My Second Apartment

Lately it seems that I have to things vying for attention when I lay down at night and think, the stress of dealing with my job and apartment hunting. For some reason I didn’t think it would this time consuming and stressful to search for just the right place to live? And I feel added pressure to find a place that both me and my brother, who will be my roommate, will feel at home in.

Now that I’ve settled into my professional full time career, I find myself wanting to settle down for the next few years. So this place has to be if not perfect as close to it as my budget and time will allow. I have a deadline, well two actually, September 1 being the soft deadline and the 30th being the hard and final deadline. Our lease officially ends in October, I think midway, but if we move out by October 1st we wouldn’t have to pay for that month in rent.

If I'm honest, ideally I would love to be setting out on my own and finding a place just for me. Don't get me wrong, I love my brother and I think it would be good for him to be semi on his own before fully being thrust into the world. But there's just something to be said for having your own space, being able to unpack (all the things I've brought over the last year and all the things stuck in storage), and decorating a space that reflects me.

So the apartment search has begun sort of; beforehand there was no real urgency but a definite "top of mind" placement. Of course, I plan on sharing some of my search here. I don’t think I’ve actually chronicled an entire journey here before. I kind of jump in and out of things and fill in the blanks later. This time I want to write about the entire journey. The good, the bad, and the in-betweens.

Last time I wrote about looking for a new place to live I mentioned that my first apartment search was very haphazard and I went into it with no idea on what I was looking for. This time I’ve created a list of what I'm looking for. I don’t think I’ve mentioned this before but I love lists, I like looking at other people’s lists and I like looking at old lists I have made. I got inspired by Kay, on Chronicled.

Here it is:

The Deal Breakers
*Full Sized Appliances. I love to cook and I love to bake. So I need appliances that can handle that. No mini sized things for me; they don’t have to be the latest and greatest just not mini.

* Onsite Laundry Room. I'm not crazy about laundry mats either. As a child I spent many of Saturdays stuck in the laundry mat…just can’t do it. (I would say laundry in my apartment but I'm being realistic...)

*Clean Common Areas. It doesn't have to be anything fancy but it does have to be clean and kept up. This also includes the outside/landscaping. The place we live in now is not a dump by any means but they are lax on keeping up the maintenance. For one of our neighbors there’s a bush that’s very overgrown, now it’s a tree blocking their front door and it’s the kind of bush that attracts bees. Not cool.

*A safe neighborhood (self explanatory) that's close to some amenities - like a grocery store and some shopping. Even though I’ve narrowed the location down to one specific neighborhood I am kind of cognizant of where in that neighborhood I want to be.

* Quiet neighborhood. I am by nature a very quiet person; I can go days without speaking because I don’t need to. When I come home I want that quietness and peacefulness. The last thing I want is to come home to all night rave next door. I would rather go to the entertainment than be surrounded by it.

* A parking spot or two included. I don't have a car right now but I do plan on getting one in the next year, my brother has well. Being close to downtown does pose a problem with parking space, and our streets are somewhat narrow and winding…so off street parking would be great.

*Some green space or a park nearby just in case I decided to get that puppy.

*Clean and rodent/insect free. This should be a given but I've seen and heard horror stories so... More so in the bathroom and kitchen I just need those to be über clean.

Would Love to Have But Not Deal Breakers

*Small Building. For some reason I just prefer small buildings to high-rises or large apartment complexes. They seem to have more desirable flavor when they are small.

* Natural Light. My last apartment got pretty nice natural light; I wouldn’t need to turn on a single light all day. I'm hoping to luck out in this area again.

*A View Of some sort. Trees, building tops, a park, a garden something. My last apartment looked out onto the parking lot, my bedroom now looks onto a weird interior courtyard that has grass and cement walkway. I prefer the weird interior courtyard to parked cars.

*Updated Appliances. They don't have to be stainless steel - but I'm hoping they are from this decade or the end of the last decade…just saying.

*A window in every room. Not just for ventilation purpose but for the natural light. Especially in the bathroom, I don’t do my makeup or anything in the bathroom but when there’s no light in there it just makes it seem like a sad little room.

*Space or well utilized space. Even if my brother doesn’t stay with me and even when he leaves, I would like that extra space for guests and entertaining. Also I have books, I am a librarian after all, so I would need space for a home library.

*Fit Into My Budget. I’m on a tight budget for everything now a days. I’ve never been one to overspend so this is a big deal for me. I want to live comfortably but I don’t want to ruin that by worrying about paying the bills.

And that’s my list. I don’t see it as being overly needy, but I haven’t really hit the pavement looking and with

 just three months to get it done. It’s time to start. I really just want to already have found a place so I can get to the unpacking and decorating part. I have so many ideas and I’m not sure how I’ll pull it all together because I haven’t really attempted something like this before but I think that’s the exciting part.

I was looking over my inspiration board on pinterest and I’m seeing so many different avenues and design trends. I’ve got colorful spaces with mixture of patterns and colors, sparse interiors with pops of bold colors, ethnic inspired pieces with a very natural organic nod, girly and feminine, dark and moody. I’m all over the place! Part of me wants the space to feel light and bright and fresh...and then there’s that part that is screaming for drama and and "the unexpected" . But mostly I want to create a place that is inviting and comfortable and far from beige or cookie cutter; something that screams me.