Apartment Update

Well, we saw the apartment this morning. I was initially a little... repulsed... by how small it was. I'm pretty sure it's the size of our living room. It would mean getting rid of a lot of furniture. I'm also not sure if our bed would fit in the bedroom (we have a california king). It comes with a parking space, but that (unsecured) space is in an alley behind another building. There's one closet. My clothes wouldn't fit (nevermind M's); I would have to either buy one of those standing closets, or put clothes away in plastic containers. We would no longer have a washer/dryer, we'd have to use the communal ones (not terrible, but a pain). The building is not secured, so strange people could walk right up to our front door (though that's the same as with a house).

So, there are all the cons. Pros are that it would mean a decrease of $800/mo in rent. We can do a 9 month lease, so we can buy and move into something of our own early next year. It's not available until June, so we have time to sell our excess furniture. It's right down the street so the move will be easy.

When I first moved up to LA, I was living with M in his parents' house. So we've shared one room before. There was a lot of tension... but it meant I went to the gym a lot more. ;) At least here we would have a living room and a bedroom to which someone could escape.

I'm really not sure what to do. What do you think? Do the pros outweigh the cons? Or should we keep looking? I took another look on Craig's List and there were some 1 bedrooms (in the area we want) for closer to $1100 (a savings of $950/mo!). Unfortunately, they were all available now. But that gives me hope for finding something like them come May.

4 comments:

Shtinkykat said...

Hey there, Sunflowers. Just wanted to let you know I got the book! Thanks so much!
Anyhow, it's always so much harder to downgrade your life, even temporarily. But if you're buying a place next year, $800/month x 9 months = $7,200! That's money you can save towards your new home. I say bite the bullet now. Most 1 BR will be around the 650-750 sq. ft. range.

Sunflowers said...

Hope you like the book! :)

I have a feeling this place is more like 600 sq. ft... maybe even 500. :\ I would be really happy with 700-750. We could keep all our furniture then.

M and I are going to talk about it tonight... but I think we're going to wait until May 1st, because then (most) everything will have a June availability... I feel like we can get a bigger place, just as cheap (maybe cheaper).

Mentally Sane said...

From the sounds of it, I don't think you'd be happy with this place. I think you should keep it on the back burner "just in case," but you should definitely keep looking. It's great to save about $800/month, but at what cost to you? Sure, you can sell your furniture now, but then you'd have to buy again come time to get your new place.

I wish you luck! I hate apartment shopping and I'm certainly not looking forward to it when I move to L.A.! Just the idea of paying over $1000 for a 1 bedroom just kills me. I pay $747 for my 1 bedroom now and that's expensive for my area. It's an uppity neighborhood, but I chose that on purpose.

Kristy @ MYC
www.masteryourcard.com/blog

Miss M said...

Keep looking, there was story in LA times today about how rents are falling. Though the westside was strongest of all :( But my house is under 750 sq ft and has 2 bedrooms, a bath, living room and separate dining room, kitchen and a laundry room. You can imagine how small my rooms are! It felt huge after a 400 sq ft studio.

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