500 Lake Shore Drive

My fiancé and I have lived in the building for a year now and just signed our second lease. We absolutely love the modern building and high end amenities, but what really makes the experience worth the cost is the staff. This is the only building in Chicago that has «standing staff» and it makes the biggest difference. The staff is attentive, knows most residents by name, and makes the extra effort to make your life easy. We have lived in 4 other high end apartment buildings and I can honestly say 500 LSD tops them all! In the summer the pool deck is managed perfectly with a balance of security and friendly staff, making it enjoyable.

I love this building because of the location. After all it’s all about Location Location Location! The views of the Great Lake are amazing. The sunrises are breathtaking. I love the changes of the color of the water.
When the sun hits it, it makes it look like its shinning and glistening, when the clouds are dark it looks grayish, and when the skies are clear and blue, the water looks deep blue!
The amenities are fantastic. The gym is large with state of the art equipment. Even the views from the gym are incredible. The staff is polite and attentive. Work orders are completed the same day.

I have lived in this building since December of 2015 and find it superior in every way. The building is immaculate. The concierge staff is outstanding. The maintenance and engineering team have been great. The diversity of the tenants here is refreshing. There have been no loud disruptive parties, no dog barking or any of the complaints that I see posted here. I must say, I am a retiree and familiar with luxury properties, not a kid with low expectations. 500 Lake Shore Drive does am amazing job. I would recommend to family and friends without hesitation.

During my time living here I had a remarkable experience. Easily a five star building in my book and I would not hesitate to recommend the building to anyone.
The outside of the building looks modern and new with the all-​glass exterior. The finishes and interior decorating from the lobby to the individual units are well thought out and luxurious. All of the staff I have interacted with have been very friendly and helpful. The lobby is staffed ²⁴⁄₇ and hold any packages behind the desk. They are also able to coordinate deliveries, visitors, and assist with the scheduling of moves. There is a dedicated service elevator that can be reserved for moves which prevents the main lobby elevators from getting tied up and keeps any move-​ins or move-​outs from getting delayed by crowded elevators.
The building is dog friendly and you will often see a lot of dogs going up and down the elevators. I never heard any dogs barking from within my own apartment. There is a dog park directly across the street from the building so most of the residents I saw with dogs would take them to the dog park.
The pool deck area can get packed during the nice weather, but other times there is usually plenty of space to hang out up there. There are several top notch Weber grills up there that are open to residents. The rest of the lounge area is great for hanging out or bringing up guests. There are also large spaces that can be reserved for parties. The computers and the printer/​scanner/​copier also came in handy frequently.
The gym in the building is incredibly convenient and truly worthy of being called a gym. It doesn’t have every piece of equipment that a dedicated gym may have but it certainly has enough to accommodate many different exercise programs. This was never crowded when I went in the mornings and everything was clean and well taken care of. It’s great to just be able to take the elevator to the 12^th floor and be at a gym.
The units themselves look impeccable. Everything seems carefully planned out and well made. I rarely heard anything through the walls. The floor seems to be scratch resistant and is a great material. The bathroom with an oversized walk-​in glass shower and large mirror cabinets looked luxurious and offered plenty of space.
All of the appliances in the kitchen are stainless steel. The only thing I would have liked was a built-​in microwave. The units all come with a washer/​dryer which is a nice upgrade compared to buildings where you have to share a laundry room with the rest of your floor or the entire building. The views from the unit were incredible and the floor to ceiling windows significantly brighten the interior and made the rooms feel larger.
Work order issues were always resolved either the same day or the next day. The trash chutes and garbage rooms were checked frequently and never got out of hand.
Parking in the attached garage was convenient, albeit a little pricey. Once you register as a monthly resident with the parking garage you get a transponder to put on your windshield and can breeze in and out of the garage. It is open the public so unless you get one of the resident reserved spots on the top floors of the garage parking can fill up, but I’ve never had an issue.
The area around the apartment is in walking distance to a Whole Foods, Target, AMC, Walgreens, plenty of restaurants, Michigan avenue, Navy Pier, the Lake Shore Drive trail, Pinstripes, and the Grand red line ‘L’ stop. A little bit of a longer walk will get you to Trader Joe’s, USPS, a mall, Millennium park, and ample other spots of interest. There are also several major bus lines that originate and end from Navy Pier that have a stops right outside of the building. Two Divvy bike rental stations within a three minute walk round out the public transportation options. I found that that the building was well-​placed for everything I needed. I felt like the area around the building was safe and would generally quiet down in the evenings.
I could not have imagined a better living experience and would absolutely try to come back to this building if I were to move to Chicago again.

