Pricing ranges from
    $4,124 – 4,948/month

    Sunny Side Retirement Home

    1600 US-221, Forest City, NC, 28043
    3.5 · 8 reviews
    • Independent living
    • Assisted living
    AnonymousCurrent/former resident
    2.0

    Beautiful place, rude unempathetic staff

    I love the owner - I even miss their yelling. The place is beautiful and many people are great, but several staff were unkind, sometimes insulting or abusive and showed little empathy. Communication is poor (phone lines often unresponsive), which is frustrating despite it being a nice place to stay.

    Pricing

    $4,124+/moSemi-privateAssisted Living
    $4,948+/mo1 BedroomAssisted Living

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    Amenities

    Healthcare services

    • Activities of daily living assistance
    • Assistance with bathing
    • Assistance with dressing
    • Assistance with transfers
    • Medication management
    • Mental wellness program

    Healthcare staffing

    • 24-hour call system
    • 24-hour supervision

    Meals and dining

    • Diabetes diet
    • Meal preparation and service
    • Restaurant-style dining
    • Special dietary restrictions

    Room

    • Cable
    • Fully furnished
    • Housekeeping and linen services
    • Kitchenettes
    • Telephone
    • Wifi

    Common areas

    • Beauty salon
    • Dining room
    • Garden
    • Outdoor space
    • Small library

    Community services

    • Move-in coordination

    Activities

    • Community-sponsored activities
    • Resident-run activities
    • Scheduled daily activities

    3.50 · 8 reviews

    Overall rating

    1. 5
    2. 4
    3. 3
    4. 2
    5. 1
    • Care

      3.5
    • Staff

      2.3
    • Meals

      3.5
    • Amenities

      3.5
    • Value

      3.5

    Pros

    • Positive sentiment toward the owner/leadership
    • Friendly staff reported by some reviewers
    • Beautiful facility / pleasant environment
    • Great people / strong sense of community
    • Described as a nice place to stay / 5-star rating by some

    Cons

    • Staff shouting at residents
    • Lack of empathy and abusive staff conduct
    • Insulting or unkind treatment of elderly residents
    • Poor communication / unresponsive phone lines
    • Difficulty reaching the facility and caller frustration
    • Inconsistent staff behavior (both friendly and rude reports)

    Summary review

    Overall sentiment in the reviews is highly mixed and polarized. Several reviewers express strong positive feelings about the facility environment and the owner, calling the place beautiful, describing great people, and giving 5‑star impressions. At the same time, there are multiple serious negative reports focused on staff behavior and communication problems. The combination of strong praise for the owner and facility aesthetics alongside allegations of abusive or unempathetic staff creates a clear split in reviewer experience that is important to note.

    Care quality: The most significant and concerning theme in the reviews is related to direct care interactions. Multiple summaries allege staff yelled at a resident, insulted an elderly person, and displayed a lack of empathy. These allegations point to potential issues in the quality of interpersonal care and raise safety and dignity concerns for residents. Because the complaints describe active mistreatment (yelling, insulting, abusive conduct), they represent serious red flags about resident-centered care and would warrant verification and corrective action by management.

    Staff and interpersonal conduct: Reports about staff behavior are inconsistent. Some reviewers describe staff as friendly and nice, while others directly call staff rude, unkind, or abusive. This dichotomy suggests variability in staff performance or differences in individual staff-member behavior. The consistent positive mentions of the owner contrast with negative descriptions of frontline staff, implying there may be gaps between leadership intent and day-to-day staff interactions. The mix of friendly and rude accounts indicates that experiences may depend heavily on which staff members are involved, shift times, or specific circumstances.

    Facilities and community: Multiple summaries explicitly praise the physical setting and community atmosphere: "beautiful place," "great people," and "nice place to stay." These consistent positive notes suggest the facility’s environment and the broader resident community are strengths. Such positives can contribute to residents’ quality of life when other elements of care are functioning well.

    Communication and operations: A recurring operational complaint is poor communication channels. Reviewers report unresponsive phone lines, difficulty reaching the facility, and frustration when trying to make contact. These issues affect families and prospective residents, undermining trust and compounding the impact of any care concerns. Even when the facility environment and some staff are appreciated, inability to reliably reach staff or management is a significant negative pattern.

    Dining and activities: The provided reviews do not include specific comments about dining, meals, programming, or activities. There is no available information in these summaries to assess food quality, recreational offerings, or the vibrancy of daily programming, so no conclusions can be drawn about those aspects from the current dataset.

    Management and notable patterns: The owner receives notably positive mentions—several reviewers explicitly express affection or appreciation for the owner and even say they miss the owner. This suggests leadership or certain individuals in management are well regarded. However, the juxtaposition of positive management sentiment with serious accusations about staff conduct and poor communication suggests gaps in staff oversight, training, or staffing stability. The pattern is one of polarized experiences: strong positives around facility aesthetics and leadership, but recurring and serious negatives around frontline staff behavior and responsiveness.

    In sum, Sunny Side Retirement Home appears to have meaningful strengths (appealing facility, some friendly staff, and an owner who is respected by reviewers) but also serious, recurring concerns that cannot be overlooked—particularly allegations of staff yelling, insulting, and showing a lack of empathy toward residents, together with unreliable phone communication. These are substantive issues affecting resident dignity and family trust and should be investigated and addressed to reconcile the polarized experiences reflected in these reviews.

    Location

    Map showing location of Sunny Side Retirement Home

    About Sunny Side Retirement Home

    Sunny Side Retirement Home has 34 apartments and senior living units where people can choose between studios, one-bedroom, or shared apartments, and there are even in-room washers and dryers if that's something someone likes, and you'll see each apartment gets regular housekeeping and laundry, so not much to worry about when it comes to cleaning and maintenance, which is handy if you don't get around like you used to. The place offers assisted living, memory care, and regular senior living, so care looks different for each person, and the staff do personalized needs assessments for every resident and then offer support with daily things like bathing, grooming, eating, moving from a bed to a wheelchair, monitoring diabetes, and physical therapy services whenever that's necessary, plus they've got people who help with medication and doctors do monthly checks. For folks with Parkinson's, they have staff who know what to do and programs meant to help keep people moving and safe.

    Dining is all taken care of, with meals served three times a day-breakfast, lunch, and dinner-and snacks in between, and cooks will make special meals for those with dietary needs or for celebrating birthdays and other events, which adds a nice touch on special days. The home lets people bring small pets, so you'll see a few animals around for company, and if you like to be busy, the calendar's always full with daily recreational activities, arts and crafts, games, fitness classes, movie nights, socials, and both community-led activities and ones run by residents themselves; there's even a library, computer room, fitness room, games and entertainment area, art room, and a movie room if you want to be indoors, along with gardens, patios, and scenic walking paths outside for when you want some fresh air.

    There are added services like help with moving in, optional concierge services for things like dry cleaning or errands, and transportation if someone needs to get to an appointment or wants to join off-site trips and picnics. Security's a focus too, with a 24-hour security system, keyless keypad entry, and emergency alert systems, and staff are present at all hours to respond if anything happens. Family and friends are included, with regular gatherings planned so people stay connected, and the staff, who all speak English, aim to make living comfortable, with everything tailored to individual needs whether that's more support, social opportunities, or simply a quiet place to read in the well-stocked library. Sunny Side Retirement Home, managed by Homestead and led by President Mr. Michael Wellmon, is a corporation and part of a Continuing Care Retirement Community; though it doesn't have BBB accreditation, people here find there's a sense of reliability and routines that make life a bit easier for seniors looking for help with living and ways to stay active.

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