Toronto Ïce Condominiums at York Centre | 234.07m | 67s | Lanterra | a—A

[Richard White]

Read all the reviews here: https://www.google.com/search?q=ice...e..69i57j0.2423j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#
This is the most liked review:

Please - never live here. Moving out of this condo was such a relief. What a stressful place to live. Three elevators for a highrise that size is not enough to begin with, and for 9 of the 13 months I lived there, at least one, sometimes two, and occasionally all three were broken. The elevator wait times were often 20+ mins. Twice, I got stuck in the elevator. The facilities, although nice, were consistently closed for repair (in fact, the gym had been closed for four straight months when I moved).
The short term rental traffic is constant and hectic - hotel volume traffic, with no hotel staff to manage it. With this comes people who have no concern or respect for the property or people who actually live there.
Fire alarms go off weekly, there is often trash, alcohol containers, cigarettes etc. in the common areas, and the cops visit the building somewhat regularly (including the SWAT team on my last night there). The chaos of this building is exacerbated by the hectic area in general, particularly on game day. To top it off, the management office was extremely rude from move in to move out, and obviously ineffective given the laundry list of issues with the building. I’m just glad I was a renter and was not paying a mortgage and condo fees for such a garbage place.

I worked at the Burano just as they were building Ice and I knew the staff who built it

I lovingly refer to this as Lanterras experimental phase where they were trying new ideas and hoping they worked.

At the Burano they had 3 elevators for the highrise and low rise banks despite only having 55 floors in the condominium and Ice was built the same. This presented a problem with the elevators and the long waits. It would have been better to have 6 elevators serving all floors like any normal 50 story building.

At the time Lanterra was about cheap quality and flashy designs. They had built the Murano just before and that was also a disaster.

When they moved onto Maple Leaf Square they were starting to move in the right direction having learned from their mistakes but it wasnt until they completed Riverhouse that they truly fixed the problem.

 

[Richard White]

the cops visit the building somewhat regularly (including the SWAT team on my last night there).

I actually joked with a cop last week about that. He joked about how it would be easier for TPS to buy a unit there and set up a detachment given how often they are there.

 

[karledice]

I worked at the Burano just as they were building Ice and I knew the staff who built it

I lovingly refer to this as Lanterras experimental phase where they were trying new ideas and hoping they worked.

At the Burano they had 3 elevators for the highrise and low rise banks despite only having 55 floors in the condominium and Ice was built the same. This presented a problem with the elevators and the long waits. It would have been better to have 6 elevators serving all floors like any normal 50 story building.

At the time Lanterra was about cheap quality and flashy designs. They had built the Murano just before and that was also a disaster.

When they moved onto Maple Leaf Square they were starting to move in the right direction having learned from their mistakes but it wasnt until they completed Riverhouse that they truly fixed the problem.

Great intel! and elevator issue is only one of many in this building.
It is unfortunate it tainted their reputation because all these reviews are public to anyone looking at these units

 

[DarkSideDenizen]

 

[Big Daddy]

Read all the reviews here: https://www.google.com/search?q=ice...e..69i57j0.2423j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#
These are the most liked review:

Please - never live here. Moving out of this condo was such a relief. What a stressful place to live. Three elevators for a highrise that size is not enough to begin with, and for 9 of the 13 months I lived there, at least one, sometimes two, and occasionally all three were broken. The elevator wait times were often 20+ mins. Twice, I got stuck in the elevator. The facilities, although nice, were consistently closed for repair (in fact, the gym had been closed for four straight months when I moved).
The short term rental traffic is constant and hectic - hotel volume traffic, with no hotel staff to manage it. With this comes people who have no concern or respect for the property or people who actually live there.
Fire alarms go off weekly, there is often trash, alcohol containers, cigarettes etc. in the common areas, and the cops visit the building somewhat regularly (including the SWAT team on my last night there). The chaos of this building is exacerbated by the hectic area in general, particularly on game day. To top it off, the management office was extremely rude from move in to move out, and obviously ineffective given the laundry list of issues with the building. I’m just glad I was a renter and was not paying a mortgage and condo fees for such a garbage place.

---------------------------------------

I lived here for a little over a year and it sucked. I will not disclose which floor or tower I lived in but I was above the 40th. I shared my floor with the most inconsiderate neighbours I have ever experienced in my life. The ICE towers have a university/college dorm room vibe to them since many of the residents seem to be younger and are having difficulty transitioning into adulthood and out of “party mode”.

