Top Apartment Hunting/Moving Tips
Do your research.
Researching the area you want to move to is key. Especially in a large city, there are many factors to consider. For example: 1. If you are not bringing a car, are there a lot of things in walking distance. What will your commute be every day to work from that area. 2. What’s the demographic like? Is it more young professionals or college students who you may have to listen to playing beer pong every weekend outside. 3. What is the price range? After figuring out your budget see what area of the city works best for your budget. This will help make sure when searching you aren’t getting scammed and that your budget will fit that area/size.
Here’s a few resources for you. For Chicago neighborhoods check out here and here. When searching try domu, zillow, hotpads, radpad and craigslist (sounds scary, but you find some of the best ones here just be cautious)
Ask questions.
When going to look at an apartment, have a list of questions prepared to ask. The person showing isn’t going to tell you the details that don’t make the place sound absolutely amazing unless you ask. So make sure you are aware of the move-in fees, where the laundry is and if it’s a coin machine, what you utilities you are in charge of, if something breaks there is a maintenance man to fix it, etc.
Make a plan.
Moving in general requires many moving parts and usually many extra hands. Make sure you plan out how you will be moving the items, how you will get them up if the unit is not on the first floor, what the requirements are for moving-in, that you turned on the utilities you needed before hand (nothing like moving in with no air conditioning), where you can park your vehicle while loading and unloading (beware of many tow zones in the city), etc.
Decorate mindfully.
Last but not least the fun part, decorating. I say this last, but usually find myself planning out this part first as it’s my favorite thing about moving into a new space. When moving at this age though, something good to keep in mind is while we are no longer in college with a complete mismatch room of furniture we still are not in our forever home (most likely at least). So when it comes to decorating make sure you get pieces that will last in your next move. While the blue couch is super cute and trendy, are you going to want that 5 years down the road in a small family home? Most likely not. Also, thanks to so many great home shops these days you can get great furniture and decor for very reasonable prices. A few of my favorite shops are: World Market, Home Goods, Ikea, and CB2.
Now back to packing for the big move this weekend. Hope everyone has a lovely weekend!