You know the feeling: euphoric from scoring the apartment you wanted, you're moving in, getting settled, and suddenly you realize: your cell phone doesn't get reception — your new home is a dead zone! Or, maybe you are finally falling into bed your first night in a new place, exhausted from the move, and just as you're drifting off your eyes snap open again: is that incessant banging coming from your radiator? And will it never go away despite the ministrations of several accredited plumbers?
My friend Lindsay keeps a list with her husband Nick for the next time they're apartment hunting. Whenever they have a complaint about their current place, they write down what to check for next time. Cell reception and radiator noise are on the list, as are street noise, noisy neighbors, ground-floor bike storage (so they don't have to lug their bikes up treacherously narrow stairs, window quality (for both drafts and noise issues), any materials that are difficult to clean (ie. special countertops or floor treatments), and a bunch more.
Of course, the realities of the market these days — and of real estate in general — mean that you're probably not going to be able to avoid every potential pitfall on your list. But if you know up front that your sofa won't fit in the stairs or elevator and you'll have to spend a few hundred bucks for someone to disassemble and reassemble it, it might shift the calculus of how much you're willing to concede on price, location, or other tradeoffs.
What do you wish you'd known before moving into your current home? What will you be sure to ask about next time?
(Images: Shutterstock, Dr. Sofa.)
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I have three things on the list:
1. If moving into an old building, making sure a full size hanger will fit in the closets.
2. Having at least one out of the way place to tuck a large litter box.
3. No holes in the door to the outside.
I live in a basement apartment with a code-required second exit in the back of my bedroom closet. I wish I'd thought that through a little better before renting-- I'd have to take everything out the closet (including the top shelf and the clothes rail) in the event of an emergency! Plus the doorframe is super drafty.
Here's to hopefully living above ground when I move this summer!
Once I moved in to an apartment that did not have OUTLETS OR LIGHT FIXTURES in two bedrooms. I did not check since I assumed most places would have outlets in all rooms. Learned my lesson.
Check to see that the heating system has been updated.
If I moved into an apartment, co-op , studio (or built a 500-700 sq, ft. home) I would love to have
1. a washer/dryer system in kitchen
2. enough outdoor space for a clothes line, table and two chairs
3. two tiny bathrooms (one with shower, one with tub)
4. I'd like to try a murphy bed system. (A friend had one and she loved it)
5. a very good oven for baking bread.
6. properly done outlets and fixtures as LHSIMM says.
I don't care about sofas,tvs, or anything I can move into a place.
a noisy new neighbor can move in anytime. that's just life.
I would definitely check apartmentratings.com before we start hunting again. Our property management company has been in the apartment over fifty times since we've lived here - less than two years - and they rarely fix problems on the first visit. We didn't have a/c through the entire summer and it gets super hot in central Illinois. I just recently checked their rating and all of the previous tenants have had bad experiences.
Also, I second the outlets. I didn't check and now I have to curl and blow dry my hair in the extra bed room because the bathroom has no outlets.
Less windows. Most people want more, but my current place has waaaaay too many, so many that putting useful furniture in a room is almost impossible. I'm so over sunlight.
Empty space always appears larger! As soon as I started unpacking I realized that the awesomely spacious kitchen only seemed big because there was almost no storage and absolutely no counter space! Once I brought in stand alone shelves with counter tops and a small work table the kitchen shrunk back down to a run of the mill small apartment kitchen :-(
Hahah outlets is a big one! We bought a little house this summer and didn't realize the lack of electrical outlets in the main bath until we moved in. ooops!
I own my house now, but I don't think it makes a difference. I, too, had to have an electrician come in and add a bunch of outlets after I moved in. Most rooms only had one, and I had power strips all over the place.
I also want a house with closets. Though my bedroom has ample closet space, having no coat closet or spare bedroom closets leaves me with a vacuum and a bunch of shoes lying about my living room.
