12 Tips When Looking For Apartments
Apartment searching can be stressful and undesirable at times! The key is trying to find the right apartment, but sometimes it can seem out of sight. Being able to get the apartment of your dreams might feel like an impossible task, but it shouldn’t be. These are simple tips to help ease your mind to get focused!
1. Know The Area
You won’t want to move to a new area blind! Do some research! Find the best spots for coffee in the morning, the best park to walk through, restaurants you’ll want to go to. You don’t want to buy apartments that are not in the right area for you. Look around, ask people who live in the area questions, make it feel like home! The last thing you want to do it only look at the apartment, which is important, but the area should be as important too!
2. Be Open To New Ideas
You might know exactly what you are looking for, but when it comes to actually looking for the perfect apartment; it might not be there. Think out of the box when you see a kitchen that might not be exactly what you are looking for. Look at the window in the living room, close your eyes, and wonder about the opportunities you can have with a blank canvas. What would you decorate it with?
3. Know What You Are Looking For
Start searching realtor sites and see what’s out there. Keep track of what you need and where you want it. It’ll be hard to go look at apartments that you would never want to be shown. No one knows what you’re looking for except for you. You’ll want to give the Realtor something to work off of and fill the blanks in along the way.
4. Imagining Is Key
Apartments are not always clean or “show worthy”. When this happens, think of what the space could become. It’ll be you living in it, so where would you put your things. Really map it out. You have to get past what you actually see to get to what it might become. Take pictures and video if you can’t think right then. Take time to decompress.
5. Think About How You Want To Live
Do you want a big, spacious apartment? A small, minimalist one? Can you afford to live the way your imagining. Money can be the root of all evil when it comes to finding the apartment you would like to live in. You may want a nice big apartment, but it reality, you can only afford a small studio. If you really need that spacious apartment, think of how you’ll get there and try to find ways to contribute to that end goal.
6. Take Advice From Everyone
There are so many people who have lived in apartments and know curtain things you should pay attention to. Embrace the advice, even if it makes you sad. This will help you assess and choose which one you could see yourself in. Advice will keep you thinking about where you’ll want to live and if you’re looking where someone lived once, talk to them about what they thought about it. Why did they move out? How were the neighbors? The tenant? What problems came up while you lived there?
7. Always Be Looking
Listings pop up out of no where and you need to be ready when one does. If your not actively looking, make sure you’re checking every once and a while. If you’re looking in an area that everyone else is looking into, you’ll need to hop on anything that might catch your eye because it might be gone tomorrow. Let people know that your looking an a curtain area because you never know if they know someone how might be moving out of an apartment.
8. Don’t Jump On An Offer
The worst thing you can do it is jump too soon on an offer because of how good the price is. Why is it a low price? Is the apartments in bad shape? Is there something wrong with the plumbing that you’ll have to fix? Is the heating working? Neighbors?
You need to know the apartment before you can adequately make a decision about it. This may take time. Never rush something you’re unsure of! That’s when you’ll buy apartments that might not be what you’re looking for.
9. Don’t Let Anyone Push You Into A Sale
If some one else thinks that a sale is great, let them buy it. Don’t be pressured into buying something this big because of one person who thinks they know what they are talking about. Always remember that you need to do what is best for you and only you really know what is in your head.
10. Pros & Cons List
Along with any big buy, creating a pro’s and con’s will help relieve the stress of not knowing how to take the first step. Understand that some of the things you are asking for are not realistic or out of your price range or deciding what is more important. Take your time with this. Really think about it. Don’t just do the obvious. Create an actually list.
11. Take Someone Close With You
Having the right person on the hunt for an apartment with you makes the hours of dedication and long nights of searching for the right place worth it once you find THE place. This person should know you better than anyone and have an idea of what you want. They will be the your head when you can’t think straight and ears to talk about your thoughts.
12. Get Excited
Be happy! You’re finally getting your own place and are finally adulting. You’ve been dreaming about the day when you get the keys to your home, where you’ll have holiday parties, people over, and making the best memories.
Of course a search as big as thing can be stressful, but it’s who you have by your side that will make everything you’ve done so far, worth it.
What were your experiences like! Who was your number one person you picked when touring apartments? Let us know in the comments below!
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