The Downside Of Apartment Life
The Downside Of Apartment Life is easy to find. From noise, to parking, and making your own stinking ice, the negatives can overwhelm you. Fortunately, we try our best to relish in The Upside Of Apartment Life but it’s time to get real. If you have considered Apartment Life, THIS is the real deal.
The Downside Of Apartment Life
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Stairs
Although living on the second floor makes us feel ever so slightly safer, there is still a flight of stairs to climb with each load of groceries. It brings new meaning to one trip with the groceries! (Use a grocery list printable to make grocery shopping more efficient.)
Maintenance
It is incredibly nice to have maintenance, however, there are times when you get a little note on your door saying maintenance will enter on such and such day. No tightened-up time window, just sometime between 8:00 and 6:00. Ugh! It is quite the inconvenience, especially if you’re a stay at home mom who is in and out or may want to shower within those hours. There is also the dog to contend with.
Appliances
When you’re outfitting hundreds of apartments with appliances, cost is a huge factor. More than likely, those appliances will be the most inexpensive ones of the bunch.
Not a big deal, right? Except they need to do their job and, hopefully, in an efficient way. Apartment dwellers do pay the electric bill, after all!
Apartment Life may land you in the realm of staggered showers and delayed use of the dishwasher and washing machine in hopes of a hot shower!
Ice
I’m sounding pitiful now. Seriously though! We get used to conveniences of little things like an ice-maker. Apartment life will have you searching for an ice tray!
Guests
Even if there was room for guests, we would more than likely have noise complaints if we dared to invite guests! Plus, they would have a hard time finding a place to park!
No Yard
There is no place to garden and the dog has no place to run free. No more opening the back door for TeddiBear to run and explore and bark at the neighbors. Apartment Life means putting him on a leash and walking him to the designated spot for dogs to pee and poo. It also means finding your foot in a pile of dog doo that your neighbors were too lazy to pick up.
Thankfully, we discovered Fresh Patch!
Storage Is Minimal
I’m the person who would store at least two Costco size toilet papers in the garage. The thought of running out scared the crap out of me. Unfortunately, there just isn’t room for that kind of inventory in our apartment unless we use them as chairs.
Apartment life has necessitated we buy as we go. Of course, this plan of action almost resulted in a toilet paper emergency last night. Ahem, I just might be using Costco size toilet paper as chairs after all. It’s the efficient way of decorating!
No Garage
I didn’t realize how big of a deal no garage would be until our car was broken into at the movie theater. With two busted out windows, a carport off a busy street just wasn’t going to cut it. Thank goodness for friends with extra garage space!
No garage also means no garage storage. Sure, we can cram tons of stuff in our balcony storage but the lawnmower and wheelbarrow we held onto for our future home needed to find a different place to hang out.
You may also need to plan extra time to scrape your icy windshield, you always need a coat and shoes, and your car will be colder on those winter mornings.
Neighbors
You’ll never know all your neighbors. There is a lot of humanity in one apartment complex! It is next to impossible to know who belongs and who may be up to no good. For this reason, I walk my daughter to her vehicle every morning.
Noise
You would think apartments would have extra strength noise reducers between units, right? it would just make sense. Unfortunately, we can hear every step, drawer closing, and door slammed. We even know when the upstairs neighbor is wearing high heels.
Early mornings you may hear dueling alarm clocks. Throughout the day you may hear traffic from a nearby busy street. Sirens and lights may flood your apartment.
Parking
Parking sucks! We were permitted to rent up to two covered parking spaces. Those parking spaces are super difficult to maneuver into as the isles are skinny as well as the spaces. But those poles. Let me tell you, those poles give me anxiety. One of our cars may have scrapes on them from said poles. Ahem.
A neighbor or one of their guests may help themselves to your paid parking space leaving you to, hopefully, find an open spot a block away.
It Ain’t Cheap
I can’t speak for every apartment building but we pay more to live the apartment life than we ever paid in our 1,969 square foot home. Rent is $1,830 which includes base rent, two carport spots, pet rent, sewer, water, and garbage. Woah!