Also, in my old apartment I got rid of my old sofa and had to buy a new loveseat, carefully measured, to fit it in the door. It never occurred to me that there are services that will disassemble them for you!
i wish i had known the roof leaked when i lived on the top floor of one place. i ran out of pots and pans.
i roach bomb any new apt. but one place was beyond that.
noisy neighbors are a crap shoot, but i've left apts.. because of them.
within a block laundry, post office, bank drug store and supermarket and green grocer.
My next place will be free of all the creepers/peeping Toms/would-be rapists that we have caught *repeatedly* hopping our fence and trying to pry open our kitchen windows.
It's uncanny - I was just making this list in my head last night!
1. Better proximity to public transit (for non-car-owners); at least one route VERY close, instead of several routes only kind-of close.
2. Counter space. Counter space. Counter space. Kitchen and bath.
3. East or South-facing windows
4. Outdoor space. Tiny balcony, shared rooftop, first-floor shared patio - whatever. Just something outside.
We rent a house, and didn't realize how annoying it would be to not have alley access OR a driveway. It is pretty much unheard of in our area to not have one or the other with a single-family house. Not only is it an issue with parking, but also garbage. Garbage pick-up is in the alley, so we have walk our trash all the way around our house and our neighbors house to take it out. Weird.
Ditto on the checking to see if large furniture fits up the stairs. Couldn't fit a box-spring, desk, or sofa up to our second floor. There is a small landing and a turn in the stairs and large stuff that can't bend can't get around that corner.
Not next to a college parking lot. Not near public festivals that happen every weekend from late spring to early fall. Not next to a freeway. Not on the ground floor. Built to current earthquake and fire codes. No freezer is a deal breaker.
I rented my latest apartment full of optimism. It was perfect, with one large and one small bedroom, a nicely updated kitchen with a dishwasher! A big dining and living room, and backyard access. However I didn't take into account that if I could smell smoke from the downstairs neighbor in the summer, it would only get much much worse in the winter. Though the apartment air seemed fresh and clean when I looked at the apartment, the smoke seeps in through every entry point - especially my under the sink areas and closets (so gross!).
Moving into an apartment where many of the tenants have been established for a number of years can be a challenge. They're unwilling to give up the storage area they've already claimed, leaving none for us, or might already consider the backyard all theirs. I totally get that, but it's no fun to be in the position of the equally rent-paying newby with nowhere to store your christmas ornaments.
I will, from now on, always take into account when tenants warn you that a landlord is "less than responsive," at best this can mean the landlord lets you fix things and take it out of your rent, leaving you mostly alone to do what you want with the space, at worst this means that dryer you were promised doesn't work for months, water leaks from the ceiling into your bedroom, or the basement fills with water and your stairs sink down an inch (all have happened to me).
My husband and I moved into our first place together back in June. My brother lives in the same building and we loved it so much, we had the landlord call us once a small unit opened up. We ended our leases early at our other places and immediately moved in. Now, 7 months later, I can't wait to get out. The downtown urban charm is wearing me out. The building is really old, the apartment is way too small for us and our dog, and the landlord is a pain in the ass. My husband wants to wait until our lease is up, but that doesn't stop me from checking craigslist everyday.
1. Dishwasher
2. Insulation (we have exposed brick that is very old but doesn't keep any heat in)
3. Door to the backyard
4. non-passive aggressive landlord.
5. oven that was made in the last 20 years
6. Hardwood floors that you can't see though to the basement and are not rotting away
7. No mice
8. At least four blocks away from the homeless shelter
9. At least four blocks away from train crossing
10. A bedroom (no more loft beds)
11. House, not apartment
Can you tell I really want to move?
Oh yes, also since our house is a story-and-a-half, the upstairs has those charming slanting ceilings under the eaves. Great, except that means the shower head in the bathroom is only about 5'6", which is pretty awkward for my 6'3" husband.
New House Checklist:
-Find out if husband will fit in shower.
Ask who lives downstairs, and if it's an old person, stay farrrrrrrr away. Also, these prewar apartments seem quaint and cute, but check the floors. Our old apartment had holes and warps in the floor underneath every single radiator. And guess who came to visit from the holes? Mickey mouse aka Mickey. Now I would only rent an apartment that has seamless floors to walls. Also check the walls and make sure they are smooth. Warps in the walls usually mean they have been spackled a million times. Which in our case was because of water damage that they kept covering up.
