Apartment Searching & Hopefully Found

Last year, apartment searching was miserable. Our budget was tighter with me moving on a (Kansas) salary that was Much too small for NYC living. I didn't Really know what I was doing and the market was a bit tighter than it is now. This year, it's been a bit different. We don't HAVE to find a place, because our place is okay, do-able. We could be picky, and we had a good idea about what to look for before even calling about a post.

So we've looked at 4 apartments and thanks to my amazing sister-in-law, we think we've found the one we love. We put in an application, the owner is running a credit check tomorrow and she's going to let us know by tomorrow if it will be our new home.

The first apartment we looked at was about the same size as the one we live in and even though it had roof access, it wasn't anything special. Plus, I panicked over the validity of the apartment and the owner... long story. That apartment was not an option pretty much immediately.

The second apartment was much bigger. It had a separate kitchen (no big enough for eat-in) but separate is special (considering our kitchen is on one wall of our living room.) The living room was a good size with a small office off of it (no windows in the office). Down the hall was a bathroom and a bedroom with Lots of closet space. The bedroom was a great size. The lighting in the apartment was great. If I were a normal girl, I'd probably have been obsessed with the closet space... But I'm not normal. I don't much have a closet now. I didn't have a closet growing up. I did have 4 huge closets in college. And all I did was fill them with stuff that I never used (and as I mentioned before, I don't really want to collect more things.) The 2 major things I did not like about this apartment was the lack of a stoop and the location. It was located on 11th street and 9th street was the furthest I wanted to go.

The third apartment was in a perfect location. And close to the subway, and close to the Coop. There was no stoop, but there was a little space for chairs out front. We got into the apartment and realized that it wouldn't work pretty quick. The kitchen walls were horrible, as they had suffered from a lot of water damage (despite the guy telling us the building doesn't have leaks... sure looked like there were leaks to me!) The natural lighting was horrible and dark.

The last apartment we looked at was the one I was most hopeful about. My sister-in-law sent a message with some information about the place and after contacting the owners, we had an appointment to view it this evening. It's located a block down from our nephew. The price is a little bit higher than we pay now BUT it has a separate kitchen (woo woo!) and electricity is in the rent (along with the normal water and heat!) AND... yes it gets better... washer and dryer (WOO! WOO!) The natural lighting was wonderful for afternoons and evenings. It's a second floor walk-up. The park is about 2 blocks away. The subway is two blocks away. We can probably work out getting bikes and storing them somewhere. So, we quickly applied (to beat the other couple who was also looking) and will hopefully know tomorrow whether or not we get it!

Hopefully everything will work out and all we'll have to do is pack up and move all our stuff. I'll let you know for sure... and hopefully, if it all goes through, I'll see if I can get some more pictures. I hope to get another better look at the place soon, I kind of went through quickly to make sure there were no black holes in it, and jumped quickly to apply so we would get it before the other couple took it! So, I didn't get the clearest look, but according to the landlord, the people who've rented from them before have stayed for years, so it must be a good place!