Lease: extend or move out? Would like some thoughts.

[Fudgie]

My boyfriend and I moved into a place in September. Things are going well. Sometime later in the summer, we will need make a choice regarding the lease. Renew or move out. I'm a little stuck as is my boyfriend.

 

Our current place is great but very, very small. It's essentially a studio. There is no true separation between the living room and bedroom. We each have learned how to use headphones because you can here everything the other person does. It's essentially one big room, aside from the bathroom. We have a shower stall, sink, and in toilet in the bathroom. The living room is big enough for 2 recliners or a small couch, a desk, and a couple dressers. The fridge is in the living room because the kitchen is hall-sized.

 

My parents think we're crazy to live in this together because when we're home, we're always in the same room. I have to admit, it's hard to entertain friends and keep it clean but we usually don't invite people over anyway.

 

But here are the pros!

 

-only just over $600/month

-I don't have to hear or interact with any neighbors. Ever.

-no ghetto/sketchy neighbors or business around

-nice, helpful landlord who isn't nosy

-good street, okay area

-close to everything

-WE PAY FOR NO UTILITIES. NOT EVEN ELECTRIC.

-lets us have a cat at no extra cost

 

I don't know how much electric costs per apartment. All my friends have their bills paid by their parents. I don't know who to ask. Because we are in the attic, I blast A/C during summer and run heat during the winter (my landlord gave me an electric heater in addition to house heat and encouraged me to use it because he said it can get cold up there). I'm scared we'll end up a with a high bill if we move elsewhere.

 

Overall, I would love some more room. Just for stuff. And entertaining. Maybe we'd enjoy it? I don't know. My boyfriend says if we found a good place, sure but he rather live here again than pay for high utilities.

 

Our friends moved out to a beautiful one bedroom with, gasp, a real separation between the living room and bedroom, plus a real porch! But then they got screwed with electric.

 

Any ideas? Thoughts?

[abitbroken]

I have no idea if your area is comparable to mine so I can't comment on the price.

 

I think you have weighed the pros and cons well. To be honest, what I have did in that situation - since it is so early - go look at apartments, people renting out their guest house/in-law apartment, etc, etc, so you can get a feel for what else is out there. You'll see if the grass is greener or not. Granted, some of those places might not be available when the time comes, but you'll get an idea. No harm, no foul.

 

ALso, when you apartment hunt, you can ask what the heat or electric typically is if its in a building, etc. Electricity is all up to how you use it you''' get really good with energy efficiency.

 

I would just be careful if you rent a place thats in a super old house or building. If you live in something well insulated and say built in the past 40 years, your gas/electric heat would be tons cheaper than if you picked a 100 year old "updates" place.

[pl3asehelp]

Is buying property an option? Are you in the USA?

[SapphireNoir10]

Your current place does sound great

 

It wouldn't hurt to look around but if you can't find anything better then you know to stick with what you have.

[chitown9]

Your landlord gave you an electric heater and encouraged you to use it?? To me, that speaks volumes in view of the fact he pays your electric bill. Have you considered using a partition of some sort? I have a folding divider between the my bathroom and the bedroom so that the sun does not come streaming in my face in the morning. If you are interested, Ikea or Pier 1 would probably carry such an item. Just an idea.

[Fudgie]

a bit broken,

 

Lol, the place where we are now is actually a very old house that was converted into completely separate 1 bedroom apartments. We got the attic apartment. This place is solid. There are 4 other apartments but I don't hear anyone else because I'm on the top floor.

 

The house was built in 1900. Add the fact that I'm in the attic and yeah, no way I'd want to play utilities here.

 

I've looked some CL for my area. I guess there are some options. Mostly I'm worried that I'm leaving an okay place and taking a chance and possibly getting a worst place, like what if my landlord is a jerk and my neighbors are loud? I've never had those issues here. Is the trade off worth it? I keep asking myself.

 

Is buying property an option? Are you in the USA?

 

Yes, I'm in the US, Northeast. I don't see buying as an option. I may need to move temporarily out of state for 2 years to complete grad school and then I'll come back to this city. My boyfriend would come with me.

 

I don't see myself buying for at least several more years and that's okay.

[Fudgie]

Your landlord gave you an electric heater and encouraged you to use it?? To me, that speaks volumes in view of the fact he pays your electric bill. Have you considered using a partition of some sort? I have a folding divider between the my bathroom and the bedroom so that the sun does not come streaming in my face in the morning. If you are interested, Ikea or Pier 1 would probably carry such an item. Just an idea.

 

He did! He showed me where it was in the closet, told me how to use it safely, and said that it gets cold in the winters in the attic so if I felt cold or if my boyfriend felt cold, we should turn it on until we were comfortable.