I had no idea that I was going to live below a Sumo wrestler who has a love affair with Yo Yo Ma and Josh Groban on repeat. She offers banana bread as an olive branch, but, I will never live with people above me again. Not even the rumble of the nearby subway (every 3 minutes) disturbs and annoys like she can.
However, my high rise apartment (13th floor) had 45 minutes of a fraction of a sunbeam and a flock of 100 cooing, crapping pigeons.
My Victorian home apartment had a crazed cat lady who routinely fed all the neighbourhood's cats and, subsequently, raccoons. Tops? A Vancouver house rental that was haunted with a roommate who laboured over a six foot paper mache penis sculpture for months.
I can't remember who said it, but you have to check three things before you move in. The neighborhood, the neighborhood and the neighborhood.
This is such a no brainer LANDLORD.
its the only thing that you can't renovate or DIY.
@lhsimm i had almost the same problem. My apt was an old house converted into 4 apts and apparently they didnt see the need to change the old plugs to the ones we use now. half the apt didnt have modern plugs and the other half's light switches wouldnt work.
such a pain!
I want my own water heater (which is possible if I rent in a condo or house). My current apartment has two water temps: freezing and scalding.
1. WOOD or even tile floors! My disgust for 'apartment carpeting' knows no bounds...plus I have a cat, so the upkeep is constant. Why it is that every other place in the country seems to have apartments without carpeting except in the DFW area is beyond me.
2. Along with that, GOOD INSULATION between apts., floors, etc. I don't want to even know I have neighbors...for obvious reasons...like in the bedroom.
3. Storage space - to make up for lack of an attic, basement, garage, etc.
Onsite laundry is one of my personal dreams, but for laughs, I'll share a quote from my dad's speech at my wedding this summer:
"I know that G. and R. are truly children of the city, because looking around, I think just about everyone here has either been a roommate or helped them move at some point in the past nine years. For their future, I have one word for them: ELEVATOR."
The building is right on the corner of a main intersection. I thought it would be great to have the bus stop be right at the door, but I didn't know about the DIRT that would come in from the street! I wish I could move further away but the rents have skyrocketed in my part of Northern Virginia in just two years!
Check for good water pressure: your morning shower should not equate to ancient chinese water torture.
I hate to be the obnoxious person who says there's nothing I would look for that my current place doesn't have, but it's mostly true. I have huge closets, tons of storage (both are very unusual for a Victorian, so I'm lucky), great proximity to lots of stores and various types of transportation, a washer/dryer, quiet and nice neighbors, bay windows, high ceilings, crown moulding, and hardwood floors throughout most of the place, and an amazing landlord... But there are definitely things I wish I could change about THIS place to make it perfect.
- Take out the peeling ugly wallpaper in my living room (it's fairly neutral, but I hate it).
- Replace the royal blue carpeting in the bedrooms with a neutral berber, or even better, the same hardwood floors as the rest of the apartment
- Paint the ugly 60s wood-paneled doors the same color as the moulding trim, and change out the equally-hideous hardware.
These things are so simple to do, and I have written to my landlord requesting that they happen, but I haven't actually sent it. . . The other thing I love about my place--great rent for the area--might be in the balance, since I'm now on a month-to-month lease. I don't want to rock the boat, even if he is awesome!
Double paned windows - for the most part I love our apartment in a historic townhouse, but we didn't even think to check the windows when I moved in, and it turns out they're about 100 years old and are about as good as tissue paper for blocking cold and wind. I apply the 3M plastic wrap stuff to them every winter, but I will definitly be checking the glass on our next place.
Any tips for houses ? Especially older ones ? I'm planning on buying a mid-century house and would love some tips on what to look for...
001. Outlets are a must! Especially in the bedroom. My first apartment in Brooklyn only had one single outlet in the bedroom...right behind the door. I would be crouching in a corner just to do my hair.
