Dear SOS,
I'm a sophomore and I just moved into my housing arrangement (if you could even call it that; I got left out of the sweet Wren suite that my 10 BFFs are living in and now I'm stuck in a single in the boonies of Lewis). Anyway, I have a little bit of pent-up anger about the situation and I'd like to start looking into off-campus housing for next year so at least I'll have something to look forward to. What do you suggest is the best way to go about this?
Sincerely,
Hung-up on Housing
Dear Hung-up on Housing,
Your inquiry comprises of the first step to combating the housing crisis. And no, I'm not talking about sub-prime loans here. I'm talking about the mid-sophomore-year crisis that all students face where they have to decide who they're living with, where they want to live and when they want to start looking into the process.
And the answer to the latter, in all cases, should be: as soon as possible. Trust me on this one; I've had my own share of experience with the housing hullabaloo.
And what a hullabaloo it was. After deciding that the latter half of the spring semester was an optimal time to start the house hunt (first mark against me), I got to work with my two future housemates and started utilizing all of the standard search tools: the Tufts Off-Campus Housing Web site, ads in the Daily, and then when utter desperation kicked in, CraigsList.com. After fervent highlighting, jotting and underlining, my friends and I finally began to look at options. And by the end of the exhausting quest, I finally have a roof over my head, as well as a variety of tips I learned along the way. Note: All tips are based on real experiences. Just ask me or my housemates for factual verification.
1. Make sure your answering machine is something credible if you plan to give a landlord your phone number. I learned this the hard way. I still have my Vmail from eighth grade, which asks callers to "leave me a beautiful message." But that didn't mean I wanted landlords to return my call with messages such as, "Roses are red, violets are blue, I hope this message is beautiful enough for you." Aaaaaand I'm not kidding.
2. Choose a location you like as soon as possible. The four basic areas are a) the West side of campus, perpendicular to Curtis Street, b) the North side, on Boston Avenue, c) the East side, on College Ave (near the Broken Yolk! And the library! And the track! … Can you tell where I live?) and d) the potentially underrated South side, off of Powder House Boulevard.
3. If a landlord tries to convince you that a makeshift room fashioned out of a corner of the living room is actually a bedroom, he is lying. Plain and simple. Unless you are Harry Potter and your former residence was in a broom closet.
4. If your landlord is a Somerville police officer, run.
5. If the ad in the paper is ambiguous about the presence of a living room, THE HOUSE DOESN'T HAVE ONE. Apparently, come mid-April of last year, it was all the rage to do without living rooms! It's sooooo eco-friendly not to have one think about all the electricity you save! But seriously ... no common area. Even dorms have those.
Long story short: If you want to live off campus next year, start early, read between the lines and don't be afraid to make an offer on one of the first houses you see. There may not be a better one out there.
And if you were curious, I am happily living in the basement of a house with nine senior football players I met after I moved in. I figured out my housing two weeks before last semester ended.
--
Charlotte Steinway is a junior majoring in sociology. She can be reached at Charlotte.Steinway@tufts.edu.
