Apartment Application

Finally – some good news on the apartment front:

We went to look at a place last Wednesday. It was 875 square feet (our current place is 525) and was a top-floor apartment in a four-plex. Rent is just under $800 (very reasonably priced for a huge 1-bed in this neighborhood), and the apartment had hardwood floors, lots of light, a good bathroom and kitchen, and a little nook-type thing for a dining table. There is a porch out back and an assigned parking spot, should we need it.

When we went to see the place, it was an open showing so there were about six other people milling about checking it out. The lady showing it went through all the details and then mentioned she would take the applications first-come first-served basis. I have never filled out an application so fast in my life.

Problem was, neither Daniel or I thought to bring any cash for the application fee. The lady said she’d take the first app that had money with it, so while we did finish our applications and turn them in first, Daniel still had to run out to find an ATM and another girl turned in her application with her money while he was gone. Apartment Lady kept mumbling “Ooh, this is hard… That was in first, but without money, but the other was in afterward with money… Hmm… This is difficult.” I casually mentioned that we had rented with this particular company before, and wondered if that would make any difference. After I said that, the lady got this huge smile and was like, “Ohhh… FABULOUS. We may not even need your application fee, since we’ve already done a background check on you.” Sweet.

She still seemed a bit wishy-washy even after that, so when most everyone else was leaving, Daniel and I stuck around and chatted with her a bit in hopes that she’d decide she liked us more. We were instructed to call the office before 5pm on Friday to see whose application they ran and if we’d need to bring in our money. After our call on Friday, Daniel and I were still no clearer on whether we were going to get the place or not. From what I understood (since Daniel was the one who called) they mentioned something about running the other girl’s application first but they weren’t sure and we could call again later. It infuriates me that they’d run the other girl’s app first, since we got ours in before she did and they weren’t going to need our money anyhow.

At any rate, I was remaining cautiously optimistic and Daniel was refusing to get his hopes up. After the Friday call, I think we both just wrote off the apartment, figuring they had run the other girl’s application and she had gotten it. I even called another place on Friday to try to set up an appointment. (They didn’t call back.)

Cut to today, noon-ish: I got a call on my phone from a number I didn’t recognize. I typed the number into Google just to see what it’d come up with, and right as the phone finished ringing I realized it was the rental company. I quickly called back, and managed to talk to the Apartment Lady. They did run the other application first (*shakes fist*) but IT GOT DECLINED. I didn’t even consider that a possibility. I know it happens, but I just assume that most people have clear histories.

So! The apartment is not yet ours. After work today we have to take a bus to the rental company and give them some money for the background check (turns out they need it, initial check was over a year ago) and then they will run our application first thing in the morning, and then I think we have 24-48 hours to give them the deposit money and then I think it is ours.

Very long-winded way of saying hurray, we might have a new apartment.

File Under: Apartment, General

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