Stereotypes
There seems to be a stereotype that goes along with Apartment Life. Multiple times I have witnessed community members complain about all the apartments and the crime they have brought.
Honey, let me tell you something, you don’t make apartment life any easier by claiming you heard shots fired and they must have come from THOSE apartments. Get your facts straight before you spew them all over Facebook! I’m certain there are questionable apartments with creeps who reside in them. Please don’t assume ALL are apartments of crime.
At our place of residence, every person over the age of 18 must fill out a background application. Felons are not allowed. Low income is not allowed. Let me reiterate, it ain’t cheap to live here!
Let me tell you, it was harder to rent this place than it is to buy a home with the hoops you are required to jump through.
Can you tell I’m passionate about this? Stereotypes are probably the biggest downside of apartment life.
Neighbors Are Slobs
You would think a complex full of professionals would take pride in where they live, right? It continues to amaze me when neighbors can’t open the compactor door to throw away their garbage and, instead, pile it up just outside the compactor. They also leave furniture, FURNITURE, in the garbage area. No Joke! It’s commonplace to find a mattress leaning against the recycle bin.
Do you want to talk about dog poop? It’s abundant. I’m not sure why neighbors think it’s okay to leave piles throughout the complex. Sometimes it looks as though a horse has been through! Seriously! Okay, I’ll stop. You get the point.
No Return On Investment
It’s the age old belief that if you rent, you throw away money. I agree. The $1830 we pay each month will never be seen again. When we sold our home of 13 years, we saw a return on our investment. Our monthly mortgage wasn’t thrown away. We were able to recover a large portion of that monthly cost in the sale of our home.
Decorating
In our particular apartments, painting is not allowed. We are permitted to hang pictures on the walls, however, we have opted not to. We realize that hanging pictures may cost us fees in the long run. It will be interesting to see what our move out fees look like.
Shop More Often
As mentioned above, we shop as we go. We have enough room to store food and expendables for a week’s time. Instead of hitting Costco or the grocery store every other week, we find ourselves at both places every single week, if not more.
Music
Drums and amplifiers can’t be utilized in an apartment. Thankfully, our teenagers don’t mind practicing their guitar and bass without the amplifier. My husband, well, let’s just say his drum set is safely tucked away at my parents’ house.
Extra Keys
Of course, apartment management and maintenance have extra keys to your apartment. This can make you feel a little unsettled at times. For this reason we purchased the Door Security Bar. No one is getting past that!
Apartment Life is for families between homes, young couples starting out, college students living with roommates, young families saving for their first home, empty nesters who want to minimize their workload, or families who want to live without debt.
Apartment Life can be for anyone but it isn’t for everyone. Their are Upsides and Downsides of apartment life. Only YOU can determine if Apartment Life is for you.
Apartment Life IS for us while we look for our next home! It works for us and has been a positive experience as long as we dwell on The Upside Of Apartment Life!
Oh my Bridget, you reminded me of some things I’d forgotten. Yipes. I especially didn’t like the noise. In one apartment we lived in, you could hear the lady upstairs clogging back and forth across the floor in her heels. I finally saw her one day, expecting a heavy set woman. No. She couldn’t have weighed more than 110 lbs. She was just a heavy FOOTED woman. And don’t get me started on “night time activity” noises, if you know what I mean. I’m also with you on that maintenance whenever they felt like it thing. I don’t want someone in my apartment when I’m not there, not even maintenance. I am praying you find your dream home real soon AND that you have smooth sailing until then. I really enjoyed your upside and downside lists. VERY honest assessments of apartment living. P.S. I just use cheapy plastic ice cube trays from Walmart. They’re much more user friendly than the fancy rubbery ones. I, too, look forward to an ice maker again someday! 🙂
Haha! Yes, we have heard all of the noises you mentioned, Kay;0) We try our best to be light footed for the neighbors below us. Blake had his hip replaced a few months ago and walking lightly isn’t possible at this point but the rest of us work hard at it!
Can you believe the store we went to didn’t even have those good old fashioned ice cube trays? I looked, believe me! In the spirit of temporary living, I’m not buying any more! Heehee!