Okay. This has nothing to do with Asia, and everything to do with my life after Asia. But I'm kinda freaking out and need advice from older, wiser folk, or others who are also graduating and moving and such.
AAAHHHHH! (Whew... now that that's out...)
How does one find housing, when one moves to a new city? Or roomates? How does one live and pay rent and phone and internets, and food and stuff... with minimal income? Or make a deposit on said housing? In essence, how does one live in the real world?
I will be graduating upon my return from these Asian Ambulations, (which is getting a little too close for comfort!), and once that ordeal is over, I'll be joining Teach for America and moving to North Carolina. And Craigslist intimidated me earlier today. As did my pre-TFA planning checklists I was provided with... *whimper*
I never thought graduating would be scarier than traveling halfway around the world.
My Fabulous Freshman Year- Find the Prize
9 years ago
3 comments:
Good luck with the move! Craigslist is really going to be your friend for cheap housing. The best you're going to be able to do for a decent place to live on the really cheap side is find a room somewhere that you can rent. Just plan on talking to a few of the different offers. I wouldn't agree to anything till you get there and see the place and meet the people in person, but you'll probably get a feel for them over the phone.
Good luck getting the cash together. That's always hard at the start. There are going to be deposits and down payments for a lot of little things, and if you have to hook up utilities there will be fees for all of that.
But don't get too overwhelmed with it. You'll find a place and get settled before you know it.
Take care, and good luck!
Heather - I´m in the same boat with moving too a new city, apartment searching, and all that. It´s overwhelming, but so exciting at the same time. Don´t worry, you will get it all figured out. I´m so glad we got to talk a few times while we have been abroad and can´t WAIT to get back to the US so we can catch up on everything. I miss you! Love you! - Steele
Hokay, that's a big question all at once, but here goes:
Craigslist will certainly be helpful once you get past the intimidation. Another excellent source of help though is just networking with the connections you already have. For instance, I know people all over the world (largely through my open source software involvement), including some in North Carolina. In fact, if you needed it I could probably talk your way into a spot on a couch or something for a bit while you look for a place if necessary. (In Apex, just outside of Raleigh)
As far as the money stuff, one thing most people our age do is forego a land line and live soley on the mobile, for a while at least. Sharing an internet connection with as many people as possible is extremely helpful also, especially since you can double the bandwidth for less than double the price. Sometimes you can even get away with doing this among multiple houses. I could help with the technical aspects of that. Rent is hard to fudge on, but one thing you can do is try to get as many little things covered by the landlord as possible (heat, electric, replacing light bulbs, a newspaper, various fix-it stuff, etc.). For the deposit, you either a) use savings you already have, which since you're asking I'll assume you don't, b) take out a loan (ouch), c) beg friends who fulfill (a), or d) beg parents.
For food, you learn to eat cheaply. This does NOT mean stupid crap like ramen noodles - if you do that I will scold you heartily. The more you cook for yourself rather than eating out or ordering delivery the better, and the more you do from scratch the better. It's far, far easier to cook for two, three, or four than one, so try to find roommates with similar tastes. Balance costs with health - meat, cheese, and fruit are all relatively expensive, but necessary. You can more than make up for it in other things. For instance, if you eat oatmeal with brown sugar and a glass of orange juice every day, that meal will run you significantly less than a dollar apiece (much less than cold box cereal). Overall I recommend planning on spending $8-10 per person per day on food (this is the same number we use for budgeting purposes in Scouts).
On a related note, I've been seriously considering an online recipe and grocery list application, which I may well try to put together once school ends. Let me know if you'd be interested in contributing.
Post a Comment