Apartment and Rental News
07/28/2010 05:22 PM
Stories from Apartment Land
Weekly News Update
To find ideas for the blog, sometimes we browse through the Google alerts that we have set up around such terms as apartment living, LEED apartment buildings, off campus apartments, etc.
Police Find Coyote Caged in Cape Cod Apartment – To be honest we don't know why these people weren't awarded an honorary police badge. Where else are you supposed to keep a coyote? Also, they are protecting their neighbors and pets; imagine a coyote eating your pet for breakfast or going out to take the garbage down to the street and being attacked by a pack of coyotes. These responsible apartment dwellers have captured and caged the threat and are now facing animal cruelty charges. And now the police are going to put them in a cage. [Boston.com]
Woman Finds Escapee in Her Living Room – Is escaping from jail a crime? At some point, after laws had been passed for years and years and prisons had become a mainstay of the judicial system, did some legislator just raise his hand one day and say, “you know, we should kinda tie this little loophole on up." And it was one of those utterly simple moments of brilliance that made everyone chuckle and the law was passed unanimously, and the legislative day ended with backslaps, jokes and beers. [KETV ABC]
Eco – Apartment Building Powered b Wood Pellets, Sunlight – All utilities included, we suppose. [TreeHugger]
Have anything to share? Post it on up our MyNewPlace Facebook wall.
07/15/2010 02:26 PM
Apartment Rental Match Game: Celebrity Edition
Apartment Match Games!
Hello everyone, we've got another version of our Apartment Rental Match Game, a celebrity edition. Match the famous person on the left with their bedroom on the right to win prizes! Leave your answers in the comments section.
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| 2) | | b) |
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| 3) | | c) |
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| 4) | | d) |
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| 5) | | e) |
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| 6) | | f) |
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| 7) | | g) |
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07/09/2010 02:19 PM
Couch Surfer Compensation Packages
Roommates
Couch Surfer Compensation Packages
As we alluded to in our recent Apartment Pet Peeves series (posted on the MyNewPlace Facebook page), we have an additional guest staying with us for a month. That guest was our 4th roommate until a lovely couple we knew from Colorado arrived on July 1st. So, our old roommate had no choice but to move out…to our couch.
So now our apartment has two more people than it did 2 weeks ago, (we are operating under the more the merrier maxim) we've got to figure out what kind of payment plan on which to put our ‘my bed is your couch' roommate. According to Roommate Common Law, any a period of 7-14 days should be gratis, anything more and some kind of compensation should be discussed. But here, I think there are a few things to consider.
Firstly, not one but two of the current roommates, (myself included) were allowed to stay by previous roommates for free on the couch for more than one month, so it would be nice to pass along that heritage of hospitality.
The circumstances are not quite the same, however. Both our situations were acclimatization focused. We had just moved to the city and needed a place to keep ourselves (and our stuff) somewhere while we found jobs and permanent residences. The hospitality was extended as part of a halfway house kind of deal.
This is very common, especially for recent graduates, which is why we wrote an about the Recent Graduate Dilemma and an apt follow up, called The Rules of Couch Surfing, which, I think, if obeyed can be applied to any couch surfing situation, regardless if the person is an incoming or outgoing roommate.
We won't reprint that classic list here, maybe on Facebook, but regardless, our former roommate/current couch occupier has followed the rules without too much difficulty, so it is not as if she need to compensate for any disruption in the apartment's operation.
That being said, it is not as much a matter of her paying for intrusion, but more a matter, of “hey man, if I could live on the couch for free, I'd do it, so in the interest of being equitable to our other roommates, fork over some bones, or clams or whatever they call it these days."
But the compensation would have to be split 5 ways; do we each get a hundred bucks? Perhaps it would be better for her to use that money towards some kind of apartment improvement project. But what, (we've already got a TV, a couch and a frying pan) would we ever need?
THIS.
06/24/2010 05:28 PM
Worst Roommate of All Time: The Exciting Conclusion (Part 3)
Roommates
“The time has come," the Yoav said,
“To talk of many things:
Of drunks–and the homeless on my couch–
Of roommates–and of thieves–
And why the eviction note is on my door–
And whether pigs have wings."
This will be the final chapter of this tremendously overhyped roommate sage. Last week, I set the stage for the story by describing my apartment and neighborhood. This week, I will finally discuss how my living experience turned into a cluster-funk.
Let's start with the roommates. The lease owner was a 38-yr old hipster. Tight jeans, fixed gear bike, graphic designer…all the credentials necessary to be a real ray of sunshine. There were two other roommates.
