Flat Hunting

Looking for an apartment here in Sydney was fun. actually, no it wasn't. We were looking for something akin to what we had in the UK, two bedrooms, two bathrooms and a parking space. They are like gold dust here and no sooner had we seen one on the internet or on the rental list of a real estate agent, it was gone.

Before leaving the UK we had done some research into the areas of Sydney that we would like to live. Initially we had thought that Leichardt would be nice. It's an Italian influenced community and with our love of everything Mediterranean, especially the food, we thought it would suit us well. Further research revealed that the journey from there to the office where I would be working in North Sydney could be a potential nightmare. The suburbs of Balmain, Crows Nest, Newtown and Rozelle were among others that were suggested. Crows Nest, with its cafe culture looked like a favourite and after visiting the area, we decided that its village feel, restaurants, cafes and shops would suit us well, so we concentrated our search in that area.

So, we began visiting every real estate agent in the area and booking up to see anything that was still available.

We visited one place in a large tower block that sounded great. The tower block had a gym and a pool that were used by the residents. Upon visiting it, the apartment looked like a bomb had hit it! You couldn't see the floor for clothes and children's toys! The walls had been drawn on and there were Disney transfers on the windows. We tried to look past the mess, as we knew that it would all be cleaned once the current tenant left, but we couldn't look (or hear) past the traffic noise from the Pacific Highway.

Another time we did a viewing with about a dozen other people. That flat was in North Sydney and was very nice so we took an application form. One of the things that you have to submit with an application for are several forms of id information. They have a points system where a passport may be 30 points, driving licence is 20 points etc. We realised that, because we had no previous rental history in Australia we had almost no chance of being able to come up with the 100 points of documentation required so we didn't bother applying for that one.

A few days later we joined a few other people in viewing a nice flat in Crows Nest. It was a little small but otherwise fulfilled our criteria. We spoke to the real estate agent and explained the issue with the id “points”. She advised us to send whatever we could, so we took an application form. We also said that we would be in a position to pay six months rent in advance, should that make any difference. So, we filled in the application form and faxed it back with copies of as many documents as we could find – passports, drivers licenses, mortgage statements, job offer letters you name it. If it had something on it to show that we could pay monthly rent okay we sent it. The following day we heard that our application had been accepted. Hurray!

The only downside was that we couldn't move in for two weeks so we had to find a place to stay for those two weeks. We were both fed up of living in the hotel, so we decided to find a serviced apartment for a couple of weeks. This would be cheaper than the hotel and would allow us to cook for ourselves and do our laundry without having to carry everything to a laundrette. We found one eventually in Cremorne which although not luxurious, has suited our needs.

So, we move into the flat in a few days. I can't wait!