Home sweet rental unit
Sep. 28th, 2002 01:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
days_unfoldingI know where I want to rent an apartment.
I found a complex with an incredible location. It's next door to a strip mall with a grocery store, Blockbuster Video and Blockbuster Music, Kinko's, a few restaurants and Starbucks, dry cleaners, watch repair, and a bunch of other stores. (Crown Books was there before it closed.) Tower Records is across the street. Home Despot and Office Despot are farther down the street. The local mall is diagonal from it. The one 24-hour place (Denny's, unfortunately) is down the street from the mall. There's a miniature golf place across the street from Denny's. Barnes and Noble is a short drive away. There's also a lot of shops and restaurants that I haven't mentioned. There's a light rail stop within walking distance. If South San Jose had a town center, this area would be it.
I remember seeing the complex when they first built it, and wondering if it contained apartments or condos, and if they took pets. Yes, they do take pets. Also, the rent on a 2-bedroom apartment is the median for the Valley, which is roughly the same as my mortgage payment plus HOA dues.
I think that living there would have more of the feel of the apartment that I had in Santa Clara. That apartment was walking distance to the big mall in the area (Valley Fair) and another shopping center across the street (gone now). I loved living there. The only reason that I moved was that I wanted to buy a place and I found a condo that was very close to work. Hmm, that makes it sound like I love to shop, and I really don't (except for books). I love to have places to walk to, browse storefronts, and people-watch.
The commute from this apartment to work probably would be about 20 minutes. (I should try it out.) No big deal.
I looked into apartments in downtown San Jose. Unfortunately, most of them raise their rents higher than usual because of the location. People are complaining online that the place that I looked at a long time ago isn't being maintained well. I did find one place that's walking distance to downtown that might work. It has a live/work one-bedroom loft with a home office alcove that's slightly more expensive than the two-bedroom apartment at the other place. However, the place is smaller (819 square feet) than my condo (850 square feet). (The two-bedroom apartment at the first place is 1064 square feet.)
It'll be interesting to see how all this works out.
I also read about what I need to do to prepare my place for selling. Most of the advice is of the common-sense "dejunk, clean, paint, fix, replace the carpets" variety. I'm planning a busy winter. I also need to save a lot of money, which will be challenging, especially given that I'm planning a trip to Austin in November and to Portland in the spring. I might hold off on the Portland trip.
I found a complex with an incredible location. It's next door to a strip mall with a grocery store, Blockbuster Video and Blockbuster Music, Kinko's, a few restaurants and Starbucks, dry cleaners, watch repair, and a bunch of other stores. (Crown Books was there before it closed.) Tower Records is across the street. Home Despot and Office Despot are farther down the street. The local mall is diagonal from it. The one 24-hour place (Denny's, unfortunately) is down the street from the mall. There's a miniature golf place across the street from Denny's. Barnes and Noble is a short drive away. There's also a lot of shops and restaurants that I haven't mentioned. There's a light rail stop within walking distance. If South San Jose had a town center, this area would be it.
I remember seeing the complex when they first built it, and wondering if it contained apartments or condos, and if they took pets. Yes, they do take pets. Also, the rent on a 2-bedroom apartment is the median for the Valley, which is roughly the same as my mortgage payment plus HOA dues.
I think that living there would have more of the feel of the apartment that I had in Santa Clara. That apartment was walking distance to the big mall in the area (Valley Fair) and another shopping center across the street (gone now). I loved living there. The only reason that I moved was that I wanted to buy a place and I found a condo that was very close to work. Hmm, that makes it sound like I love to shop, and I really don't (except for books). I love to have places to walk to, browse storefronts, and people-watch.
The commute from this apartment to work probably would be about 20 minutes. (I should try it out.) No big deal.
I looked into apartments in downtown San Jose. Unfortunately, most of them raise their rents higher than usual because of the location. People are complaining online that the place that I looked at a long time ago isn't being maintained well. I did find one place that's walking distance to downtown that might work. It has a live/work one-bedroom loft with a home office alcove that's slightly more expensive than the two-bedroom apartment at the other place. However, the place is smaller (819 square feet) than my condo (850 square feet). (The two-bedroom apartment at the first place is 1064 square feet.)
It'll be interesting to see how all this works out.
I also read about what I need to do to prepare my place for selling. Most of the advice is of the common-sense "dejunk, clean, paint, fix, replace the carpets" variety. I'm planning a busy winter. I also need to save a lot of money, which will be challenging, especially given that I'm planning a trip to Austin in November and to Portland in the spring. I might hold off on the Portland trip.