My partner and I were among the very first residents to move into the building when it was new. The first few weeks were heaven because we had the building and amenities almost to ourselves and the staff had not yet started to turn over or become burned out from the frat and sorority-​like residents.
The building is stunning, among the best we have lived in anywhere in Chicago, LA, or New York. Related Rentals which is from New York, knows luxury rentals better than anyone and in some ways, I still miss our apartment because we had a corner two bedroom overlooking the lake and the views were incredible and the interior finishes sophisticated for a rental. I also loved the Equinox gym and really enjoyed running while looking at the lake and city.
Then the students moved in and management was completely overwhelmed. Who knew there were so many entitled, trust fund kids in one neighborhood who could afford (well, who’s mommy and daddy could afford) rent here?
As other posters have noted, loud parties every night of the week became the norm, we smelled cigarette and weed smoke all of the time and the pool was out of control and not in a good way. One night we saw a drunk dude in a horse head mask have sex with a woman in the hot tub while their buddies got naked in the pool. Classy. Complaints to the totally inexperienced and inept management were met with vague promises but basically nothing was done.
The doorman and concierge staff were equally frustrated and we felt sorry for them because when the building opened, all but one were excellent and tried to enforce the rules but received zero support from building management.
Related’s buildings in New York are generally very well run and I am surprised that they would entrust such a beautiful property to unqualified management in Chicago or allow the building to became the luxury frat house that it is. Simply not allowing guarantors would get rid of the problem residents and encourage professionals who actually work for their money to move in instead. The building itself is amazing. The community is awful and I would never recommend it to friends or family over the age of 20.

Just a couple of things — I have lived on the 28^th floor for quite some time and as the other reviewer indicated the entire floor has a strong odor of weed. We all talk as neighbors but the management refuses to do anything other than place a letter under our door that says it’s against the law and building policy to smoke marijuana in the building. At least 3 nights a week I smell the strong odor of weed and I have a massive headache. Not sure who else to report this to? Guess I need to send a letter directly to Stephen Ross and Jeff Blau.
Also, we had a shooting just outside the building on Grand Ave and the bullet actually shot through the lobby windows. We didn’t get a note under our doors though but an email that simply said there was a incident and the glass in the lobby was being replaced. I have a copy of the police report and there was a shooting with multiple gun shots last week 9−16−15. Nobody injured but it is sad that the Related management does nothing about the illegal marijuana being smoked on our floor and refuses to tell the residents that gunfire actually shot through the lobby windows. Unbelievable. Again, not one word about the shooting from the management team. Check it out people

I really want to like 500 Lake Shore Drive but we have had too many issues and too many property managers/​staff since we moved in.
Pros:
Location — great location although public transportation can be limited this Far East.
New building — for the most part the building still looks new.
Kitchen — really love the finishes in the kitchen.
Cons:
Management: Haley is just as incompetent as the previous manager. I honestly don’t know where Related finds these property managers. Related is a great company and should not hand over a building to clearly unqualified people.
— we had our car broke into our 3^rd night living here. The guy literally walked in past our parking ‘security guard’ who only called 911 and did not try to stop the guy from entering the building. Naturally I was furious as this guy was only in the garage for 3 minutes which means he cased the garage prior so that he knew exactly what cars he wanted to break into. The old property manager tried to give us the run around and I had to hire an attorney to make Related pay for my deductible. As other reviews have stated — the garage is very busy and a lot of people come and go, your car/​you are never really safe… Even in the nesting area.
— We moved into the building in January with the expectation that when a one bedroom apartment came available — we would move. The leasing office and management have made it so difficult for us to try and move that we will just sublease our apartment and move back to Aqua in LakeShore East!
Staff:
— We have lived at various high end buildings around the city and have always loved our doorman and other staff. 500 doorman are worthless and quite frankly — extremely frustrating to deal with. Anytime they call to let us know we have a food delivery instead of saying «Hi Mark, I have a food delivery here for you — is it okay for me to send them up? … Great I’ll send your food up now. Have a gray night» we get «your food is here and on its way up» and then they hang up without us ever getting a word in.
Bryan… I think is the name of the admin in the management office — not sure what he even does. I think he has been with the building the longest but for some reason we don’t really know what he does.
Residents:
We live on the 28^th floor and the smell of weed is always prevalent. I have talked with other residents on the floor and we all know what unit it is coming from. We have told management over and over again about the unit and how frustrating it is to have visitors or family visiting and it smell like you live back in a college dorm.
The building seems to be a party place. We have had issues with the people above us partying until 3:00 AM on a TUESDAY with load music and a girl who laughed like a dying animal.
You might as well avoid the pool in the summer if you have family or kids in town. I had family visiting and we decided to head down to the hot tub. My two cousins who are 9 and 10 got to hear a story about one of the residents ‘Fu**** stripers in Mexico’ and how he prefers a certain type of mouth to give him oral sex. Fast forward 30 minutes and my cousin needs to go to the bathroom. I show him the men’s bathroom/​pool locker room and as soon as we walk in there is a guy doing two lines of blow on the bathroom counter.
Honestly for the amount of money we pay to live here, Aqua is a much better place to live or even Loews (which has way better amenities). If you are someone who works hard and wants to enjoy the time you do get away from work — don’t move here. You’ll find yourself finding every reason to stay at hotels around the city just to avoid the circus that is 500 North Lake Shore Drive.

