Blargh, rental-hunting
Sep. 7th, 2012 06:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
holyschist posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
actyourwageThe rental market in my area has gotten kind of ridiculous. Our rent is going up, again: I don't know how many years we can absorb this kind of rent increase, since my partner is close to the wire and not getting huge raises every year; I make pretty decent money and could afford rent increases for a while, but I'm currently on contract and still looking for a genuine long-term job that pays enough to live on.
We would like to move, both for financial reasons and because this place has gone downhill, particularly maintenance-wise since management changed in 2010 (it took the terrible outside contractors three tries to retile our shower, and it's still a terrible tile job and a worse caulk job; it was not fun).
What we would like in a new place:
1) Cheaper than the current place.
2) Ideally a little bigger, so we can store camping gear in it rather than the storage unit (which costs $30/month).
3) Not full of bedbugs or roaches.
4) Not in a high-crime area.
5) Allows cats (preferably without an astronomical pet fee, but I'd suck it up if it meets 1-4).
6) Outgoing mail. Although I suspect every complex in the area but ours probably has this.
So far just about everywhere I've found that fits 1 and 2 has apartment reviews that suggest that bedbugs and/or roaches are a big problem, drug deals are going on in the parking lot (is this exaggeration? beats me!), or has great reviews and prices but...no pets.
I'm not sure how much weight to put on reviews. Half the reviews are people claiming a complex is the WORST PLACE EVER and there are much better, cheaper places (but not naming them!), and the other half are glowing and look seriously fake, and I'm not sure I want to rent from a place where the management sockpuppets. Every complex I've ever lived in, including the ones I loved, have lousy reviews--I mean, even when my current complex had no laundry room for months and took away our outgoing mail permanently (!), I would personally call it mediocre, because there don't seem to be pest or crime problems, and it's middling in price for the area.
So...anyone have advice on apartment-hunting? We're also maybe looking at townhomes for rent, but so far the only one we've found in our price range that allows pets is literally right next to a train track, and I already have trouble sleeping.
I'm getting really discouraged.
We would like to move, both for financial reasons and because this place has gone downhill, particularly maintenance-wise since management changed in 2010 (it took the terrible outside contractors three tries to retile our shower, and it's still a terrible tile job and a worse caulk job; it was not fun).
What we would like in a new place:
1) Cheaper than the current place.
2) Ideally a little bigger, so we can store camping gear in it rather than the storage unit (which costs $30/month).
3) Not full of bedbugs or roaches.
4) Not in a high-crime area.
5) Allows cats (preferably without an astronomical pet fee, but I'd suck it up if it meets 1-4).
6) Outgoing mail. Although I suspect every complex in the area but ours probably has this.
So far just about everywhere I've found that fits 1 and 2 has apartment reviews that suggest that bedbugs and/or roaches are a big problem, drug deals are going on in the parking lot (is this exaggeration? beats me!), or has great reviews and prices but...no pets.
I'm not sure how much weight to put on reviews. Half the reviews are people claiming a complex is the WORST PLACE EVER and there are much better, cheaper places (but not naming them!), and the other half are glowing and look seriously fake, and I'm not sure I want to rent from a place where the management sockpuppets. Every complex I've ever lived in, including the ones I loved, have lousy reviews--I mean, even when my current complex had no laundry room for months and took away our outgoing mail permanently (!), I would personally call it mediocre, because there don't seem to be pest or crime problems, and it's middling in price for the area.
So...anyone have advice on apartment-hunting? We're also maybe looking at townhomes for rent, but so far the only one we've found in our price range that allows pets is literally right next to a train track, and I already have trouble sleeping.
I'm getting really discouraged.