Moving & A horribly frightening story about being in the right place at the right time.
Andrew and I have been looking for a new place for a few weeks now. It is incredibly difficult finding a nice, affordable place in Austin. Right now we live in a three bedroom house in a new subdivision in a town just south of Austin. We pay $995 monthly...and that is just rent. We have to pay for our electricity, gas, water, wastewater, trash, and lawn services. Those are just the necessary bills. Then we've got roadrunner (internet), Direct TV, TIVO, and digital phone. Also my website and a few other bills - education, credit cards, etc.
THAT SHIT IS EXPENSIVE!
I want to save money so we can buy a house. I hate putting money into stuff that will never be mine. A supersweet condo in Downtown Austin would be *so* nice...
So anyway we decided to move. We started looking around at apartments and found out a few things about living in Austin:
a.) You can live in a great apartment, for a great price, but if you have issues with being raped more than five time a year then you shouldn't live there. Sorry, but my per year rape limit is currently at two. East Austin is not for me.
b.) You can live in an awesome part of Austin affordably. You will be able to walk to all the fun and funky stores and to live near the live music scene...but the ground might fall out from beneath your feet.
c.) You can find a GORGEOUS apartment for a FABULOUS price, but you have to live in North Austin. When you are Andrew or Monica that means you have to drive AT LEAST 30 minutes to get to work. Andrew works twice a week in South Austin, twice a week in San Antonio and once a week in San Marcos. I work in San Marcos five days out of the week. No, thank you.
We started visiting different communities about two weeks ago and we have not had any luck. It makes me sick to my stomach...but get this.
THIS GETS ME SUPER DUPER SICK TO MY STOMACH. Like, I seriously want to hurl just thinking about this...and I did not even witness it firsthand.
GOD. Andrew went into the office of an apartment community we visited last weekend. We went in a little late and they were already going to close, plus there were two other couple waiting ahead of us, so we decided to try to catch the folks at another complex and to visit OAK RUN later. It looked pretty old and kinda ghetto to me but Andrew found it charming because it has a natural habitat with bunnies & shit hoppin' along and there are a lot of trees, so he went back to check them out today.
Well, he says he walked into the office and heard a tenant complaining to the woman behind the desk. In his words: She was pissed off and telling them that "this is the FOURTH time this has happened and I expect something to be done about this? what is going on?"
Andrew looked at the woman and she had a BIG GREY RAT in a large ziplock bag. Talk about being in the right place at the right time. SHOULD YOU EVER MOVE TO AUSTIN, DO NOT EVEN GO NEAR OAK RUN OR ANYTHING AROUND IT! SHIT!
Fuck me. I'm so glad he saw that. Andrew decided for us right then & there that we are going to have to spend a lot more than we anticipated. LOL. I can't rightly disagree after that shit. I am still insisting that we look at AT LEAST five more communities, but he found a place where we can get a GREAT deal on a very nice apartment. http://www.regencyparkapts.net We actually went by this place and Andrew went in to grab and brochure. The rent was way too high for us. It is $1015 monthly for a two bedroom. Well, he went in today and the deal is $865 for a two bedroom two bathroom apartment, no deposit fee. no application fee, and $500 off the first month's rent! SUPERSWEET! They are in the perfect location for us. It is a lot more than we wanted to spend but we won't have to pay for several of the utilities that we had to pay for before.
I looked on http://www.apartmentratings.net and there are some bad reviews on the place, but there are for every other place, too. :/ All I know is that, no matter where I move to, this time I will NOT be fucked over. And these people I am renting from have another thing coming if they think they are going to screw me over any more than they already have...and I still do expect some reimbursement. I am planning on telling them that they have one of two options:
1. You charge every other tenant a $250 holding fee on a home for a 30 day period. You charged me an extra $745, even though two people quoted me the $250 holding fee. You apply that to my rent for next month.
2. You get sued for the extra $745 you owe me as well as an as-of-yet undetermined amount that I feel I am owed for several appliances never having been maintenanced and a garage door that does not lock (security issue).
I might even add a third option.
3. I rape you with a rake and claw your face apart with my nails then go to find Montecore.