002. Toilet in the unit. This may seem like an obvious thing but my second Brooklyn apartment shared a toilet with an art gallery that I lived behind which was totally fine until they started throwing raging parties and there was a line of loud kids in the hallway trying to get into my apartment cuz they thought I was another bathroom. I also love that I no longer have to put on shoes (or pants, for that matter) just to run to the bathroom in the middle of the night.
003. Oven. Some people can live just fine with a hot plate and a microwave. I am not one of those people. I enjoy cooking. A lot.
004. Laundromat and 24-hour bodega within a two- (maximum three-) block radius. Schlepping eight blocks with 20 lbs of laundry is not fun and doing it more often to lighten the load just isn't an option and delivery services are much too expensive. As for bodegas, sometimes I just really want Ben & Jerry's and Spaghetti-Os at 2 in the morning.
005. The closer to the subway, the better. Every place I have lived has been within 1 to 3 blocks away. Less walking time = less travel time (which is fantastic when bopping about in heels after a hellacious day or night).
006. Dog-friendly. As much as my mother adores having my little chihuahua when my living situation doesn't allow me to keep her, I don't like going through long stretches of time without her.
I second the good windows and insulation. My place seems so charming with 3 outside walls and lots of windows and no-one underneath me, but BRRR it's cold in the Winter; and I live in a temperate climate! The heat works great but costs the moon.
I also will always ask about the oven. After a lifetime of gas stoves, when I moved to my current place, I thought, okay, I can live with an electric stove since the rest of the place is so good. The stovetop, while annoying compared to gas, I've learned to deal with. But the oven is SO bad and erratic it makes it a pain to bake in. I'm not entirely sure how I would check that out before moving in, however: bring a batch of cookie dough and a cookie sheet to bake while I check out the rest of the place? (I almost want to do that just to see the landlord's face.)
When I moved into my apartment, it had everything on my list at the time: dishwasher, disposal, balcony, on site laundry, pets allowed, gas stove. My list has been changed slightly to specify WORKING dishwasher, disposal and refrigerator, and in unit laundry. I've been here two and a half years and the aforementioned appliances seem to break down every other month. And I think the $4 per load I'm spending on laundry adds up to more than enough to cover the difference in rent for a unit with a washer and dryer.
I'd like a proper entryway, with enough space to enter the home carrying a full load of groceries, and not immediately walk into a wall. I'd also add more closet space to my wish list.
I will never again rent a place above the parking garage. Our floors are FREEZING all winter long, and my heating bill is through the roof.
Quiet. I will deal with almost anything else if I can just have peace and quiet.
My biggest nightmare ever was duplex neighbors who moved in and set up their BBQ directly under my bedroom window, then BBQ'd every night at 9:30 or 10pm, even in the dead of winter, rain, snow, sleet, etc. I'm a vegetarian too, so extra bummed out. I finally got the landlord to get rid of them after my husband ended up in the hospital due to smoke inhalation.
Any neighbor who doesn't care about the effect they have on other people in the building will make your life hell with their smoking, parties, music, junk piles...
Not having the elevated M tracks right outside during open-window months woudl be nice, but we should've seen that coming. When looking at apartments in November, be sure to open the windows.
Laundry, water pressure, NO carpet & off street parking. All are equally important and imperative.
If you live in NYC, check HPD online before you sign a lease.
It is the last link on the page.
http://www.nyc.gov/html/hpd/html/pr/violation.shtml
Familiarize yourself with the complaints and violations in your building before you move in. Note how many times your landlord has been taken to court. Note how long it takes before violations are resolved. Note that if people are calling 311 to try to resolve issues it means that the porter/super/landlord isn't doing his/her job.
(says she who lives in a building with 67 class C violations - yes, those are the ones that are supposed to be resolved in 24 hours)
I've been telling this to all my NYC friends for a while now and I hope it will help everyone who is looking for a new place.
i lucked out in my current place, but i will always check toilet flushing and shower head/water pressure.
Our next apartment will have
2 bedrooms
2 bathrooms
washer/dryer in the unit
dishwasher
backyard space
the same charm as our current place
Dream a little dream
Really, don't we have to put up with some small annoyances no matter where we live? There's no such thing as a perfect apartment (within most people's price ranges, anyway!) This should be more like a list of "Non-Negotiables" that are deal-breakers!
