Putting the "finance" in "personal finance"

You may have noticed that for a personal finance blog, there aren’t a lot of numbers here. Income, debt, and savings broken down to every penny are common in this niche of the blogosphere. While that’s incredibly helpful and eye-opening to a newbie like me, I’m never going there. Never. This blog isn’t exactly anonymous, and I’m so not comfortable listing my salary and student loan debt and whatnot. Breaking down the occasional grocery bill? Yeah, I can live with that. Breaking down what my 401(k) looks like right now? No thanks.

However, I’m all for doing some mathematical gloating when I manage to come out ahead. I crunched the numbers from my apartment search the other day on my commute, and I’m happier than ever with my choice of apartments.

If I had gone with choice #1 (the two-bedroom near Central Park that was just over my budget), I would have been $780 over my budget for the year. That’s with the reduced broker’s fee. Now, $780 isn’t insanely horrible (especially in this city), but $780 is $780.

Now let’s look at choice #2: The one-bedroom in Harlem, which I’m signing the lease on tomorrow. Even though it’s a one-bedroom, the square footage is more than any two-bedroom I looked at. And with the management company offering two free month’s rent and a couple hundred dollars knocked off the broker’s fee, I’m coming in $2,905 under my budget for the year. That’s almost $3,000 bucks! What’s more, the two free months of rent perfectly offset the broker’s fee. So by the end of the year it will be like we never incurred moving costs. We’re paying roughly the same amount to live in a place that’s twice as big as the one we’re in now!

Apartment Hunting in Manhattan–Whee!

I applied for another place today! And I feel so good about it (as opposed to yesterday, when I felt uneasy). This place is a dream, and unlike anything I’ve ever seen in Manhattan. It has a freakin’ washer/dryer right in the apartment unit itself! And a dishwasher! And lots of space! And it’s actually in our budget! It’s in Harlem-Harlem, not Spanish Harlem, so it will also be a much-needed change of scenery. I’m too tired to write anymore about it, but hopefully I’ll find out tomorrow if my application was approved.

Apartment Hunting in Manhattan–Budget Guilt Won

I slept on it, and it’s clear I should not have applied for that fab apartment. I just can’t risk the rent going up next year. So I withdrew my application this morning and am back to square one. As I continue on my quest, I’m going to keep a few things in mind:

• I’m young. Too young to actually love the Manhattan apartment I live in. These are the years to garner the quirky stories of what’s it like for newlyweds and two cats to live in a one-bedroom apartment, to have three of the four stove burners not function, to have a malfunctioning kitchen light that can’t be fixed because your super’s phone has been disconnected and you don’t know which unit she lives in, to live across the street from a police station and a fire station and get used to the constant sirens. Someday, I’ll look back on these annoyances with fondness. Maybe.
• Despite all of the above, this apartment was actually a good find. And you know how I decided on it? It was the cheapest one I had looked at on my apartment hunt two years ago. That was the selling point. Because it definitely wasn’t pretty when I viewed it (the last occupant had been a smoker—there were actually soot marks outlining the spots where pictures had been). Maybe I need to be thinking like that again.
• Paint can do wonders. I should know this from my years at home decorating publications. A coat of paint is the easiest, cheapest way to change the character of a room. Maybe that’s all it takes to make a place feel like home.
• We’d like to buy a house or apartment someday. Isn’t it worth living in slightly less than fabulous apartments for a few years if it means we can be putting away money toward our own place?
• I need to trust my gut. Not my eyes.

Apartment Hunting in Manhattan

Finding a place to live in NYC is a fascinating, if not exhausting, process. In any other city, you’d call the rental office of a building that looked clean and safe and ask about any availabilities. They’d show you the place and give you a price, and you’d sign the lease.

Oh, but not Manhattan. Here, you must contend with brokers and fees and the crazy idea that you shouldn’t bother looking at apartments until two weeks before you need one. Which is how I spent my snowy Saturday.

I’ve lived at my current one-bedroom apartment in Spanish Harlem for two years. When I signed the lease, I felt like I was getting a good deal. But me and Mister Redhead have been itching for more space, and when we got the lease renewal letter in the mail Thursday, I suddenly felt like we no longer had a good deal on our hands. The rent went up more than expected. It hit that tipping point price, the one that makes you think Really? That much for just a one-bedroom in Spanish Harlem? So, with ten days to accept or reject the lease renewal, we embarked on an apartment hunt. Except Mister Redhead had a business trip, so really I’m the one doing the hunting.

Our ideal situation would be finding a two-bedroom for the price we’re paying for a one-bedroom. It sounds crazy, but they’re out there. I looked at a few today in our budget, and lemme tell you: They’re cheap for a reason. Namely, because the kitchens and bathrooms are messed up. I’m not a foodie, and I don’t need a spa-like powder room, but I’m not buying that any of those appliances were “brand new” (um, maybe in 1975?). Nor am I crawling into some nook-and-cranny corner to stand in a “shower” that’s not big enough to turn around in.

Of course, the broker saved the best for last. Exposed brick, gorgeous trim, glass-door kitchen cabinets, a spacious layout, half a block to Central Park. This is a place I could call home. But it’s not in my budget. At all. My dear broker said it’s a good time to bargain with landlords, though, and predicted we have a good chance of getting the monthly rent down to just $100 above my budget. And if that worked, the broker offered to slash his fee, so that the year’s cost would be close to my original budget.

So I applied.

And now, a few hours later, I’m having second thoughts. OK, what if we do all this bargaining and get the yearly cost to align with my yearly budget? Great, right? But what about in 2010, when Mr. New Landlord wants to hike up the rent to what this place is really worth? Then we’d be back in the same situation, wasting money on application fees and broker fees and moving vans. Is it worth all that just to love where you live?

I have an appointment with another broker tomorrow. Who knows, maybe she has a fabulous two-bedroom in our budget, and I can withdraw the app for my dream apartment. Or maybe she’s just going to show me more dingy places. It seems we have a few options:

1. Stay put, even though this place now feels overpriced. At least we’d save money by not paying a broker’s fee.
2. Go through with the dream apartment. Feel budget guilt. Worry about rent hike in 2010.
3. Keep looking. Torturous.

Sigh. Stay tuned for part 2 tomorrow…