 

I love the idea of a partition but there is an awkward half wall between the bedroom and living room. So there is some separation but not much. You can still see everything. We use the half wall as a ledge for a TV so we can cuddle in bed and watch together.

 

I was thinking curtains? I've been here since September and never complained though, lol. But I would like to be able to have friends over.

[chitown9]

Well, Fudge, if you do check out other places to live I have a suggestion for you based on my daughter's experience. She leased a place that she checked out during the daytime. Once she moved in she realized that she should have also checked it out at night because that is when all the kids emerged from their units to play and make a racket. She would not have taken the place had she known. Just a caveat.

[Fudgie]

Oh gosh that would be awful. But how does one check out a place at night? The landlord usually isn't available then so how could you check it out?

 

I would probably steer clear of any place that required me to share a bathroom or a kitchen with people I don't know but that's me. Did that in college... No more.

[chitown9]

Oh gosh that would be awful. But how does one check out a place at night? The landlord usually isn't available then so how could you check it out?

 

She could have just gone there at night. No need to go inside the apartment. No need for a landlord. The kids were just all out there playing with a bat and ball and making a general racket. She was stuck in a 1 year lease...chi

[Fudgie]

Oh my god that's awful. No way I could stay in a place like that.

 

You see my dilemma? I don't even have to deal with neighbors or hear them. I'm worried I'll move into a place and then I'll be like everyone else, complaining about how it's loud and it sucks. All of my friends complain.

[chitown9]

Oh my god that's awful. No way I could stay in a place like that.

 

You see my dilemma? I don't even have to deal with neighbors or hear them. I'm worried I'll move into a place and then I'll be like everyone else, complaining about how it's loud and it sucks. All of my friends complain.

 

Now do you see where I am coming from? Also, only $ 600 per month rent? Think partition!!! .....chi

[annie24]

i would go check out a few other places and see if it makes sense to move or if it is better to stay. can't hurt to look, right?

[catfeeder]

Electric heat makes all the difference when considering utilities. I once moved into a beautiful studio unit in a complex where heat was supposed to be included. But they made a mistake and put me in the half of the complex that was built with electric heat. I won the argument but needed to wait for a heat-included unit to become available--and my electric bills for heat were a disaster.

 

My bill for months in winter in NJ with heat for a tiny unit was over 140 per month, and after that, without the heat it was down to an average of 25. That was in the early 1990s.

 

Today I pay between 25 to 35 a month for a large one bedroom, but I'm not home all day and don't run a washer or dryer. This bill spikes in June, July and August for air conditioning, roughly 85 to 95 for each of those 3 months.

 

Bottom line: don't even consider a place with electric heat.

[annie24]

yeah, my electric heat for my 1 bedroom apartment was $200 for the first month. i soon learned after that to sleep in a sweatshirt!

[Fudgie]

Electric heat? Geez. Those bills are crazy. I know we have house heat. It comes in through a vent. Although it's not enough in the winter. It gets very cold up here without a space heater. And that's why my landlord gave me one. So we wouldn't freeze. Very nice of him. I imagine it costs him a lot.

As for A/C, he does ask in the summer months that people with a A/C pay an extra $20/month to offset the A/C usage. I think that's fair. I do use it a lot.

 

Oh, I just thought if another pro. This place had cable hookup. Not all places here do. Many use satellite. I hate satellite. It is expensive and slow. I prefer cable Internet. I have a package for both a dvr, cable, and Internet and I pay $100/month. That's the only utility I pay.

 

Btw we don't have a washer or dryer.. I go right down the street for that. I can do 2 loads for about $5. I don't have a dishwasher but I'm thinking of getting a portable one. We can make room. I hate dishes. I hate them so much.

 

I'm going to keep an eye out on other places but unless I see something stellar I'm going to plan on staying in this place. My boyfriend is leaning that way too. He's cheap and doesn't want more expense. We are good tenants and are quiet and keep everything clean and even alert our landlord by text if something big happens near our house (the neighbor's house got burglarized and police shut down the street for hours, several hours. My landlord lives 15 min away and had no idea it happened until I told him which he appreciated). So I think he will let us renew no problem.

 

Uhm, does anyone have any partition ideas that involve curtains? Maybe hanging from hooks? I have no space for an actual standing partition because of the stupid half wall. Of course sound will go through but that's okay, I'm used to that now.

 

Maybe it's time to try and rearrange the furniture to try and make it feel less cramped.