My Deal-Breakers:
1. No oil heat. NEVER again. So expensive, such a hassle, and so inefficient!!
2. No upstairs neighbors. I've tried it, generally I can't cope with it. I'm living in a wonderful townhouse right now, and even though the neighbors to the side of us play their electric guitar loudly every evening, it's still better than having someone stomp above my bed while I'm trying to sleep.
3. Full kitchen - i.e., garbage disposal, dish washer, and a full-sized oven. I've learned that life is MISERABLE without these things!!!
I own (unfortunately). Please learn from my mistake. My house is freakin perfect....except for 1 boorish neighbor. Just try to meet your neighbors before you sign/close. I am stuck with this one for who knows how long. Dogs yapping day and night, drug deals going on, cops raiding their house every two months or so (usually ambushing them from our yard!). Yeah, totally meet your potential neighbors if you can. Or just hang out on a Saturday night and see if there's noise at the very least before you move.
1. Direct Sunlight! My plants are dying.
2. Top floor. High heels at all hours (3am!) of the night is so not cool.
3. Small balcony to grow my own food/herbs.
4. More storage in bathroom and kitchen. Not a deal breaker, but more storage is always nice.
@ZHAHIRA I feel your pain!!! I swear there are elephants living above us! Stomping and stomping at all hours... and we have concrete floors with (supposedly) a foot of concrete between us. They also seem to move furniture and build things in the middle of the night... seriously... at 3 and 4 am! Strange...
My old apartment had the following:
Shitty landlord
No water pressure...got worse as time went on
Drafty windows
House was 120 years old
Bathroom that I could shit, shower and brush my teeth in all at the same time (no, it's not as efficient as you would think)
Major mice infestation (bf and roommates would shoot them with BB guns, i know horrible but the buggers wouldn't die or leave)
No washer or dryer (though there were hookups but we weren't allowed to use them because they leaked into the other tenants apartment)
A basement that went from concrete to straight up earth. Hence why the mice were so bad.
No closet in one of the bedrooms (previous tenants took the armoire that was suppose to serve that purpose)
A roof that leaked into my bedroom for literally six months (we nailed a tarp to the ceiling and poked a hole in to so the water would drain into one stream instead of seven)
A front door that was missing a window for six months
$400+ heating bills in the winter
A driveway that was so warped it made my right tire go flat if it was there for more than 2 days..luckily there was off street parking
oh..i could go on for days, and I already have. my new apartment has the exact opposite of all of those things. except i pay pretty much double what I did before. But for piece of mind I would pay anything. Live and learn I suppose. That was my first apartment at the age of 19.
I'm renting a house for the first time (as opposed to an apartment) and boy have I learned my lesson about what to check in houses I'm considering in future.
- electrics: especially if it's an older place, count/locate the outlets - silly me for assuming the house's only bathroom would have an outlet! Also, just because an outlet accepts a 3-prong plug does NOT mean it's actually grounded (bring a volt-meter if you have access)!
- electrics, part 2: turns out the pull-cord to the ceiling fan has current running through it - found this out the hard/painful way. Not fixable without getting an electrician to come in and remove part of the ceiling, due to how the house is wired.
- electrics, part 3: the circuit breaker is OUTSIDE, & the case is constructed in a way that it cannot be locked. Maybe I'm paranoid...but I don't like the idea of someone being able to turn off our electricity from outside the house.
- Location: never again will I live in a place with a bus stop directly out front. I thought it would be convenient. I hadn't considered that between the people waiting, & the people cutting across the (non-fenced) yard to get to the bus stop, the yard would get littered with trash every day. Also people waiting for the bus come and sit on my front steps, which is a little weird.
- Repairs: if the landlord has a dedicated person to do repairs, check the quality of the repairs they have done to the place in the past. Turns out my landlord's handy-person sets the bar at "functional" - the repair jobs are not pretty, & make the house look run-down.
- Water: as others have pointed out, water pressure is important. Also look under sinks & around bathroom fixture seals to look for signs of water damage/leaking.