Firstly, there was a party on my floor almost weekly (sometimes two or three in a seven day period particularly in the summer). I always knew when my immediate neighbour was drinking because his voice would get so loud I could hear his conversations word for word through my walls. His friends were heavy drug users and I would not be able to have my window door open because of all the pot they were smoking. One of the brunette girls who lived down the hall was… let’s just say… “popular” with men (especially of African descent). She would get visits from four or five different men in a weekend. At first I thought that maybe she just “gets around a bit” but now I suspect that she was probably a low end escort. I remember leaving my apartment early on a Sunday morning and as I walked past her unit I could clearly hear her still partying with several men at five or six in the morning. Another unit on my floor was available on air bnb and it wasn’t unusual to have large groups of random people wandering around the hallways with luggage noisily trying to find the room they rented. I would often get woken up at three in the morning when the air bnb group drunkenly returned and attempted to find their room… again… after they returned from whatever evet they were in town for. This was just my floor, as far as the building goes…

If there is a Blue Jays, Leafs, or Raptors game going on (which as you can guess is frequent) you can pretty much guarantee there will be multiple parties on multiple floors and the lobby will be filled with drunken idiots all night. The concierge desk (a resource that is meant for the actual residents of the building) was constantly flooded with short term renter tourists asking ridiculous questions. I often couldn’t pick up my packages because there was a lineup of luggage wielding morons asking the concierge what restaurants where around and where they could park during their visit to the CN Tower... Yeah. There is also something about being in a tall building in the big city that inspired residents and their guests to throw things (or just spit) out their windows and watch it fall to the street below (I wish I were joking). Apparently there were a few near misses that probably would have resulted in a serious injury or death of a pedestrian below had they not been just a few feet out of the way.

Because there are so many people in these buildings false fire alarms are at least weekly occurrences. I would say two fire alarms per week were normal (one during the work week and one or two during the weekend). Once a fire alarm is activated it is probably going to be sounding for at least half an hour (the fire department has to respond, investigate the triggered alarm, and THEN deactivate the alarm). You can imagine this was a lot of fun around midnight on a work night because you are going to lose an hour of sleep that evening. People also think they can smoke in the stairwell without triggering the alarm (FYI - you cannot as there are detectors there as well). The elevators… I don’t have much to add here… but two elevators for the highrise is completely inadequate.

The location is great… but it does not mean very much because since you cannot easily get in and out of the building due to the insufficient elevators (which frequently break down). I would not consider buying or renting a unit in the ICE towers and I would not encourage others to do so on a long term basis. Steer clear of this one!

This speaks to the vast number of inexperienced "landlords" that unfortunately make up the biggest part of the current rental system in T.O. A true investor would be very concerned about the long term value of the building because rental cash-flow isn't going to make money for anyone. Where an investor stands to make his/her return is in the equity they can build over ten or fifteen years. Anyone who has done the math can vouch for this. If the building falls apart, nobody wins. Unfortunately there are a lot of investors who see the quick cash of short -term rentals and don't see the true value of their units being destroyed. This is the ultimate plague for Toronto. Thousands of these quick built, poor quality buildings popping up all over downtown and no clear management as there would be with a true rental building.

St.James town of the future.

 

[TheSix]

This speaks to the vast number of inexperienced "landlords" that unfortunately make up the biggest part of the current rental system in T.O. A true investor would be very concerned about the long term value of the building because rental cash-flow isn't going to make money for anyone. Where an investor stands to make his/her return is in the equity they can build over ten or fifteen years. Anyone who has done the math can vouch for this. If the building falls apart, nobody wins. Unfortunately there are a lot of investors who see the quick cash of short -term rentals and don't see the true value of their units being destroyed. This is the ultimate plague for Toronto. Thousands of these quick built, poor quality buildings popping up all over downtown and no clear management as there would be with a true rental building.

St.James town of the future.

While I agree with your point on the vast number of inexperienced "landlords" in this building and across DT, your observations are far cry from anywhere close to the history or neighbourhood that we know as St. James Town. An area I actually think is becoming quite nice.

On the ICE condos front, they are a residential first building. Yes, while they are heavily rented because of the current policy of the condo in regards to short-term rentals, this will slowly change as the new AirBnb rules become enforced. These and most residential buildings in the South Core are not rental buildings like most of the towers in St. James Town, these are owned condos. ICE in particular is in the centre of the financial capital of Canada (arguably one of the strongest in the world), blocks from one of the most popular entertainment venues in Canada, and it's front door is connected to the PATH and a few minutes walk to our transportation hub, a walk to the revitalized waterfront, numerous grocery stores in arms reach and unlimited restaurant options.

Please elaborate how this pair of condo towers are deemed to have the same fate as St. James Town?

 

[TheKingEast]

lol @ St James Town. Get a grip.

