This story is called The Search, The Find and the Almost Move. But don't worry, it has a happy ending :)
Last December (8 months from move-in): I started the apartment search early with the hopes of finding a decent-size, decent-price apartment near downtown Iowa City. My two roommates from my first Iowa City apartment both got married this summer (well, Katie's wedding hasn't happened yet but is just 3 weeks away!!) so I knew I had to either find two new roommates and stay in the same place, or find a new apartment. I always like adventures so figured it was time to strike out really on my own. I looked at one 1-bedroom apartment very close to downtown. I'm going to go ahead and say it was more like 1-room, not 1-bedroom. The kitchen was one wall of the living room and the bedroom was more like an entry way at the back of the apartment. Needless to say, that was not my new apartment.
The second apartment I looked at seemed a little bit like it was out of the 80s. There was wood paneling on one of the walls in the living room. The price was decent, location was stellar and I liked that there was some separation of the living room, bedroom and kitchen. Definitely not a 1-roomer. Instead, a roomy 1-bedroom apartment.
So about a week later, I signed the lease and paid for my August rent about 10 months ahead of time. I was set!
Mid-May (3 months from move-in): Because the location of my chosen apartment truly was stellar (about 3 blocks from work), I inadvertently made it a habit to walk by the apartment on my way to work from my car (yes, if I drive, I typically have to park 7-10 blocks away from work). One day when I walked by there was a large truck in the drive way and construction workers were chucking stuff out of the upper apartment: wood panels, cords, glass, who knows what. I was mildly shocked so I emailed the company and I quickly received a reply that the upper floor apartments were being redone, but apartment 1 (my apartment) would stay the same. Sounds good to me! No big deal.
Late-May (about 2.5 months from move in): Dan and I went on a walk as a comps-break one afternoon and I said we should go check out my new place. Not that we'd be able to get in or even see inside, but at least he could see where I was going to live.
To my surprise, not only could we see in my apartment, but we could also see THROUGH my apartment. That's right- there were no walls. And no flooring. The entire house had been gutted.
Um....what?
Dan asked multiple times if I really was sure that was my apartment. Yes, it definitely was the one I was planning to move into in 2.5 months. It was. I was sure of it. Turns out (thanks for my friend Heather's sleuth skills), there had been a fire in the house in March. Thankfully, no one was injured.
Two days later I received an email from the landlord saying the electrical was going to be redone throughout the entire house. That meant that they would redo the apartment: new hardwood floors, new kitchen, new bathroom.
Pretty cool actually. I was excited about it. Except for the fact where they failed to mention that there had been a fire- so I felt kind of sneaky for knowing about it.
Anyway, the habit continued. I inconspicuously (or maybe not) walked past the apartment at least twice a week and kept tabs on the progress.
1 month to move-in: No walls. No floors. New roof nearly finished!
3 weeks to move-in: New windows! Still no walls. Still no floors. New roof looks nice.
2 weeks to move-in: This was the most exciting. I walked past the house one Monday morning after I had driven back from Chicago. And there were walls! I could no longer see into the neighboring apartment. Hooray!
1 week to move-in: Appliances seemed to be arriving and getting settled. Hard to tell though, now that there were walls ;)
At this point, I was a little surprised I hadn't heard anything from the landlords. August 1st was the move-in day. July 31st was my move-out day from the other place. The plan was to stay at the hotel with my mom and sister and Michael after they helped me move out on Thursday. All of my stuff was in a truck that I rented for Thursday, Friday and Saturday morning until 9 am. Seemed like a good plan.
And then we walked past the apartment Thursday afternoon. At this point my stuff was in the truck, I was officially moved out of the old apartment and I was relatively homeless (not really--I had a place to stay. But no address to call my own).
I called the landlord's office Thursday afternoon and received multiple conflicting responses about when to pick up the keys, such as "yes, the apartment certainly should be ready by noon tomorrow." and "Oh, you mean the fire house?? Oh yeah, we aren't sure about the state of that house right now."
Well, we had seen it. We were sure. There was no way I was moving in on Friday. The construction guys really had done a great job and they certainly were busting their butts to get it done, but I'm sorry, it just wasn't there! Which seriously was not really a big deal. I didn't mind if I had to stay with a friend. But it was a little odd not finding out until...well, the day before I was supposed to move in.
Not even a heads up. Except for my sneaky walk-bys.
The landlord was quite nice though and insisted that he'd have a place to put my stuff until they could get me moved in, which would be "definitely by tomorrow (Saturday) at 4 pm." (as you'll see later, that did not turn out to be the case).
Well, he did have a place to put my stuff. But we didn't get that whole issue sorted out until 7:30 pm Friday evening, after he started ignoring my calls and also gave us the wrong address for the garage we would be using. I'll just say, it was an ordeal.
I have awesome friends. I texted nearly everyone I knew in the Iowa City region and I had a whole gang show up to help unload my stuff into that garage. They were rewarded with cookies and my undying affection.
We returned the truck that evening and were quite grateful for some food and a place to sleep after a rather long day. My stuff was relatively safely stored and I had a bed to sleep in, so I was content.
Saturday morning, Michael and I took some cookies to the workers who seriously looked like they'd gotten no sleep for approximately 2 weeks. And they were nice enough to show us the apartment! Ordeal or not, the apartment was awesome! I couldn't stop saying how beautiful it was.
I ended up staying at the hotel until Sunday and then staying at my friend/coworker Arianna's house until Tuesday morning, at which point I met my mom, the landlord and 4 construction worker-type guys at the garage. We all loaded my stuff onto an open trailer and then the construction worker-type guys sat on top of my stuff to ride the 6 blocks to the apartment. Admittedly, it was quite a hilarious sight. 3 loads of trailer, my mom's car and my car all packed full and about an hour later and nearly all my stuff was in the new apartment!
I am officially settled into it now. I even had my couch delivered this morning! I am 3 blocks from work and all of my favorite things (froyo, restaurants, swing dance, High Ground coffee shop).
The construction guys are still working on the other apartments in the building, so I've decided I'll be making them brownies or something within the next few days. They did a pretty good job on this apartment ;)
You are all welcome to come check it out sometime! I'd love to have you over for tea....and leftover brownies.