- Paint: beware obviously thick, multiple coats of paint. It may be far worse than just sloppy painting - it might be covering up mildew.
Every time I move, I come up with a new item for this list. For our next move, I want a place with lots of natural light and outlets in the bathroom.
@KMSQRD - totally with you on the cat box! We're looking to buy a house now that we've been in our condo for over 5 years and I seriously think to myself in every house I walk through "Hmm, where will the litter box go?" and if I can't think of a solid plan it seriously influences my view of the house. Our current place only has a little nook in too close proximity to our bedroom, waking up to litter box scratching or (worse) the smell of cat poo has upped this issue considerably...
where do i start.. i would love for the next place i move into not be owned by a SLUMLORD. where requested repairs are made in a timely manner, with no lies, no being dicked around, or retaliated against by having the rent raised on us.
i would check to make sure there are enough outlets in every room, as that's a problem i also have with my current place. not cool.
also, no stay-at-home-self-proclaimed-musician neighbors who play LOUD live music day and night, with occasional loud "concerts" right outside our window.
i guess a washer and dryer would be nice too. :)
No neighbours who smoke - the smoke from our neighbour's apartment comes straight in through the windows at the back of our apartment, plus seems to leak into the second bedroom closests - gross.
Apparently, if you can smell it, it's damaging your health. Not happy.
a vent hood that vents outdoors. not the POS microwave over stove junk
I once rented a place only to discover that the shower head didn't work in the bath tub -- I could NOT take a shower, only baths, and I HATE sitting in my own dirt! Landlord thought baths were great, refused to repair. I moved. (Hey, it was when I was young and desperate...)
The next place I rent should definitely have,
1. At least a small window in the kitchen and in the bathroom for natural light.
2. Lots of direct sunlight.
3. 2 full bathrooms
4. Windows and doors that are not drafty.
It would be nice to have
1. Updated kitchen with good counter space and storage
2. Wood floors
3. Parking garage
We just moved from living in an apartment in NYC to living in a house in LA. Things I've learned so far about renting a house:
1. Make sure you run the heat/ac before renting in case there are dead critters, problems with the air flow, etc. We had a horrible smell coming from a vent in the master bedroom that only manifested itself when the heat was running. Turned out rats had torn through a vent and urinated in the vent. When the air was on, the smell was pumped through the vent. The landlord had to send an HVAC team to replace the entire vent line. Thank goodness the actual rat issue had been taken care long before we moved in and it was just the vent.
2. Water Heater - Make sure its not too old otherwise your hot water may not last very long or the water pressure may be an issue.
3. Electricity - Where are the outlets, do they all work, and is there anything that might require having electrician fix before you commit to a lease.
4. Parking - We were so excited to get a house with a garage coming from NY, but our house is on a hill and the path to enter the garage is too steep for my car to get in without scratching the underside of my car so although we have a 2 car garage, I have to park on the street.
I'm a chronic insomniac with asthma. My next apartment MUST have:
-Neighbors who are QUIET between midnight and 6am
-NO CARPET! I will never live with carpet again, it's a dust magnet and makes my wheezing a lot worse. I would rather live with old, sticky plastic flooring than carpet.
-No neighbors who smoke. This might require me to move into the dead center of a larger complex with a no-smoking policy...fine. Whatever keeps the smoke away. (I use a smoke-filtering air purifier inside, but I need to be able to breathe while I walk to my car, too.)
Oh, and I've learned the hard way not to pick a new neighborhood in the dead of winter when you live along the SoCal coast. From now on, I'm going to scout apartments on summer weekends so I know which areas are most flooded with tourists.
Not what most people would say, but when I moved last time northern exposure was a big plus for me. My previous place faced full south and I got over thinking sun was great really quickly. It was blinding for half the day and the place got unbearably hot - also everything faded. I had the blinds closed all the time.
I find the north-facing windows much more comfortable. I've still got plenty of light, but never too much.
