Housing

[AllisonAzee]

I'm a little worried about finding a place to live.  How is everyone else doing it?  I want to get a place for August 1st, but I'm a little worried a lot of the places will have been taken before that.  Any ideas.  I'm leavin CA around June 30th and will probably spend July in NJ, so I could drive down for a couple days now and then to look at places.  Does anyone know how tight the housing market is?  In my town the summer months can be really rough if you don't get in early.

[larkin]

I'm from NJ, so I am planning on going down there as many times as it takes.  Not quite sure how how the DC market is, but it doesn't seem too bad.  I have a friend down there right now and she hasn't had much trouble finding places.  It may be different depending on what you want though.  There are a fair number of apartments available, but not as many rooms in houses or people looking for apartment mates.  These are just my guesses based on what I have seen so far and how my friends have fared. 

If you need any help, you can let me know.  The first time I am planning to go down there is the weekend of May 6th.

[AllisonAzee]

Wow you're starting that early?  Yeah I'm debating whether I should try to fly out for a weekend prior to July, maybe in late May or something to look at places.  I've had so many bad experiences with roommates (I love my current place and don't want to leave) and I don't want to make a mistake with my living situation for my first year of law school.  I may give the school a call and ask for their opinion because I don't want to show up in July with no options other than that unbelievably exspensive student housing they have.

[larkin]

Well the only reason I am starting so early is because I don't have much else to do.  Also, I don't live too far from DC, relatively speaking.  I go down there a few times throughout the year to see friends anyway. 

That said it might not be a bad idea to go to DC a bit earlier, prior to July like you said, just to check things out and get a feel for the city before you decide on where to live.  I know I found a site with plenty of listings on American's website.  It might have been through their web portal, or whatever that thing was they gave a password for.  There seemed to be a decent amount of stuff on there.

[Groovyju]

Yea the housing portal is through that my.american.edu thing.  So far I haven't seen anyone that needs roommates for the fall; it's more like people who have a room in their house or things like that  People also post on craigslist, so those are two things I've been searching.  I think people will start putting more listings on the american site during May and June. 

[AllisonAzee]

yeah I might try to fly out the last weekend in May or something like that.  I really don't want to get screwed at the end.  That last thing I want to be stressing over next year is where I'm living.

[larkin]

I would say the American portal and craigslist are probably the best ways to find a place to live,(and maybe some local papers) if you would like to live with someone; that is outside of knowing people who are looking for roommates.

If anyone is thinking about living in Georgetown -- Allison might have mentioned something about it -- you might want to keep in mind is that it has no metrostop.  The closest stops are Foggy Bottom and Rosslyn.  Getting to class would then be a short trek.

[AllisonAzee]

Foggy Bottom?  That is so cute, I have to live there now.  Yeah my goal is to live in walking distance.  At the most 20 minutes away, but I would prefer much closer.  I don't know if the Georgetown area would totally qualify.  I'm thinking though if I were close by but not necassarily in walking distance I might be a lot better off taking the bus because taking the metro to take a bus could really drag out the commute time.

[larkin]

Foggy Bottom?  That is so cute, I have to live there now.  Yeah my goal is to live in walking distance.  At the most 20 minutes away, but I would prefer much closer.  I don't know if the Georgetown area would totally qualify.  I'm thinking though if I were close by but not necassarily in walking distance I might be a lot better off taking the bus because taking the metro to take a bus could really drag out the commute time.

Not only does it have a cute name, but it is a decent area.  Actually, that is where GW is.  If you don't want more than a twenty minute commute, you probably could not live more than two metro stops away from AU, in either direction.

http://www.wmata.com/metrorail/systemmap.cfm

That is, of course, if you are just planning on taking the metro.   Personally, I would prefer to live on the DC side versus the MD side.  Although, rent will be cheaper the further into MD you go.  I don't know much about the bus routes, so I can't help you there.

[Cyrus]

Looking for housing. Debate: 1)Live alone in a studio. 2) Find cool people on the internet, hope they're not crazy, and find a place to live together. 3) Live with established law students. 4) Pretend to be a Georgetown student, find special someone with higher starting salary, and mooch off of new hot/smart girlfriend's couch space.

~~~~You decide, housing 2005.