Knowing what I know now, I would never have moved into this building. I have lived in a one block radius for 30 years. It is overrun with dogs. I listen to dogs bark virtually every hour of every day. There have been dog feces in the entryway and urine in the elevators. Rules about dogs in the lease agreement are never adhered to or enforced.
Other sources of noise include traffic from LSD, abundant construction in the neighborhood and unnecessary noise within the building. Specifically, unit doors are designed to SLAM shut. The noise is extremely loud and very stressful. Other problems I have had to deal with: water pipes have burst forcing me to vacate the apartment for a few days with no compensation, railings on the deck have had to be replaced due to safety concerns, the porte-​cochere replaced due to poor construction, etc.
I would also note that the crowds at Navy Pier park in this building, so when friends come to visit they’re shut out of the parking.

—-Editing this review from 3 stars to 5
One of newest 500 North Lake Shore Drive representative was made aware of our parking incident. This individual has bent over backwards to resolve this matter and has given us alternative choices that we were uninformed initially regarding the parking spaces.
There are 10 floors to the parking structure and the top three floors are well secured /​gated (& wire fenced) private residence only monthly paid parking. The transponder is scanned twice from the first entrance, as well as when you get to level 8 for the garage door to open. And it is scanned again twice on your way out.
We were aware of the ‘preferred parking’ in floors 1 – 7; spaces by the elevators, however not assigned. We couldn’t really park there, since our Blue Link signal is weakened in those areas (for winter auto start). So, we were originally parking anywhere where there’s a spot available (usually on level 4, across the elevator, and closest to the glass wall).
So, the top three floors pretty much have assigned (numbered) ‘reserve parking’ which are similar spaces as the ‘preferred parking’ on the lower floors. And open parking /​unassigned for anybody allowed to park there.
Oh! And the key fob is required for the elevator to be able to access floors 8 – 10.
My boyfriend, and I specially, feels much safer for our vehicle, as well as for myself walking to my car at around 5am when I leave for work. He use to walk me in the morning. The parking lot already gets busy before 6am from the construction crew in the area. Besides the top three floors, the elevators, as well as the main lobby have security cameras.
Also, for future reference. In the first floor of the parking garage are parking for future residents, available zip cars, as well as hybrid specific spaces.
Soooooo, finally! We feel like we’ve found our perfect apartment in Streeterville! :D

this is a great place overall. i have been living here for 2 yrs. it is expensive, but i feel you get what you pay for. the amenities are amazing, and the utility package is very reasonable. there are a lot of dogs. i love dogs but some residents don’t take care of them properly and you can hear them barking all day, e.g. if they are left home alone too long. i am usually away from my apt at work all day so it’s not an issue for me, but if i wanted to work at home, it may be a problem. the rare times when i am at home during the day, i can hear dog barks above, below, left, right, a feeling like i am living in a kennel. this does not happen too often but is the only reason why i don’t give 5 stars. it would be better if the some floors or areas of the building were designated as ‘no pet’ areas bc this probably would not bother everyone to the same extent. also — the staff is extremely helpful in correcting any noise issues (loud stereos, sub woofers, parties). i complained once and the issue was immediately resolved.
Also i am not sure what Anna R. is talking about RE the parking situation. there is a nested area on the top two floors ONLY for residents that is enclosed by a secure garage door. i have not had any issues with my car. it is very safe. its expensive, but safe.

I’ve been living here 2 months now, and I *adore* it. Here are just some of the many, many reasons:
1. My apartment is gorgeous. It looks exactly like the model pictures on their website, and it was immaculately clean when I moved in. I have a studio, but it is spacious, and the clever way the closets and kitchen cabinets are designed allows more than enough storage space (and I have a lot of kitchen equipment). The kitchen is a joy to cook in, with plenty of counter space and a very well-​performing oven, range, exhaust fan, and under-​the-​cabinet and over-​the-​stove lighting. My view is to the North, but I still get a lake view because I have 2 mirrors positioned such that I can see the reflection of the beach by Navy Pier and the water when I’m in the kitchen or living room.
2. The amenities on the 12^th floor are equally gorgeous. Outside, look to the left and you get full view of the lake all around, and look to the right and you get a wonderful city view. There’s free coffee, tea, and cream, many cabanas and grills, a hot tub, and a pool. I went to a social event up there for the residents, and there were complimentary drinks and great food. They have a pool table, a library with another gorgeous lake view, and too many other features for me to list here. Everything is immaculately clean and beautifully designed.
3. The door men and amenity supervisor are professional and friendly. Have a guest, maid, or delivery coming over when you can’t be home? Just authorize them to be let in using the resident website. They also coordinated my move. There are dollies available by the lobby if you’re taking lots of groceries or other weighty items up to your apartment.
4. A key fob is needed just to have the elevator go to your floor, so I feel very secure here.
5. The utility package is generous and reasonably priced (a flat fee [I think $ 85?] includes heat, A/​C, cable, internet, water, trash, etc.). I only pay electric, and I gather I’m just paying for the amount that my appliances and lights use.
Again, it is a dream to live here, and I would recommend it to anyone. I also have a coworker who used to live here and had an equally wonderful experience.