Silverback Development

Oct 26th, 2021

Silverback has made my life a living hell. I purchased a new apartment in the Long Island City Hero building, and in the first year we have had building multiple floods, mold, health hazards like proper water heater drainage missing, air conditioner parts missing, no gym and decor which is cheap and a total departure from the offering plan. Contractors should be able to fix the issues quickly, I suspect Silverback must not be paying them because the contractors have not been present to finish. I lose tons of sleep over these issues.
Aug 21st, 2021

I am a resident owner in the HERO LIC building sold by Silverback Development. I would warn prospective buyers of any of their developments to hold off on buying. 1. Amenities and common spaces are not done and are way behind schedule. They were promised to be done back in September 2020. And from the progress we have seen so far, they don't look as nice and upscale as the marketing renderings: just visit the building yourself and you will see. The amenities spaces that are not done include: garden, resident lounge, rooftop outside area, 6th floor veranda. The rooftop lounge has some furniture but doesn't look as nice as the renderings and is missing some elements that were marketed, such as pool table and a bar. It's also smaller than shown in the renderings and can't fit everything shown in the renderings. 2. Gym closed due to water damage due to water pipe bursting during the winter freeze. Mold damage to that floor and the units below. The gym remains closed due to the water damage. 3. Lots of small craftmanship and quality issues. When I did my walk through, my unit was filthy and many cosmetic issues were covered by the filth. You have to wonder if this was done on purpose. 4. Every unit's ac/heating units are missing a component, which makes them malfunction. Sponsor has not fixed this issue despite it being months already. 5. Sponsor absolutely wouldn't communicate to the residents despite multiple attempts and letters to reach them. Feels like they are just stonewalling us and hoping to walk away from the problems after they finish selling the units. Owners had to literally protest in the lobby to warn potential buyers for the sponsor to actually agree to schedule a meeting to discuss the problems. 6. Only 1 of 2 elevators in the building was working for over a year. The building opened to residents a year ago. Both elevators are still in an unpolished state. 7. Bathroom vents on all lower floors have no airflow. They're supposed to (so if you put a tissue paper next to it, it'll stick to the vent) but from what I hear, it's not working because the contractor hasn't been paid yet. 8. Everyone in the building has reported getting absurdly high electricity bills: we're talking in the area of $500 for a 1-bedroom. We haven't figured out what's wrong but the issue seems to be unreasonably high measured consumption rather than the rate per kWh. The submetering company in the building is QuadLogic (you don't open an account with ConEd like you typically do), and QuadLogic is extremely shady and untrustworthy based on our research. QuadLogic refuses to send someone to check on the correctness of the submetering unless they're paid $200 per meter. UPDATE: bills have been corrected to a more acceptable level and those who overpaid are being credited. We are still unsure of what the problem was and whether the numbers were getting now are still accurate. 10. All units' (mine included) water heaters are missing a drainage pipe to the Temporary Pressure Release Valve. Google it. Because the water heaters are mounted high above the washer/dryer in a closet, boiling hot water released through this valve would fly right in your face if you were standing under it. This is a safety hazard. I'll update this review with the latest info as things change and hopefully get fixed.
Aug 4th, 2021

I also purchased a unit in HERO and I fully agree with the reviews by Kevin and Ray. I want to additionally mention that having the items in the contract and legally protecting yourself when you purchase may not be enough, because even if you get the missing items in the contract, Silverback may still not deliver! We closed on June 3. We have the missing plenum as a walkthrough punchlist item, and we have still yet to receive the missing part. We have the TPRV drainage pipe in both our contract and in our punchlist. In the contract the language says explicitly "add extension to the floor" but when they finally installed the pipe on July 27 they added it as shown in these images, where the pipe ends just above our dryer unit. Silverback has given me no avenue to communicate with them directly about these issues -- they reject all my phone calls and emails, and I have to communicate with them via our building management company (and they have not responded to any of those communications). Our attorney may have been able to make some headway, I am not sure exactly, but I would note that today is August 4, significantly after the legal window by which they had to fulfill their contractual obligations, and we still do not have the plenum or the pipe to the specifications that were agreed upon. Potential buyers, keep this in mind when purchasing from HERO or anywhere else Silverback is the seller.
Jul 17th, 2021

I own a unit in Hero LIC, one of Silverback's new developments. There have been numerous issues in the building, which we have communicated to the sponsor over and over again, yet have seen very little and slow movement on addressing those issues. I recommend you check out the Google maps review I left on that building for more details. As others have mentioned, the actual outcomes we're seeing (such as how nice the common spaces, furniture, decor, installations, and amenities are) vastly fall short of the renderings that were marketed to us. So far, I am disappointed, and gravely concerned that the sponsor is trying to finish selling the units, finish the building as cheaply as possible, and then walk away without fully addressing all the issues that the owners have with the building. For this reason, I would warn any prospective buyers of Silverback's developments to take extreme caution in protecting themselves: in your legal contracts, as well as in making pessimistic assumptions about the future rather than optimistic. For example, if a building is still being constructed, assume things will turn out worse than expected. Wait until a building is fully completed before buying, and don't assume that anything more will be delivered (for example, everyone's units in Hero LIC are missing the TPRV drainage pipe on their water heaters, which is a safety hazard, and everyone's units' AC units are missing a part called a plenum, so the temperature reading is inaccurate and causes the AC unit to malfunction).
Jul 16th, 2021