Looking for an apartment?

Finding a new apartment can be one of the most stressful things you can do in your life. Unfortunately, a lot of people learn the hard way when it comes to the Do's and Don'ts of Apartment hunting. They get the apartment and then realize, "What the hell did I just get myself into?!?!?!"

Here's an insiders look on the Do's and Don'ts while looking for an apartment from the point of view of someone that WORKS in the industry-me.

Don't look for an apartment in the ghetto.

The worst mistake someone does is moving to the wrong side of town. Every town has bad parts. You want to stay as far away from those parts as you can. Not sure what's the ghetto and what's not? Ask around. People will up and tell you. Don't got anyone to ask? Go into a local chat room online. They'll tell you. Still not convinced? Go to your favorite search engine and look up your local police department's website. Go to the section of crime statistics. These sites will tell you how many crime reports they have gotten in the area where you're looking to find an apartment. Don't expect the leasing person to tell you "the crime rate." 1st of all, it's against Fair Housing law for any apartment employee to talk about crime. 2nd of all, let's say they break the rules and DO tell you, don't believe them. Apartment people are out there to get potential residents. If the crime in their community is bad, do you seriously expect for your leasing person to tell you the truth? The whole 100% honest truth? Please...give me a break.

Do drive around the community.

Drive around the community at night and on weekends. Get a feel of it. If you see things that are NOT you, like people drinking out on their patios, and loud bass music, you probably don't want to live there. Also, pay attention to the patios there. Are they messy? If most of the patios there are messy, that is a sign that the management company does not walk their property and doesn't really care. How about trash? Is it clean? Or is it trashy? 1st impression really does count. If you see a resident outside, try talking to them and ask them how they feel living there.

Don't be rude to the person helping you. That's my biggest pet peeve.

Don't be intruigued by awesome specials like 2 MONTHS FREE! or something like that.

Too good to be true specials=probably true, but too good for you. Let me tell you why...when an apartment community gives away the whole damn farm, you gotta wonder why. I could actually pin it right in the tail. A lot of unsatisfied residents probably moved out at the same time and they gotta fill it up. Unfortunately, that can result in 2 things. It will attract the people that you don't want to be your neighbors (they'll be more lenient on their credit checks) and you'll probably inherit a horrible managment staff. If the previous people left, it was probably because of the staff and them being unreliable (service requests not getting done, etc.). If a property is 90% occupied or better, that is a good sign that the residents are satisfied there. Ask them how full they are. Also ask them what percentage of people renew their lease, or rephrase it as "how many people have lived here for years?" Also, if you get in on a really really good special, expect to have a HUGE increase upon renewal.

Take a look at the inside of the apartment.

If the appliances look like they're from the 70's, your electric bill will be sky high. Check for gaps in the aparment. Check the a/c filter.

Do ask them the following questions:

What are your qualification guidelines?

Do you do criminal background checks? You don't want to live next to a felon.

Do you take affordable housing or section 8? If they do, turn around and leave. Trust me. No offense to those on gov't assistance (my mom is disabled, so I know) but a lot of those people are druggies and have "trouble" written all over them.

Don't look at the model.

Now, my management company's model apartment is just like the vacant one you would lease. But, believe me, that's not the case with every apartment community. Sometimes they make the model look WOW!!!! and the apartment looks Bleh. Look at a vacant apartment. That'll give you a true feel of what to expect.

Do ask what the utilities run there.

Sometimes they can't give an estimate on electricity, but see how the water bill and trash fee works at their community.

Ask about renewal increases.

Apartments sometimes have to increase your rent due to market changes and to compete with their competition. But too big of a gap isn't good.

Do observe the body language of the person helping you and his/her coworkers.

If the person helping you is acting like they don't want to help you, they'll probably act like that when you live there too. Also, pay attention how they handle a current resident if you're lucky enough to be there when one walks in or calls.

Gates aren't always better.

Gates are just a luxury. That won't keep a burgler from getting into your community. I used to live in a gated community for 3 years. Sometimes I forgot my gate card and would wait for someone else to drive by and I'd follow them in. And sometimes the gates were busted. Gates do not equal security. How do you think the pizza delivery guys enter?

www.apartmentratings.com can be good and bad.

I personally don't like the website because it gives false views about communities. It's a website where people give their opinions on their apartment community. Most of the reviews are negative. If you think about it, if you are truly happy with your apartment community, would you seriously take the time to write a good review about it online? Probably not. You have better things to do. If you are sooo mad at a community, you'll find every way for people to know about it. You'd find that site and write the worst things. But, you can't always believe what you read. I work for apartments. I have read my apartment community's reviews. The negative comments I have gotten are of people that didn't give the "whole" story. They only tell on the review the bad things. I had one person that wrote on there and they were evicted for non-payment of rent. They didn't say that part. Another said that their apartment was roach infested. What they didn't say is that the apartment was roach free when they moved in and they brought the roaches with their furniture and the lived like slobs. Of course roaches procreate if you're a slob. Oh, and don't assume that if an apartment community has a high % rating, that it's good. Most likely, the office staff planted fake resident comments on there to make their score higher. Just scratch that site off your list. It's not accurate. A community with a 20% rating may have many more long term happy residents than those with a 70% rating.

Oh yeah. This is a good question. Ask the person helping you how long they've worked there.

Ask how long the manager worked there. If these people have worked there for years, it's a good sign that's a good staff. If there's lots of turnover, you gotta wonder why.

Okay. Now you've leased the apartment.

Be sure that you qualify before even applying (income wise). When you sign the lease, read everything and understand everything. Know when the rent is late, know that the fees are, know the procedure of work orders, etc. Write down the name of the management company. Get the company website. This would be useful in case you ever have any issues while living there. That'll be another blog topic.

I'll end up adding more to this particular blog when I think of things I didn't as I wrote this. Hope this helps you make an educated decision.