I've lived in my apartment for 6 going on 7 years, and although it's in a great neighborhood, large and built early enough to forego most of the issues that come along with living in most San Francisco apartments, I was graced with the pleasure of living below the descendent of a Latin Queen and King from New York's 20-something young stripper daughter, her ex-con boyfriend, and her 4 year old son. I wish I didn't know so much about their lives, although I honestly can't say that it wasn't entertaining hearing about why "Love don't pay the motha-f*bombing bills" and the loud phone arguments with her 'baby daddy' about knowing that her son spent the weekend with his grandma because he's coming back "all moisturized".... yeah...and who can forget the countless times she threw her boyfriends clothes down the stairs and out the windows.
Long story short, if you're determined enough, you might be as lucky as me, and about a month after your neighbor spends 10 minutes outside your apartment whistling and calling your name, asks to borrow your electricity to watch 'the game', is too poor to afford really cheap rent in a really expensive neighborhood and has to move out.
A bathtub! When I moved into my current apartment that only has a shower, I had no idea how much I would miss a warm bath on cold winter nights.
upon moving in we were not informed that all the apartments around us would yet need to be remodeled.... so half of the time we have been there construction noise has dominated any amount of peace and quiet. ask about this up front...
Also, i found YELP.com to be helpful in reviews of bigger complexes.
we've only been in our place for 3 weeks-- but electrical outlets in the bathroom are definitely on the list! where do we plug in the hairdryer/ razor?!
Oh my god- LAUNDRY in my building! I forgot what it was like to lug mountains of laundry more than three blocks! We thought it would be worth the compromise for a garage but I'm less sure every week!
Water pressure, water pressure, water pressure. When your shower turns off because your upstairs neighbor turns on her dishwasher and you have to rinse off in the laundry room sink = NOT A CUTE LOOK FOR ANYONE. I don't care how crazy it makes me look - I will be turning on every faucet, every shower, every dishwasher/washer/etc. in any apartment I ever tour again.
Speaking of home appliances, a dishwasher. And a washer/dryer. Also, I'd like a bedroom bigger than a pizza box. (I thought I could handle it, the tiny bedroom. I cannot.)
Avoid urban high rises near hospitals...the noise night and day is astonishing!
I love my current apartment complex's management. They are awesome. That being said, however, I would love a better location. This one is a little dicey if you like to walk outside as I do. Also, two months after moving into our 2 bedroom, 1 bath apartment, my mother-in-law took a nasty spill and had to move in with us. What I wouldn't give for a second bathroom!
My last apartment was really nice and in a safe place, but the cigarette smoke drove me out before my lease was up. EVERYONE in my building smoked, except my husband and I. I get migraine headaches from cigarette smoke and my husband has asthma. The place was so bad, that I would drive around town for hours on end just to avoid going home and facing that horrid smell. Smokers like to say that they are unfairly discriminated against ... well, they can kiss my ample behind!
We have moved so much you would think we would have figured this all out. Things that I must remember for next time:
* No dark granite counters or dark hardwood floors - they show everything - especially if you have pets like we do.
* Outlets, outlets, outlets!
* We have garage parking, which seemed great until we tried to get our car in and realized that due to a fan and some other electrical stuff on the wall, you can barely fit the car in. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I don't hit this stuff each time I back in.
* Water pressure
* We face a back parking lot - should have asked - what is that garage space that the neighbors have used for - because band practice everyday was not what we were hoping for.
* In NYC, we had an apartment that was split at some point and they made a studio apartment out of the smaller space - the guy that lived there was 95 and listened to his TV at volumes that should be illegal. I used to sit in the living room and play Jeopardy along with him. Ask about insulation between units!
* Listen the fridge - our current fridge chirps like there are a thousand crickets trapped inside.
Most of our apartment issues have come from noisy neighbors, but that is so hard to figure out ahead of time. And that can happen even if you're in a house. You can do all your due diligence and it's still a gamble.
I've had so many terrible experiences with landlords that I'm pretty sure I'll never live in an apartment again. I'm living in the suburbs with friends now (they bought a house with way more square footage than they themselves need, and gave me the basement). Ideally, my next move will be into a house that's mine.
And has off-street parking.