I can't believe that we're moving to Santa Monica on Tuesday! First time you've heard about it? Well, let me fill you in. At the beginning of this month, Trung and I figured we should at least try and see if we could get out of our lease, which expires late July, so that we could enroll Lydia into a Santa Monica school for kindergarten next year. Santa Monica schools are MUCH better than Los Angeles ones and our local one is currently being built. So we submitted a 30 day notice of moving form with a move-out date of 3/3 (the day I'd be picking up the enrollment packet) and hoped for the best. I honestly didn't think that there was a chance in the world that someone would take over our lease.
I called the leasing office after one week to ask a question about the procedures if I were to find someone myself and come to find out, someone was already awaiting approval for our apartment. Little did I know that there was a kind-hearted guy named Hanif in the leasing office who took it upon himself to find someone for our apartment. We now had less than three weeks to find a place in Santa Monica, actually less, because we also had a planned five day cruise in a week! After looking at a few places, we decided to go with Living at Santa Monica because of its location within a good school zone and being five blocks from the ocean. But then we decided to see Plaza at the Arboretum within a slightly worse school zone, but with better rent and more space, and decided to go with that instead. We paid the credit report fees and put our deposit down, then left for our day cruise on Monday 2/14 .
That night, I could not sleep for the life of me. Moving to Plaza just did not feel right, so I convinced Trung that we should see if Living had a place for less rent because I didn't mind a smaller place since the location is so great. So, the moment it hit 9 AM on Friday 2/18, I called Living to see if there was any availability and of course, there wasn't. We had one last option...I had talked to a girl named Dee who needed someone to take over her lease until June 15th; the rent was really good too. I e-mailed her, but didn't hear from her all day and her ad was no longer on Craigslist, so I figured her apartment was no longer available. Then around 7 PM, she called me back and said her place was still available, so we started the process of possibly living at her place. We checked it out and got confirmation from the school on Tuesday that they would honor our lease agreement even though it expires before school starts and we signed the lease just 6 days before we were to move in. Talk about a whirlwind!
I've been busily packing and entertaining the kids all week, but Trung left yesterday to hit the slopes in Tahoe with the guys on a trip he planned many months ago. Fortunately, the kids can keep themselves entertained pretty well, so I only have a few more boxes to pack and we are good to go. We're hoping that Living will offer a decent rent to extend our lease come June because moving sure is hard work. Maybe I should just leave non-essentials in their boxes until we find out our renewal rent.
I called the leasing office after one week to ask a question about the procedures if I were to find someone myself and come to find out, someone was already awaiting approval for our apartment. Little did I know that there was a kind-hearted guy named Hanif in the leasing office who took it upon himself to find someone for our apartment. We now had less than three weeks to find a place in Santa Monica, actually less, because we also had a planned five day cruise in a week! After looking at a few places, we decided to go with Living at Santa Monica because of its location within a good school zone and being five blocks from the ocean. But then we decided to see Plaza at the Arboretum within a slightly worse school zone, but with better rent and more space, and decided to go with that instead. We paid the credit report fees and put our deposit down, then left for our day cruise on Monday 2/14 .
That night, I could not sleep for the life of me. Moving to Plaza just did not feel right, so I convinced Trung that we should see if Living had a place for less rent because I didn't mind a smaller place since the location is so great. So, the moment it hit 9 AM on Friday 2/18, I called Living to see if there was any availability and of course, there wasn't. We had one last option...I had talked to a girl named Dee who needed someone to take over her lease until June 15th; the rent was really good too. I e-mailed her, but didn't hear from her all day and her ad was no longer on Craigslist, so I figured her apartment was no longer available. Then around 7 PM, she called me back and said her place was still available, so we started the process of possibly living at her place. We checked it out and got confirmation from the school on Tuesday that they would honor our lease agreement even though it expires before school starts and we signed the lease just 6 days before we were to move in. Talk about a whirlwind!
I've been busily packing and entertaining the kids all week, but Trung left yesterday to hit the slopes in Tahoe with the guys on a trip he planned many months ago. Fortunately, the kids can keep themselves entertained pretty well, so I only have a few more boxes to pack and we are good to go. We're hoping that Living will offer a decent rent to extend our lease come June because moving sure is hard work. Maybe I should just leave non-essentials in their boxes until we find out our renewal rent.
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