Moving Homes

I started writing this post a while ago, while we were in the throes of apartment hunting, so it is a little more impassioned than it would be if I wrote it today. However, anyone who has lived in New York can attest to the special brand of hell that is apartment hunting in NYC. Rents are ridiculous, and the amount of space that you get for said enormous sum of money is depressing (ie, tiny!). Things that are givens in most other places (natural light, a full bath, a refrigerator!) are often listed as amenities in NYC.

You start your search with a dream in your heart of that perfect little gem that you will be the one to find - an apartment that is the right size, in the right part of town, for the right price. After several weeks of obsessively trolling real estate listings, being scammed by brokers who claim an apartment is in one neighborhood when it is actually several less desirable neighborhoods away, and then discovering that the one apartment that you actually do like is operated by a horrible landlord (thank you, Google, for saving me from that one!), depression sets in. You get beaten down and you start making concessions. That rent number that you so carefully budgeted for, that was actually the higher end of what you wanted to pay? Well, maybe we can raise that number $100/month to see what that gets us. Or, maybe it's time to start looking farther out, or maybe a one bedroom will do for the three of us, after all.

But! This story has a happy ending! We're going to sign a lease for a two-bedroom apartment in Prospect Heights tomorrow. It's $200 under what we wanted to pay, and while not huge or brand new, it's a cool little space with a lot of storage that should serve us well. I feel really lucky - blessed, really - and while I'm going to miss the east village, and our little studio apartment, it is definitely time for us to move on. It will be hard for me to say good-bye, though. I've lived in this apartment for seven years, which is actually the longest I've ever lived anywhere. Sean and I began our marriage and our family in this apartment, and its "cheap" rent is one of the things that enabled me to work from home. I hope that whoever lives here next loves and enjoys it as much as we have.