starting the process again

I don't know what happened, exactly. We had decided that we were going to move to Brooklyn on June 1st, which means we'd have to begin looking for apartments in the beginning of May. But somehow I found myself on craigslist this weekend, and suddenly I'm looking for May 1st move-ins instead.

This will be our 3rd apartment in the city, but now we are specifically targeting the Park Slope neighborhood (or Fort Greene, but it's more expensive, if you can believe it.) Yesterday I looked at one apartment that was too small. Otherwise it was perfect - elevator, washer/dryer, dishwasher, shared roof and garden, on a nice street, not far from all of the subway lines and Atlantic Avenue. But it was advertised as a 'loft,' and the realtor said 'around 900 square feet.' Here's a tip, Property Shark is your best friend. The craigslist listing provided the cross-streets and a photo of the entrance to the building. That was all I needed to pinpoint the exact address even before the realtor gave it to me, and knowing the floor, and that the owner of the condo was a woman, I was able to see that there was no 4th floor apartment owned by a woman with more than 740 square feet. There was that one, and one that was 504 square feet. Guess which one she took me to see? Yeah, the one with less square footage than I have now. I told her it was 400 square feet smaller than she'd said, and she gives me the, "Oh, we thought it was much larger," deal, but come on. She's a realtor. She spends her whole day in apartments. That's why working with realtors is tough. They're like used car salesmen. Do your own research and don't listen to a darn thing they say, that's my motto. Well, it's fine that it didn't work out because it had a one month broker fee, and ideally it would be no-fee or through an owner or tenant instead of realtor.



The photos provided in the listing did the apartment justice (it was also in crummy shape), so I didn't take any more except for up on the roof deck, which had a 360 degree view of Brooklyn and Manhattan. It was awesome. But pets weren't allowed up there and the deck part was like a catwalk, very narrow and kind of scary, unlike other roof decks I've seen. Sort of a let down.

But hopefully I'll see more apartments later this week and into the next, and if nothing still, we'll just keep looking! Actually I really enjoy looking at apartments, it's just that I hate knowing I have to choose one of them and do all the paperwork to apply. But I cannot wait to decorate a new place!