The first was a bearded, overweight alcoholic who looked like a love-child of Santa Clause and the roaming Nome. He was constantly drunk and had managed to run up a $600 dollar tab at our neighborhood bar. He was often passed out on our floor, in his boxers, by 1pm with an empty bottle of Jaeger next to him. Naturally, he was a nanny (I kid you not).
The second, a nice enough girl – other than the fact that she let one of her friends live in her room without paying rent. She claimed he was just visiting, but, he was actually getting his mail sent to our house (I kid you not).
I was told by the lease-holder, let's call him “Kilo", that both of these roommates would be moving out within a week. Despite the place being a bit run down, I liked the idea of being able to pick new roommates and agreed to cast my lot with these colorful folks.
I moved in at night, hauled my bags in from my friend's house, walked up the stairs eager to put things down and sleep off the night on the floor of my empty room. I walk in. Holy heck, there's a giant party in my apartment. Every skater street kid the Mission has to offer is in my living room. Unkempt and uncouth, these houseguests' presence did not seem to be in the capacity of a welcome brigade. Between the dude very preoccupied with hunching over the dining room table to the two dudes passed out on one of our three couches things were a bit overwhelming.
The girl roommate informed me she was throwing a going away/ruin the apartment party! Wonderful, jello shots are now all over the carpet, drinks are spilling, cigarette butts everywhere, excellent. Anyway, within twenty minutes, one of the attendees had gotten too drunk and decided to break one of our stairway banisters and use it to begin an impromptu game of American Gladiators. When we kicked him out he redirected his anger, logically enough, towards our glass pane door which he assaulted repeatedly in troglodyte rage. Cool man. I'm going bed.
The next day, that roommate moved out, and one was left. He loved booze. Nice enough guy, I saw a lot of him, but less because of frequency and more because he was a 400 pound man, and he was usually passed out in the living room wearing only his boxers nursing a bottle of Jack Daniels. I kept telling myself, no big deal, he's out at the end of the week and we can get two new clean roommates. Before he left, however, he told me that the lease-holder was paying less rent than we were, and that he found that to be unfair. He decided not to leave without “getting his money's worth" and so he went on a day long binge of destruction. He peed in Kilo's shampoo, he punched holes in the walls, and threw his shoe against the wall for four hours, breaking the plaster and leaving a giant hole in the wall. He also left a $600 tab at the bar across the street and skipped town.
At this point, many of you are thinking, Yoav, why didn't you just move out? There are two parts to that answer, the first, is that I'm an idiot. The second, with these two trouble makers gone, I still had some hopes that things would become normal and more enjoyable.
Out with the old and in with the new. Things were looking up. True the apartment was still raggedy and still smelled like a fishing boat three months out at sea, but at least we were sailing in a new direction. The new roommates were actually reasonable human beings, one was a nice clean so-cal character, the other from Brooklyn– both nice guys.
Things went relatively well for a while. Sure, there was a homeless guy sleeping on our couch every day, but I was told by “kilo" that he was an okay guy just down on his luck. Sure there were 3 am drunken shouting matches, but it's not as if there were any stabbings.
If all good things must come to an end, it can only be fair that bad things must do the same. About a month before we moved out “Kilo" began exhibiting troubling behavior. He was drinking heavily, his psoriasis had become worse and he was routinely drunk throughout the day. This is when the weird behavior began. He was going to strip clubs a lot, bringing some strippers home. Going out all the time and acting very sloppy and violent in bars. One night, he and my other roommate were in the Mission when, out of the blue my roommate hears a fight going on outside the liquor store. He steps out and sees Kilo arguing with a guy who was definitely not not a drug dealer. My roommate goes out and separates the two and they each go their way. Unfortunately, some young mission kids that Kilo knew saw the confrontation, and decided to exact some street justice. They walked up to the drug dealer, stole his beer and told him not to mess with, you guessed, it, Kilo. And so, before you know it, Kilo and my other roommate had a hit on their lives in the Mission and couldn't go south of Market Street anymore. Kilo, through nefarious connections brought a gun into the house one day, but we managed to convince him to get rid of it. The drama continued, and all the while Kilo drank more and more, and his psoriasis became worse and worse. He had no health insurance and could not take medicine and was, likely in serious discomfort and pain.
