn't deserve her forgiveness or kindness, yet she still gave it to me. I've never seen a property manager stay so cool, calm and kind when a tenant (me) had gone off on her. I've seen her handle other tenants in kind when they've been upset about an issue with the building or whatever issue that made them upset. She will do her best to make things right. I can't speak highly enough of her. Jessica also has upgraded needed things in and around the building that have been way overdue and has plans for future things to make living here even better. I hope she never leaves.
We (the residents) have so much more to be happy for about living here. The best person is our day time concierge. Her name is Lorraine. I call her Rainey. Without her the building would not function as well as it does. She loves all the residents and will give you the shirt off her back. She is professional, kind, extremely helpful and is a great friend to many of us living here. She works tirelessly to put on all our events at the Whitney (and we have many events all year long) and is great at it. She works long hours and participates in our community activities. She's one of us. She's just amazing and that's no exaggeration. Whenever she's off for a even a day you can tell she's not here because some things fall by the waist side. Not real bad things, but you just know it's her day off. Rainey takes such great care of us just as Jessica does. Rainey goes out of her way to help everyone, even our four legged friends. She's always at the ready to greet everyone's pup. She's become such a dear and close friend to me. I hope she never leaves either. Again, I can't say enough great things about her.
The maintenance staff is superior. Marcus, Francisco and Javier are fantastic. They respond to the needs of the residents and the building very quickly. They're so friendly and work very hard every day. Marcus and Francisco are fairly new but you wouldn't know it, they fit right in. Javier has been here the longest and I'm happy he has stayed on. He too is always willing to help a resident out at a moments notice.
The other long time staff member I want to acknowledge is Donato. He is the weekend concierge on midnights. Again, such a friendly person and always up to talk sports with you for hours, amongst other interests. We've been fortunate to have some of the best concierges here over the years. Sadly many of them have moved on and are very much missed. The new people who come to take there place have big shoes to fill. I'll mention them by name because that's how important, helpful and kind they were and were some of the best we've ever had. They are Claudia, Maria, Charles and Renee. I miss them so much.
While no building is ever perfect, the Whitney is darn close to it. Bottom line is, it's the community and staff that makes it a joy to live here. While other new apartments have been built over the years lately, they can't come close to The Whitney. They may have more or better amenities, fancier decor and other things, however, all the "bling" they may have isn't important as the community we have here. It's like a big family for most of us living here. I plan to stay for many more years until I retire and move back to Texas. I wouldn't want to move to another apartment complex anywhere else in Bethesda.
If I have inadvertently left someone out I'm so sorry.
Pam Aarhus