[abitbroken]

Why not ask if you can put shelves up from the ceiling to the top of the halfwall and put your tv on something else? Whether you can see through them and the view is partially obstructed by books/knickknacks and plants or there is a solid back? You can have shelves on one side and a picture on the flat side. Also, I have seen people hang a piece of an old window with ceiling hooks - like a small stained glass window. Or what about making something like an accordian partition but only the width and length it needs to be for the top of the half wall?

oh and just regular bookcases make good partiitions

[Fudgie]

As long as it doesn't involve new hooks, I don't need to ask. You mean like a mini book shelf? I could do that! Haven't thought about that before. I could actually put 1-2 up there and leave the TV up there too as it does obscure a lot. The only thing I do need to leave up there is my fan. We use the fan to circulate air from the bedroom to the rest of the apartment because the AC unit goes in the bedroom and that's the only place for it.

 

N suggested beads in the "doorway" but I said absolutely not! Lol. He was joking.

 

I think the main thing I have to do is to make space in the living room. There's very little room to walk around. Like I said, it's very small.

[chitown9]

wondering...do you know the square footage of your place. ...chi

[Fudgie]

Uhm, not off the top of my head but I can give you some ideas!

 

Bedroom: we fit a full size bed in it. Yes we somehow can both fit in it together comfortably. Width wise, I would say the bedroom is the entire width of a king size bed and no more. Length wise, a bit longer than king size by about 2 feet. That allows entry into the bathroom. So we can't put anything in the bedroom aside from the bed and 2 tiny nightstands.

 

Living room: I'd say 12' by 11'. Yes it's small. We have 2 smallish recliners, 2 small dressers, and a small desk. N keeps his desktop there and I sometime can use that space too. We eat in our recliners, off of a small coffee table between us. Oh, and we have a fridge in the living room because the kitchen...

 

Kitchen is 9' long at most, about 2 feet wide. It's like a hall. I stack my pantry items in small metal baskets that have been screwed into the wall. It's hard to pass someone in the kitchen because it's narrow.

 

Did I mention we have a cat?

[Fudgie]

Forgot to add, in the kitchen we have a sink, nice counter, gas stove, and gas oven. I have enough space at the end to get a portable dishwasher, which I plan to get.

[catfeeder]

If you're limited to the number of hooks you can use, try stringing a waxy rope or smooth clothesline through them. Do it without curtains first to play around with pulling it more and less taught, then place marks on the line so you can repeat the placement when stringing the line through curtains.

 

This way you won't need to worry about fitting curtain rods and dealing with their overlap. You can knot the line around each hook so the whole thing doesn't shift with use, and if you find it easier to cut the line into lines, knotting them around the hooks or other pieces of line gives you flexibility.

 

If you want to go even more flexible, string curtain hanging rings (Ikea has terrific ones in lots of finishes) with clips on the ends. Then you can place as many of those as you'd like to get fullness where you want it.

 

Regarding the dishwasher--speak with landlord before making the investment. They require higher voltage outlets to avoid fire hazards. Consider whether it's really necessary with only 2 people, because you'll be stuck dealing with the thing if you ever want to move.

[Fudgie]

Turns out I only have like 3 hooks and can't get a curtain all the way accross to format a partition. Ideas?

 

And of course, because of the partial wall partition, I can't do the typical "use a big bookshelf" to divide it. I also don't have curtains (blinds only) and I'm thinking about getting curtains but again, no hooks. How does one hang a rod without a hook? This house is over 100 years old with old wood molding around the windows too.

 

Portable dishwasher is okay, actually. I took the plunge and got one. It's a bit larger than 1/3 of a normal one. You can plug it into a normal voltage outlet and it uses water from the faucet, not a water supply. It has wheels too.

 

Maybe I sound lazy but unlike college, I can't deal with the dishes in this place... at all. It's a single sink which could be fine but it's very tiny and there's practically no counter space for drying plates. You eat one small meal and the whole sink is full! Add in my night job and N's day job and neither of us wants to do it. It's so nice just to be able to stick dishes and even pots in it and then forget about it for a while and then pull them out clean and ready to store. I figure I will give it to my brother if I don't need it.

 

But who knows, with the economy the way it is and me having 2 years of grad school once I get in, it will probably be a while before we are able or willing to pay for a place that is more appropriately sized and has a dishwasher. We don't have on site laundry either. I hate running out with 2-3 loads of laundry but then I try to remind myself of how we aren't getting screwed with bad rent or having our utilities shut off (like his broke friends) so we are able to have more money for other things.

[chitown9]

Fudge, remember this when you are figuring this whole thing out....your landlord is a real sweetheart, and that speaks volumes.....

[abitbroken]

what about those stick on picture hooks that are not supposed to damage the wall?