While this was going on, we also had a 5th member join the tribe and sleep on our couch. He was an English guy who – though I never found out if this was true or not – murdered two skinheads in England who had harassed him and decided to leave England and go to America. He was nice enough and was dating a lovely girl who walked around with a gun in her purse. Believe it or not, by this point, I didn't even question why a guy was sleeping on our couch or why his girlfriend walked around with a gun. He was a pleasant guy and pitched in with house chores so… who cares.
Anyway, things came to ahead when one day I got a worried phone call from one of my normal roommates saying Kilo had flipped a cigarette into the patio, and almost set the apartment on fire. Anyway, they barely managed to put the fire out and we called in the property owner to inspect the damage. He came into the apartment, took a look and said, “you know what, I've had enough, you owe us months of rent – and now this – you're out of here by the end of the week". Excuse us, we asked, but what do you mean we owe back rent? We have been paying our checks on time, even early. Well, as it turns out, our roommate Kilo was pocketing our rent money and spending it on booze and strip clubs. Long story short, in came the 5 day eviction notice and, coming full circle, I jumped back on craigslist, time to try again and find some roommates who are functional members of society. After spending a week on a friend's couch, I landed a new place and I'm now living with three 25 year old women, which brings an entirely different set of problems, but that my sweet friends, is for the future.
06/10/2010 03:25 PM
Worst Roommate Entry: Little Yoav and the Big City (Part II)
Roommates
Over the next few weeks or so, we will be featuring articles from our very own Yoav Simchoni, as he details the events that led to his discovery of THE WORST ROOMATE OF ALL TIME.
Remember, as we stated in yesterday's post, we are running a Worst Roommate of All Time Contest. This is Part II of the official MyNewPlace entry. You can read part I here.
A few weeks ago, I pontificated on the peculiarities of apartment hunting in San Francisco. I also expounded on several guidelines imperative for safely navigating yourself towards a great San Francisco pad with amazing roommates. Naturally, many of you were overwhelmed by the sagacity displayed in all matters regarding housing.
Humbled, you are likely wondering how it is that at the tender age of 22, I have managed to accumulate an astounding breadth of knowledge that would take a normal man a lifetime of subletting to accrue. The answer is simple. During my first 3 months of living in the city, I suffered through the gnarliest living situation outside of Bear dens. In this post, join me as I describe the apartment I moved into and neighborhood I lived in. This will set the stage for the final chapter of my installment in which you will be introduced to my roommates and their devious ways.
As I mentioned at the end of last week's post, I moved into an apartment in a chic part of town known as the Hayes Valley. To be considered chic in San Francisco you really have to raise the bar. Think organic yoga mats, Vegetarian whole-grain dogfood, dudes with pony tails, ten dollar avocado sandwiches and art galleries with artwork that looks like it's been stolen from my crazy aunt in Santa Fe.
The house:
In a bid to strengthen renter's rights, San Francisco enforces rent control which limits the amount by which owners can raise rent for the duration of an active lease. Taking advantage of this legislation, wily renters “hand down" leases to their roommates before moving out, keeping rents low for years. While this practice keeps rents cheap, it also keeps houses looking like they were designed by the architect of the bombing of Dresden. My apartment fell into this category, at $800 a month, it was an incredible bargain for the area, but the strains of 8 years without renovation and scores of roommates were everywhere. The carpets were stained with what I hope was only 2 out of the 3 possible bodily fluids. The walls were so chipped and grooved that they spelled out the entire first volume of War and Peace in Braille.
The kitchen was beyond filthy, the pantry was filled with trash that had time to decompose into mulch, evolve into a species of crab people which divided into two tribes, each worshipping their respective gods “nebu" and “krazm" develop nuclear weapons and bomb each other, leaving their own – newer but still stinky – trash as evidence of a civilization far from its halcyon days.
The bathroom – well it's hard to say what it looked like, because in the 3 months I spent in the house there was no working light. What there often was, however, the scent of cigarettes and beer as my roommate had developed a penchant for smoking and drinking on this, the most regal of house chairs. Call it a double whammy, but as any follower of the superhero Daredevil knows, when one of your senses falters, the others compensate which meant a hyper acute sense of smell in exactly the place you don't want it.
My room, last but not least, was actually quite nice. It was large, and had a bay window, no complaints except that it was a converted dining room and had two swinging doors which didn't quite close. Consequence? Light beams and sound waves creep in. Okay if your roommates are into sitting quietly and reading, but not good if your roommates are into drunk shouting matches.
Having introduced the setting for our drama, join me next week as I finally cut to the chase and introduce you to my roommates, and to the sage which ended with a giant fire in my apartment and a 5-day eviction notice!
Adieu!
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