Our first flat

Not much has happened in the last three days, except that we found a flat!! Most of our time lately has been spent searching for places online, sending emails, and inspecting a handful of flats. Yesterday we saw a place along with 10 or more other people, and before we could even get a good look around, someone said “I’ll take it, can I put a deposit down?” That sucked for us, because it made our trip out to the apartment completely pointless! The place was kind of junky anyway and in a shady looking neighborhood, so… sour grapes and all that.

This morning we had an appointment to see an apartment in a newer building that sounded really nice. It was in a neighborhood we hadn’t looked at before (Maroubra) and the location seemed pretty great. There’s a shopping mall about a block away with a few grocery stores and lots of other shops, so it sounded good since we aren’t getting a car. Also, it’s only a 10 minute bus ride to my school and the bus stop is at the end of the block. So, before we even saw the place, we were really hopeful that it might be ‘the one.’

When we arrived at the real estate office at 10:30am, there was another couple also there to see the unit. I decided that if everything looked good after a quick look around, I’d employ the deposit tactic that I saw yesterday to drive our competition away. We rode the elevator up to the 5th floor with the agent and the other couple, and the agent let us into the flat. My first impression of the place was that it was small, but very nice. The kitchen looked new and nice and shockingly it had a refrigerator! None of the places we’d looked at before now has had a refrigerator! The place also had a dishwasher and a clothes washer, so there were three very big plusses going for it. We checked out the bedroom, and it was also pretty small. The bathroom looked very nice, with nice tile work and a fancy counter and sink.

Kara said she really liked it, and I was ok with it so we hurried back to the agent and asked her if we could put a deposit down. She told us that we could head back down to the office to fill out applications and put down a deposit, and that would keep her from showing the unit to any other people until the results of our application came back. So we did just that, but filling out the application took some creative work…

Neither of us have jobs, we haven’t rented from a place since August, and we’re new to the country to boot! So, we spent time slowly filling out the applications, writing on a bunch of other details that they didn’t ask for. Kara said that she’s looking for a job, and will be able to start working in March. She also listed how much monthly income she expects to make. I listed my school as my employer and put down my school loans as ‘income.’ We put down our Hawaii apartment as our current rental details, and then wrote that we moved out in August and have been traveling since. It was all carefully planned out to make us look at least partially stable and responsible. We also (at the agent’s suggestion) wrote on the application that we could pay 2 months of rent up front. When we turned in the application, the agent told us that we should know by tomorrow at the latest.

Less than 4 hours later the agent called and said that we were approved. WOO HOO! We are going back to the real estate office tomorrow at 10:30am to sign the lease and get the keys to our new place! Tomorrow after we sign the lease, we are heading over to Paddy’s place to borrow her air mattress and maybe bring back over a few of our suitcases. We have to take the bus both ways since her car has broken down, so I’m not too sure how much we will be able to bring back with us.

So now our job shifts from finding an apartment to furnishing the found apartment. We have absolutely nothing when it comes to furnishings or housewares, so garage sales and second hand stores, HERE WE COME!