Seeking God Knows What

T and I are struggling with apartment life.  We knew it would be an adjustment and we both thought we’d get used to it.  Yeah, not so much.  Part of the problem is having an upstairs neighbor-first we had Chimney Lady above us, who would go out on her balconey to smoke literally every 15 minutes this summer (I kept track one day). so her smoke/ash would float nicely in our air conditioner vent or our slider.   Now we have Weird Family with Mom, Dad and Son plus a little dog and a big dog.  Dad is apparently a sound technician with weird hours, got a new subwoofer for Christmas and thinks the prime time to play it is from 10 PM to 2-3 AM since as he told us, “my wife lets me sleep on the couch so I can listen to my music”.  Yes, we did complain to the property management, which apparently sent a letter and our neighbor then comes knocking on our door, in his pajamas while the temperature outside is maybe 5 degrees, apologizing while implying that he has to put up with our screaming kid who slams doors so we should have to put up with his racket.  Widget may be a “spirited” child but screaming and slamming doors are very rare around here.  Needless to say, T & I both looked at each other and said, “I can’t wait for our lease to be done.”  The next night he came down and offered us leftover corned beef and cabbage.  We declined.

And it would help if the parking lot and sidwalks were PLOWED in the winter, before people have to go to work.  They either do it at about 2 in the afternoon or 11 at night.  I so enjoy wading through 6 inches of snow on the sidewalks to get to my car in the morning. 

Plus I missed having a yard a lot more than I thought this summer.  So did Widget.  The only positive: the heated pool and central air since we didn’t have that at our last house.

Anyway, we are having a hard time locating anything to rent that is in a neighborhood we feel comfortable living in.  And then what people want for rent is outrageous!  I mean seriously our house payments before were just about the same except the disastrous refinance payment that didn’t include property taxes.  We’d still have to pay all our utilities, we just wouldn’t have the maintenance (supposedly- my sister and her husband got screwed when they rented a house because the landlord NEVER fixed anything that broke).  And they all want large sums of money for security deposits/last month’s rent and so on.

Of course, I’ve driven by at least 3 houses I like for sale with decent prices in the neighborhood we want to move to but as far as I know we can’t get a mortgage now since we filed for bankruptcy despite actually being in a better financial situation than we’ve ever been in before.

Add to that, I don’t really relish moving twice in the next few years- moving to a rental home, then buying a home but I cannot imagine staying here without it driving all of us crazy.