A New Home in Clinton Hill (?)

I don't wish the experience of searching for an apartment in NYC upon anyone. For the past two-and-a-half weeks, it feels like I've been riding the subway for endless hours, traversing Manhattan and Queens and Brooklyn to get to various neighborhoods people tell me are great places to live. The general rule became this: if I liked the apartment, I didn't like the neighborhood. (Exhibit A: Gorgeous, sun-filled, W&D included, 1,200+ square foot apartment in Central Harlem at 135th street and Lenox. Right next to a large hospital, with a handful of restaurants in the vicinity serving only one type of food: deep fried.) And if I liked the neighborhood, what rent I could barely afford wouldn't get me a place that would make me happy. (Exhibit B: Unit on the Upper West Side at 106th street with matchbox-sized bedrooms in a building with dilapidated common areas and likely an extensive rat/cockroach infestation, and a toilet that requires the frequent use of a plunger. Also: If you're trying to get someone to take your apartment, why would you share this information with a prospective tenant?)

Suffice is to say, on my way back up to my current borrowed shelter (Thanks, Fei-chan) from Brooklyn on Saturday, I was smack-dab in the middle of "I'm never going to find a place I love and can afford" blues. As my dad pointedly told me on Skype when I spoke to him on Sunday morning, the issue is not finding a place you want to live: "I'm sure there are plenty of places you'd love to live on 5th avenue--you just can't afford them." Big sigh. Thanks, Papa/Captain Obvious. So I started out on Sunday morning with a heavy heart, to meet up with my Craigs Listed roomie in Prospect Heights and embark headlong into another day of facing the stark reality of living on an artsy salary and not a corporate one. It was a beautiful, sunny, breezy day, but I was grumpy and about ready to throw my hands into the air and drag my suitcases under a bridge in Central Park (or Prospect Park, maybe, just so I could say I live, homeless-ly, in the "it" borough) and forget about the whole mess.

The broker met us and drove us over to the first place. As we walk up the carpeted stairs to the third floor, I realize this--unlike many others in a similar price range--is a relatively well-maintained building. And it is quiet, except for the kids playing basketball in a playground across the street. We step into the apartment, and I see a long hallway extending all the way to the back of the building, and the entire place is filled with sunlight pouring in from the large number of windows. I gasp at the size of the place. It's not perfect, of course, but here, finally, after seeing what feels like dozens of apartments in various safe and unsafe, savory and unsavory neighborhoods across the city, is an apartment I could actually picture myself living in. My heart lifts a little. Could this be it?

But the good day was only just beginning. After leaving this unit in Prospect Heights, we walk across Atlantic Avenue to Clinton Hill. The area is quieter, with picturesque tree-lined streets and brownstones that make you sick with envy and desperately wish you could afford to buy a shell for $1M and gut-renovate it however you damn well please. (Millionaires in NYC, look no further than me for your future wife!) We locate the corner we're supposed to meet the broker on, and look around for the address. Finally, we realize the place is the rather ugly, modern-looking apartment building on the corner. No historic brownstone for us, apparently. Bummer. The broker arrives and we hike up to the third floor, she opens the door (the key was left on the mailbox for four days with no issues!), and we walk in.

The third floor is a living room/open kitchen layout with enough space to have distinct areas for doing things. As in, there can be separate places to eat dinner and watch TV; no need to sit on the couch in front of the TV and scarf down your meals. There's a half-bath on this floor, and the kitchen has granite countertops and one of those fridges with the ice and water dispenser thing on the front. (You know how convenient those are.) I look around for the rest of the apartment and realize the bedrooms are actually up the stairs on the fourth floor. There are balconies to walk out onto in each bedroom, and a very pretty, recently-redone bathroom in between. There's a bit of an issue with the unequal size of the bedrooms, but we are loving the place; the fact that we'd get to pick the colors of the walls because the owner is repainting anyway is also a huge plus. Then the broker points up another flight of stairs and says, "That goes to the rooftop." We freeze. Rooftop? And lo and behold, there is a terrace that spans the entire length of the building that would be exclusively for our use at the top of the stairs. "The last guy made this into a garden," says the broker. I think, "Gardens are nice, but rooftop wine-tasting sounds stellar, too."

Now, I will readily admit that this apartment will mean that I'll basically be eating home-cooked meals until I get a raise. (Hell, maybe it'll force me to learn how to cook. That could be a valuable life-skill that eluded capture throughout my McKinsey days.) It's way more than I expected to pay in rent when I first arrived to this crazy city. (I've heard this is quite the universal experience.) Yet, somehow, I believe it will be alright. People are always telling me there are great things to do in NYC for free, so I'll have a real way to test out their assertions. Yes, I've been having minor panic attacks about whether I'll be able to sustain the monthly budget I built on Google Spreadsheets--but inexplicably and in the face of all evidence to the contrary, I think it will be okay. And if it's not, well, perhaps a second job will be in order, whether it's waitressing or bartending or teaching Japanese or making Power Point pages or throwing fish during god-forsaken hours of the morning for a few hundred bucks. (Man, that was a terrible movie. But I loved it anyway.) People seem to survive doing the craziest stuff around here.

Anyway, we are meeting with the broker and the owner to sign the lease tomorrow morning. (Brief plug: Our broker is awesome. Her name is Michelle and she went to bat for us on our behalf and took $200 off our monthly rent, and she talked to her supervisor and reduced our fee from 12% to 10%. If you're looking for a place in Brooklyn, I'd highly recommend her. Leave me a comment here if you're interested.)

I won't be able to relax until the deal's done. And Day 1 at the new gig starts on Friday.