 

[WeirdFishes]

This speaks to the vast number of inexperienced "landlords" that unfortunately make up the biggest part of the current rental system in T.O. A true investor would be very concerned about the long term value of the building because rental cash-flow isn't going to make money for anyone. Where an investor stands to make his/her return is in the equity they can build over ten or fifteen years. Anyone who has done the math can vouch for this. If the building falls apart, nobody wins. Unfortunately there are a lot of investors who see the quick cash of short -term rentals and don't see the true value of their units being destroyed. This is the ultimate plague for Toronto. Thousands of these quick built, poor quality buildings popping up all over downtown and no clear management as there would be with a true rental building.

St.James town of the future.

Seriously? St. James town of the future? You just lost all credit in my books.

 

[DSC]

Seriously? St. James town of the future? You just lost all credit in my books.

Though I certainly hope this does NOT happen with ICE and a few other areas of the current downtown condo-building boom. It is certainly not uncommon for neighbourhoods to start off as 'desirable" and move down to "undesirable" (and then often back again. (Jarvis and Sherbourne streets are examples here.)

it is worth remembering how St James Town developed, and what has happened to it 50+ years later. There ARE some similarities, so far. Both quotes from Wikipedia. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._James_Town )

"The plan for St. James Town's highrises was conceived in the 1950s to house young middle class residents who worked Downtown". and

"The buildings didn't attract the large number of demographics the developer envisioned, as well the neighborhood was designed with a lack of proper amenities to support the density spike........ After the first generation of tenants left the buildings, the area quickly started attracting tenants of a lower income bracket."

 

[TheSix]

Though I certainly hope this does NOT happen with ICE and a few other areas of the current downtown condo-building boom. It is certainly not uncommon for neighbourhoods to start off as 'desirable" and move down to "undesirable" (and then often back again. (Jarvis and Sherbourne streets are examples here.)

it is worth remembering how St James Town developed, and what has happened to it 50+ years later. There ARE some similarities, so far. Both quotes from Wikipedia. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._James_Town )

"The plan for St. James Town's highrises was conceived in the 1950s to house young middle class residents who worked Downtown". and

"The buildings didn't attract the large number of demographics the developer envisioned, as well the neighborhood was designed with a lack of proper amenities to support the density spike........ After the first generation of tenants left the buildings, the area quickly started attracting tenants of a lower income bracket."

While I don't agree with the St James town comparison, I see your point. Your rationale also supports the opposite. ICE could only get better with time. What ICE has over St. James town is the infrastructure. Within blocks you have built office buildings, entertainment venues, grocery stores, retail, restaurants and Canada's busiest transportation hub.

 

[ShonTron]

With broken elevators and an infestation of Airbnb units, those condo towers sound like a disaster.

I wonder if the extra wear and tear caused by Airbnb traffic helped contribute to the elevator problems.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/it-s-a-risky-building-high-rise-dwellers-lament-broken-elevators-amid-covid-19-crisis-1.5538573

 

[Richard White]

With broken elevators and an infestation of Airbnb units, those condo towers sound like a disaster.

I wonder if the extra wear and tear caused by Airbnb traffic helped contribute to the elevator problems.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/it-s-a-risky-building-high-rise-dwellers-lament-broken-elevators-amid-covid-19-crisis-1.5538573

It is likely. I work at Maple Leaf Square and our elevators are just as bad. I've worked at condos with little to no STRs and the elevators work fine.

 

[Regigate]

I wonder if the extra wear and tear caused by Airbnb traffic helped contribute to the elevator problems.

I get the impression it's more the same neglect that a Board and Management show towards eliminating STRs, that would also contribute to neglect of proper maintenance of elevators. After all, it's not like STR guests are riding the elevators materially more than longer term residents.

 

[Richard White]

I get the impression it's more the same neglect that a Board and Management show towards eliminating STRs, that would also contribute to neglect of proper maintenance of elevators. After all, it's not like STR guests are riding the elevators materially more than longer term residents.

The problem is that it you can't just ban STRs at a Condo Board Meeting, you need an 80% majority of owners to ban them. This has to be done at a special owners meeting where they would vote to change the condos governing documents (declaration)

Boards and Management want to ban them but they can't. In a building like Ice where majority of the owners are STRs you wouldn't have the numbers to change the condo declaration.

 

[Richard White]

After all, it's not like STR guests are riding the elevators materially more than longer term residents

The problem is that STR guests hold elevators open to cram in all their luggage while younger guests press all the buttons thinking it is a funny joke.

The fact is that many STR guests don't give two s***s about the buildings they stay in.

Older, more mature guests are fine but younger 20-something partying idiots destroy buildings.