High-rise Luxury Retreat at Opera Tower

I’m writing about my month here in October 2025, because reviews seem to swing between one-star rants about a couple of small things and five-star praise that skips major issues. Here’s my balanced take. The building’s oval shape gives it amazing views. From higher floors, east or south facing apartments look out to the Venetian Islands and cruise terminals. On some weekends, as many as 8 cruise ships were docked at once. North, west, and south facing apartments also get some pretty cool sunsets. Security is good: there’s face ID, and the doormen and women open the door if you pass the check, which helps when your arms are full of groceries. Publix is a five-minute walk away, Margaret Pace Park is two minutes away, and the resident population is very diverse, with people from all walks of life and lots of dogs. The “R” floor gym is clean and has a Smith machine, four ellipticals, stationary bikes, dumbbells up to 50 pounds, and several other machines. There’s also a secure package and mail room. You need ID to collect packages, and an email arrives when something is delivered. The main drawback was the elevators. They were slow, and two of the six were under repair, with management saying it could take months. Still, three or four were working at any given time. I timed rides from the 46th floor and a trip down from the 45th never took more than five minutes, despite some angry reviewers claiming 15. One elevator stops at floors 19 or 4 without being called. You do have to wait, but I never found it took over 10 minutes to reach a destination, and sometimes it was just two minutes if nobody else had called one. The unpredictability made it hard to time Uber or Lyft pickups. Impact windows keep out some sound, but not all. Even on the 46th floor, I could hear motorcycles revving and vehicle horns. Noise from above comes through the ceiling too, like chairs being dragged, and I occasionally heard loud conversations from neighbors on the right. The AC in my unit was extremely loud because the compressor was inside the apartment and its door wasn’t soundproofed. On each floor, four apartments have compressors outside, so they should be quieter. The pool was still closed. The gym also closed pointlessly at 10 p.m. and stayed closed until some unknown time in the morning, with no hours posted. Luxury buildings have 24-hour gyms. Management was slow to reply to emails, but they did respond and seemed to be making a genuine effort to improve the building. I didn’t see roaches in my apartment, on the 46th floor, or in the gym. Other reviewers reported a roach problem, so maybe it was on other floors or had been fixed since those posts. Some residents were less respectful than others: I saw dog poop in the stairwell, and gym users who kept grunting after being asked to lift more quietly.