Last Updated on: 12th May 2015, 11:44 am
Steve and I are looking for a place together. Our little places can get a bit cramped when the two of us are in them, not to mention if we unloaded all of our stuff into one of them. That just wouldn’t happen. This has brought me to the conclusion that god I hate apartment hunting. On top of the strange deadlines, the applications you have to fill out and the frustration of finding out that some places just aren’t within where your vision of an area of town is, you meet some real dopes. Let’s begin.
Dope 1 thinks he can call an area not much bigger than your bachelor pad a two-bedroom apartment. Just because you have 2 closets in that small space doesn’t mean it’s a two bedroom!
Dope 2 doesn’t bother to let his current tenant know we’re coming. This is blatently obvious by the underwear she is folding when we go in. What does that forecast for us? Probably not good things. See ya later.
Dope 3 doesn’t seem too alarmed that her building has no laundry and there’s no laundry near by. Why? Because “She takes it home to her mommy.” Will mommy do ours?
Dope 4 refuses to even rent the space he has available to us because we can’t mow the lawn. seriously, would you really want two blinks trying to cut your grass? This position doesn’t change even when we tell him we’re willing to find and pay someone to do it out of our own pocket. Oh no, the guy on the main floor must do it. I will laugh and laugh and laugh if I read in the paper that his nice lawn-cutting tenants wreck his house and bounce rent. That actually happened to one guy in town, wanna go for 2?
Dope 5 works for an agency to help people find housing. Their specialty is supposed to be to match your requirements with places. Some of these requirements might be safety, affordability, location, you get the idea. This guy tried to recommend I go live at a place affectionately known around town as “the crack building.” When I said I wouldn’t feel safe there, do you want to know what his response was? It was, “Oh, you know about that.” Thanks, goodbye, and I’ll never recommend you to any of my friends, you slimy prick. Oo! That was a little unexpected venom.
Dopes 6 and 7 took the cake though. Where do I begin? Over the course of 3 visits, they helped talk us out of a place we weren’t really sure we wanted anyway by doing the following:
- I asked dope 6 why the rent was so cheap. She said she honestly didn’t know, she just thought “the landlord was so nice!” so he was saving them on rent. When we arrived, it was made clear that maintenance wasn’t this guy’s priority and the building wasn’t “so nice! after all.” I mean, I wasn’t expecting a gorgeous place, but I was expecting more than this.
- Dope 6 also didn’t even know where her phone jacks were or if they even had any. She said she couldn’t see them because all the furniture was in the way. Hello. You’ve lived here for a year, and the furniture didn’t arrange itself.
- She also didn’t know who she was paying her hydro to because “my room-mate set that up and I just send her money.” After being very nice, I finally got mad and got the company name out of her by asking, “What are the words on the envelope that comes in the mail?” Even that took a couple of tries.
- The room-mate, dope 7, because I’m so predictable, wasn’t much better. She also didn’t know where the phone jacks were, and didn’t understand the question “Do you lose heat in the winter time?” or “Does the place get cold.” I’ve never had someone pause so long and then say very slowly, “Um… … … I…don’t…knooooooooooooow!” Chief, It’s May! Winter wasn’t that long ago. Sure it was a mild one. But it still covered the ground with white garbage, that’s cold enough to make you, um … … … knooooooow! And, it was their first and only winter, so it’s not like she couldn’t remember which winter was the worst.
- This was the best. After showing us around, Dope 6 looked at us, giggled and said, “Soon I’m going to go to New York City to meet this guy for the first time! I met him on the internet. He’s from Iowa, and he’s so nice!” Anybody remember what else was so nice that we just saw? I hope she makes it back alive and unscathed.
And so, the search continues. But I know, like the truth in the X files, an apartment…is out there.
