I live in Arlington, VA, and I have to be out of my house in two days. I don’t have a place to live. I walk, so I have to be near the Metrorail, which makes things worse. And I can’t afford to be blowing 1K a month on rent.
Anyone in the DC area need a roommate? I drink a lot, and have stinky feet, but I’m really a nice guy.
Anyone have any recommendations? I’ve never seen things this bad. What’s a good way to get the foot in the door on a new place? Honesty and fairness don’t appear to be working.
I assume you’ve tried the “Housing to Share” section the City Paper, right? When I moved to Chi-town last month I placed a ‘looking for a roommate’ ad and got tons of responses. That way you are screening people more than they are screening you.
Check out the neighborhood Mount Pleasant in the city. It’s on the green metro line, and there are tons and tons of group houses where people pay $400-500 each. It’s a bit transitional but a fantastic place to live.
If you email me I can try to hook you up with my old building, I know a lot of people moved out in August when I did.
Does your company have a bulletin board where people sell things and find housing?
Yes, ‘Housing to Share’ is a great place to look. Two roommates and I were renting a 4-bedroom place in Alexandria for $950. When one left, the other and I advertised and got two more roommies and reduced our share of the rent down to $250.
Although, 2 days is pretty short notice. Are you being evicted unfairly. Or were you procrastinating all August?
Yeah, whats the scoop? Unless the cops are there you don’t have to leave, believe it or not. Try a local college message board, often lots of listings.
My landlord boosted the rent to astonomical rates in order to force us out so they can sell the joint while using our security deposit to pay for the refurbishing. Pretty typical landlord bullshit, really.
There has been an unfortunate confluence of events that prevented me from securing a place earlier in the month. I was working about 60-70 hours a week, I had some pretty serious medical problems that I needed to have looked at (yes, it was a torsion; I’m really looking forward to having the errant boy “tacked down”), and I wasn’t all that worried about it because I’ve always scored a place in the last two weeks of the month. Hell, up to now I’ve been nine for nine in the past twelve years doing it that way.
Not this time. According to two different real estate agents, Arlington has turned into the number one tightest housing market in the United States. Bullshit or not, it’s been pretty damned difficult. I’m looking at DC, too, but I haven’t found anything yet. I’m not too keen on living in the People’s Republic of Maryland (no offense to you Marylanders–I’ve just heard too many horror stories).
I called one place at 11 a.m. on Sunday, and was told to drop by around 1. I called again at 12 to ask which metro station was closer. The owner said don’t bother, I’ve already signed someone up. Insane.
Today, I called the one new place that was advertised in the Post. I said, “hi, I’m Sofa King, and I am prepared to resort to bribery to convince you that I’m the guy you want to move in with you.” I really don’t know what else to do.
This is (choose one)
a) pointless
b) ironic
c) silly
d) idiotic
I think you’ll find that one homogenous D.C. suburb is very much like another. You can find nice, affordable places on public transportation in MD - check Takoma Park, College Park, Silver Spring - and still be close to ChiChi’s, Blockbuster, and some kind of shopping mall.
I wish we could help you out, but we live way outside the Beltway near Mt. Vernon and don’t really have any extra space. If you find a place farther out and need a carpool to the Metro, though, e-mail me. My wife drops me off at Dunn Loring every morning on her way to work (my office is right over the Courthouse stop), and we also live close to Huntington on the Yellow line.
Thanks, pl. I guess I’ll be finding out soon enough. I took magdalene’s and AWB’s advice and started going through the on-line CP ads. Pretty cool, since the print edition doesn’t come out until tomorrow. Let us hope.
As far as Maryland goes, I have some good reasons to stay away, not the least of which is the fact that all of my friends are here in NoVa. You also don’t see me trying to go back to Fairfax County, either. They’re both just too far from where I work and where I want to play. Commute times being what they are off-peak, living in College Park as a train-rider is very similar to living in Baltimore as a driver if I want to knock back some pops with the boys.
And any state that posts police officers outside of bars so they can tack DIP charges on people trying to hail taxis is not the kind of place I want to be. I cite Bethesda last October, and my jailbird (soon to be former-) roommate.
