grad student housing

[eifoitay]

Hi everyone,

I'll be a new grad student at UA this fall and am currently trying to find housing. I'm moving to Tucson from Illinois and am not familiar with the area at all, although googlemaps have been quite helpful. Do you have any recommendations for good neighborhoods/apartment complexes for graduate students? I don't need something RIGHT on

Comments

[footnotefetish]

I would recommend living north of campus if you don't want a lot of distractions or disturbances in your neighborhood. South of campus you'll find more of a party zone.

Mountain Avenue has very nice bike lanes as far north as Fort Lowell Road (but any further north than that, it's not as bicycle-friendly), and you can use it to bike into the middle of campus (more or less). There are townhouses, small apartment complexes, and rental houses all around the area between Grant and Fort Lowell, on each side of Mountain Avenue.

I'm not sure if they still sell them or not, but the last time I was apartment-hunting, I bought a rental listing from Real Estate Direct. The listing was really thorough, and they could tailor your list based on certain criteria (avoiding certain zip codes, insisting on off-street parking, etc.).

[feelmymoment]

Is Real Estate Direct legitimate? I see their ads on craigslist all the time but for some reason they make me nervous. How does it work?

[footnotefetish]

They were legitimate when I used them, but businesses change policies and management. I don't know anyone who's used them more recently. I hope they're not scamming anyone.

[eifoitay]

Ah thank you so much! Info on bike lanes is really helpful although I'm no stranger to riding on fairly busy roads I prefer not to do it.

Real Estate Direct's website appears not to have been updated since last September so I'm not sure what the story is there, perhaps I'll call during the week.

Thanks again!