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News Flash: Bay Area Rents on the Rise
When we began our daunting, three-month-long apartment hunt this past June, we soon discovered that the competition for affordable one-bedrooms suitable for two people was fierce. We needed to find an abode before our impending marriage at the end of September, but after spurts of fruitless open houses throughout the summer, we feared we were doomed to walk through our separate "thresholds" post-matrimony, with our various roommates lurking down the hall.
So, last week, after some wise advice to put our needs "out there," we posted a "housing wanted" ad on craigslist (link has expired), along with hundreds of other desperate apartment-hunters. An hour later, we received an email from a producer at CBS5 wanting to interview us about our plight (we never did receive anything from prospective landlords though).
That same day, we also scheduled an appointment to see a rather promising apartment the next morning, which preceded our CBS5 interview later that afternoon. We came away from the apartment-viewing very excited -- the apartment was ours once our references and credit checked out. We kind of had a feeling things would go down that way.
More of our non-story after the jump!
Julia Madden, the producer who contacted and interviewed us, and the camera guy (we wish we could remember his name) were really nice and fun people, and they made us feel really comfortable speaking on camera. They seemed to genuinely enjoy the people they meet and the places they encounter while on the job. The behind-the-scenes experience was much more fulfilling than the final product, which is what we had always suspected while watching the local news. Also, we got bumped from the original air date last Wednesday to last Friday.
The edited footage of our interview was awesome in an ironic way, but still extremely cringe-worthy nonetheless. Our s.o. stole the limelight -- he's admittedly the extraverted half, and all we seemed capable of doing was nodding over and over and showing off our [grandmother's] engagement ring. Both of us were also portrayed as sounding very "doom-and-gloom," even though there were many jokes cracked in our half-hour taping.
We especially loved the closing line uttered by reporter Jeanette Pavini:
"Leanne and Daniel are hoping to find a spot
that's just their cup of tea,"
as the camera zooms into a close-up of our literal cup of tea that we were sitting down to drink. {Groan.}
"Now, after our story, Leanne and Daniel did find an apartment..."
Let's see if CBS5's "Tips for Success" worked for us:
1. Get Current Credit Report (landlord did his own background check free of charge)
2. Dress for Success (we were more dressed up than usual, thanks to the TV appearance)
3. Don't Be Afraid to Ask [Questions] (asked a few pertinent questions, but we have good instincts)
The fact of the matter is, we got our new apartment because we were the first to see it (and qualify). There was some luck to it though -- the ad had gone up a few days prior to us answering it, but there was a weird technological glitch that caused the apartment manager to lose all of the initial responses over the weekend (while we were living it up at our bachelorette party in wine country). So, we were the first to respond to the new ad the following Monday. Weird, dumb luck.