Thanks all, I finally got access to the condo's message board and got some help from another resident. He said the ductwork was there and said something about a "door" in the fan unit. I poked around inside of it again and lo and behold, a small piece of sheet metal fell off the side of it and there was the duct! The sheet metal piece had a piece of tape on it that I think may have been a hinge, of sorts--so that it would flap open when the fan was on and then fall back over the duct opening when the fan was off to keep drafts out. But a thick coating of greasy dust had kept it from working properly, and also made it hard to see that that's what its function was. The duct opening is only about 1x2", not the big 3" or 4" round opening that I was thinking it should be. It's still not a great fan but at least it's not blowing all of the air right back into the room! And I will have to figure out how to put that flap back on once the weather gets cold, but I have a bit of time before that will be necessary. PS-- no window in that room, unfortunately...

if you have an attic above that room get the kind that the motor is actually several feet away from the vent in the ceiling as they work great and are very quiet. I put a Solitube with a light kit and a Broan vent in one of my bathrooms with motor in attic and it is outstanding. You don't need a Solitube to use this type of vent fan. If you don't have attic space above, then I would go with the panasonic or a Nutone.

Not to pile on, but this is something that should have been done near the beginning of this reno. No matter which direction power is coming from, you can't run a fan and light separately with only 1 wire. You'll need another wire running from the the fan to another switch. Obviously, that will need to run through the wall and ceiling. f you don't have open access from above, this will likely require cutting holes in the ceiling and/or wall.

Comments from us will do nothing to change thigs. You need to go up into the attic and look to see what they did.