Apartment searching in NOLA

I just completed the hunt for my ninth apartment in five years. My search this round took place in New Orleans, Louisiana – a place that will soon become my seventh city of residency in 10 years. I have lived in big cities and small towns. My apartments have been newly renovated, deteriorating vintage ratholes and everything in between. Below is a summary of my search as a well-traveled, female twenty-something who is about to be a resident of the Big Easy:

Tools

My search took place mostly online. As I have done many times in the past, I searched Craigslist, Padmapper and several other apartment websites that are not worth mentioning because I have yet to find them useful. I reached out to the contact person from every posting I found even remotely desirable. My findings:

• Many postings did not include a contact phone number – only an email address.
• I called every phone number I did find, always got a hold of the contact and saw every one of these apartments.
• It typically took at least a day for most landlords/realtors to email me back. In many cases, it took several days. About half of those I reached out to never emailed me back at all.
• To this point, all my other apartment searches have been dog-eat-dog (Find an apartment. Call immediately. Setup a viewing immediately. Sign a lease immediately. Don’t give anyone else time to swoop in.).
• This experience was more like watching the dog sniff grass for a while…then watch it sniff another part of the grass for a while. There was no dog-eating involved – mostly just watching and waiting.

Location

• As in most cities, living closer to the hoppin’ and happenin’ areas is typically more expensive or only affordable if the apartment is a dump.
• Safe areas in NOLA are patchy. One intersection might be perfectly safe, while venturing two blocks in another direction becomes questionable.
• There are newly renovated, beautiful apartments in areas where reports of gunshots are high and rundown, dingy apartments in great neighborhoods. Search for apartments in NOLA with a local.

Application Process

• Several landlords I met with mentioned that part of their application process included meeting a potential tenant face-to-face. They found it important that the tenant be the type of person they want to rent to.
• I have heard from several Tulane classmates who are also moving to NOLA from out of state. Many found landlords would not rent to them over the phone, even after offering to wire the landlord a deposit.
• The realtor I will be renting through did not have a copy of the lease together when we met. To keep on file in the meantime, she made copies of my deposit checks. Then, on the same copied paper, she hand-wrote a brief description of our agreement. We both signed two copies – one for each of our files.

Buildings

• “Shotgun” apartments are extremely common in NOLA. These are typically narrow, rectangular buildings, with doors on both ends of the apartment. The rooms are lined up one behind the other, so someone would walk through each room if entering the front door and walking in a straight line to the back door.
• Most apartment units are in houses, not complexes.
• Many houses are only one or two stories. Many also have porches.
• Since many apartments are in houses, many are walk-ups. This took a lot of getting used to since I was robbed from my first-floor walk-up in Chicago last year.
• There are a lot of rundown apartments in NOLA.
• Don’t be fooled by the outside of buildings. Many apartments look nicer on the inside than out (although some look nicer from the outside than they do inside too).

In the end, I found my apartment. I will be renting a first-floor shotgun in the Uptown neighborhood, less than one mile from Tulane University. The apartment is a few blocks off St. Charles Avenue (where the streetcar runs), about two blocks from the Mississippi River and a short walk to Audubon Park, one of NOLA’s famous city parks.

While still getting used to the fact that I will not be protected by a doorman, four doors, six floors and three locks like in my current Chicago apartment, I am excited about my unit and the neighborhood. I will be paying roughly the same rent as I do in Chicago, but will have an additional room, eat-in kitchen, backyard and front porch.

Here’s to an accomplished search, a new adventure and hoping I get along with my neighbors.