1. Take steps to solve the problem or leave the situation forever. The question people most frequently ask me is, “How are you?” After that, it’s “Have you found a place to live in New York yet?” (Seriously, that question is directed to me at least once a day… and that has been going on for the past two months. At least.)
No, I have not yet found a place to live in New York. Yes, I am currently taking (seemingly glacial) steps to solve the problem by getting my papers together, soliciting friends for advice, looking up suggestions online, scouring advertisements for apartments, investigating brokers, and planning out how I plan to hunt for my wascally apartment.
Another option is to leave the situation and live somewhere else entirely where the monthly rent for studio apartments aren’t comparably priced to 492 gallons of milk. Or 421 gallons of gasoline. Or five nights in a fancy hotel. Or over twenty months of unlimited New York City subway rides.
2. Change your thoughts or emotions about the problem so that they are in service of your goals. I am further developing my skills in distress tolerance and patience with this quest. Those are useful life skills. I’m building character. I know I will find a place to live; I just don’t know when. I will also be able to advise friends in the future should they decide to relocate to New York. This is also a short-term problem in the grand scheme of things; once I sign a lease, this experience will be a long-lost memory. Probably because I will actively block it from my consciousness.
3. Accept both the problem and your response to the problem. As I am currently about 3,000 miles away from New York City, I cannot do anything about securing an apartment right now. And since there is nothing I can do right now to hasten my acquisition of shelter, there’s no real value in getting stressed out about it. I accept that anxiety grips me with its cold, steely fingers from time to time, but I am coping. (Blogging helps.)
4. Do nothing and remain miserable. Contrary to popular practice, ignoring a problem will not make it go away. (Usually.) This option, however, is arguably the easiest, since it involves minimal effort. Change is difficult.
(Seriously: If you are connected to someone in New York City who is seeking an apartment tenant—a landlord, a broker, someone who is looking for someone else to take over his/her lease—please send me an e-mail. I’m exploring all of my options, even if the yield will likely be low. We cannot reap any harvest if we do not initially sow any seeds.)
(I know, my aphorisms are not helping my case.)
12 May 2008 |
Maria:
Does your medical center have its own real estate office? If you don’t know, call the human resources department - they will give you their own real estate agents or a list of preferred brokers. You might also prepare an advert and see if they will accept it as an email or fax and post it on their internal bulletin board. Many people rent informally and knowing that you will be on staff will get you an inside edge. As you are becoming aware, the culture in NY is to be up front, persistent and somewhat demanding. Otherwise, your request will likely be ignored. In that spirit, calling works better than emailing.
You might also investigate renting in southern Westchester County: New Rochelle, the north part of Yonkers, White Plains, Bronxville, Hartsdale, Eastchester: they are all on the Metro North lines with very easy commutes (trains run every half hour or more often and service is reliable).
There is also a fabulous evolutionary biologist blogger, Grrl Scientist, who lives in Inwood (far upper West side near Columbia New York Presbyterian Medical Center) who travels all over the city and she may be in a good position to do some advance legwork for you in terms of visiting apartments, putting you up short term, helping you with move-in, etc.
Contact me at my email addy if I can be of any further help.
Comment by Annie | 13 May 2008 @ 7:19am
RE: the (seemingly glacial) steps you’re taking.
In geological time, glaciers have some of the fastest recorded speeds. Apart from the ephemeral upstarts of the juvenile earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, debris flows, etc., glaciers move faster than almost any other process. Continental drift, fault propagation, plate subduction, magmatic convection, adiabatic rise, and orogenesis are all significantly slower than the formation and movement of glaciers.
Also, as with all other things in the geologic world, glaciers are a certainty. They can retreat for decades, but will always turn and advance, on a long enough time scale.
So, with the aid of science, take heart. Weather the temporary retreats, and I’m certain your glacial search will be ultimately successful.
Comment by Rowan | 13 May 2008 @ 5:05pm
Gluck with finding new digs.
Comment by Dragonfly | 15 May 2008 @ 7:51pm
You may need to turn your problem into a different problem.
Bottom line, or plan B might be to arrange to temporarily live somewhere (affordably) while you find a real place to live. So instead of just looking for a place to live, look for a place to stay. As you say, your access to information is far too limited where you are now.
Comment by Greg P | 18 May 2008 @ 7:36am
You may have a place by now, but I actually found my current apartment through StreetEasy (.com, won’t directly link). Right now, there’s not as much competition, so you can ask the broker trying to sell the lease to take a cut in commission.
Incidentally, unless you have a friend, all the no-commission apartments you’ll see listed there or CL seem to be uniformly…misrepresented. They’ll be freshly painted but they’ll have forgotten to tell you the window is blocked by a dumpster, or that the finishings haven’t been updated since the 1930s. Brokers (representing a listing, not one you approach to give you a list) have less incentive to BS since you’re not personally attached to them. If you have a friend on the ground who can check out an apartment with a camera for you, there shouldn’t be any surprises.
Comment by K. | 4 Jun 2008 @ 5:28pm