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The great apartment search …

Here’s a little something you have to know about looking for apartments in the Bay Area. It sucks.

I mean, I’ve been to places where you can get a two bedroom, two bath apartment in a brand new complex, complete with a swimming pool and fitness room and all the amenities you can imagine for about $1100 per month. And that’s in the higher end of the price range for those apartments.

And then you look in the Bay Area and find that for $1100 per month you can barely squeak yourself into a studio in a decrepit fifty year old building with absolutely no amenities at all, AND you might be sharing it with a few rodents at that. Ugh. Depressing much.

Wifey™ and I are looking for a nice one bedroom, now that our landlord has raised the rent to $1650 for the two bedroom we are currently occupying. So, over the weekend we looked at a few places to see what’s out there. Now, one thing that’s going for us is that the economy sucks ass and most landlords are lowering rents and throwing in bonuses to get people to move in.

Friday we checked out two apartments that we found online. The first was on this spectacular street just a block from the downtown part of town. Before I describe the apartment let me explain downtown so you know what we’d be blocks from. It’s sort of like Mainstreet USA, except it has some larger stores that have moved in. There are tons of mom and pop stores and all are VERY nice. The town we live in is actually one of the more wealthy towns in the area, so most of the shops cater to the wealthier clientelle, selling things that might attract good customers. There’s also a GAP, an Abercrombie & Fitch, and a Pottery Barn on the street and TONS of nice restaurants that we could walk to. It’s really a great block to live near because it’s usually bustling even at night.

So, the first apartment was a rathole. The rent was up near $1200/mo. for a one bedroom and the first thing we noticed was that the kitchen was nasty. The cutting board was built into the counter top and was covered in stains. None of the appliances matched — yellow stove, white refrigerator, etc. Uck. The bathroom was a sight also. Most of the fixtures were pink or flesh colored and the shower had some kind of mildew in the grout area. Also, you had to go through a central interior hallway to get into your apartment and I have a real problem with that sort of thing. I like to open my door to the outside if possible. Anyhow … we both agreed we didnt want to live in that one …

The next apartment was actually farther from downtown than our current apartment but we decided that for about $1100/mo. we’d check it out. This apartment looked very similiar in design to the previous one except that the kitchen seemed a bit larger, the appliances were all new and the it was much cleaner looking than the last. There were less amenities than the previous, but the building looked overall better. The apartment manager was willing to give us an extra parking spot for free and he seemed nice, although a bit talkative and gave way too much information out about other tenants in the building, which made us a bit uneasy.

Saturday we woke up early and just started walking up and down some of the streets that were a block from downtown and began calling numbers posted on the fronts of the buildings. One building had two apartments available and they were pretty nice except for the fact that the kitchens would barely fit one person in them comfortably. Also, we didnt think our furniture would really fit in them.

The next was in a really cool looking older building. The front of the building actually looks like it might have been a converted mansion at the corner of two streets, and the apartment we looked at is in a building behind it built in the 60’s or so. We looked at three different apartments in this building. One had a kitchen with powder blue countertops that we immediately knocked off our list … call us picky. The second and third were practically identical, except for the rooms being slighty rearranged and one didnt have a closet in the bedroom. Leaving us with one. This one was used as their model and is furnished to show you what a unit would look like. The kitchen is pretty nice and there is room for a small dinette table if you wanted to put one in there. There is tons of closet space and the living/dining area is pretty good size. The bedroom is a nice size and has a good sized closet and the bathroom is also decent. A couple of nice things about the complex is that its a block from downtown, the front door opens to the outside rather than a hallway and the building is extremely neat and has a spa and outdoor recreation area. It’s at the top of our list at this point, but things could always change. It’s not our ideal, but it’s affordable and the best we’ve seen.

One last thing. For fun we stopped at a complex we’d seen on our walk. It hadnt been open when we went by the first time and on the second round it opened up. The interior smelled horrible. It looked like the Brady Bunch had lived in it at some point, the cabinets were that ugly dark brown color, and I think the countertops were olive green. The bathroom didnt have a bathtub and it was tiny and the bathroom sink was in the bedroom. Erm, yeah, like I’d want my guest stomping through my bedroom to wash their hands. Or could you imagine someone coming over, taking a power dump and smelling up your whole bedroom. Ugh. No thanks.

Anyhow … the search continues.. and we are waiting to hear back from the one we liked best so far. They’d even give us a free DVD player if we took it.

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