Housing

[chrisvenus]

Finding a house(/place to live) is depressing. More to the point its expensive. It would probably help if I knew more definitely what I was after. I just unfortunately have a lot of ideas that just keep making it more and more expensive (nice place near the centre of town? ouch! Look at the price tag on that! Parking space? hahahah!). I need to sit and work my finances out at some point but I think I'm just goign to end up having to settle for something I don't quite want.

Finding more housemates would be useful but now is not a good time of year. I'd like to share a house but I don't want to do so with strangers since I've had bad experiences of sharing with people I don't know in the past. I think my current plan is that I'd like to move sometime in april. I've told my housemates I'll move out by end of june at the very latest but I suspect they will be happier if its earlier and I think it would be good for me too I'm starting to feel guilt about living where I am now which is bad. Not severe guilt but just a slow increasing level that I think will start becoming really bad in about two months.

Oh well, that's enough rambling for now. If anybody can suggest places that would be good to move to in the next couple of months or websites where I can find somewhere nice or point me at other people who are looking for places to live or whatever. Or just share advice. I dunno. I'm just feeling a bit lost at the moment so useful words of any kind appreciated.

Comments

[arralethe.livejournal.com]

My ha'penny's worth of constructive comments:

1) How close to the centre of town do you want to be, considering where you work? Consider how you commute, and how much time you're prepared to commute, which should give you a fairly good idea of where you're looking at.
2) Private landlord or agency? It can make quite a big difference to service provided, and acrimony avoided.
3) HOw many people do you (ideally) want to share with? And I'm assuming you're working with Krys on this one to figure out extra people etc.

Try using Fish4, or googling for the Oxford Evening rag - it may give you ideas of the sort of thing you're looking for, or agencies which might be able to help.

Another thing to consider is whether you're happy to take a short term, stop-gap place just to buy you more time to look for something.

Sadly, I have no direct quick and easy answers for you on this one. I'd recommend an agency house/flat, as they're easier to hold accountable. But answering some of the questions might throw up some ideas...

[sea-of-flame.livejournal.com]

Seconded on that 1st point - you both drive, and IIRC work out of town - you may well find that getting somewhere a bit out of town/closer to workplaces, but still on good transport links, gives you more freedom cost-wise, whilst remaining accessible to visitors.

(Thinking about how people who AREN'T you will get to your place is an important factor - if you don't want to entertain/become default crash, being out of the way can be a godsend - on the other hand, if you want to have people round a fair bit without having to act as taxi because your place is so awkward to get to/hard to find, that's obviously not what you want! It can often be worth trying to get to the place without using your car to get an idea of how easy it is...)

[chrisvenus]

Your use of the word "both" confuses me into thinking that you have made some assumptions here that are perhaps not valid. Currently it looks like I'm looking for a solo bachelor pad for just me. This is one of the reasons why I'd quite like the town center so that I can be close to interesting things and I don't turn into the hermit that I have so often said I will become one day. Admittedly I'll probably be a hermit with an internet connection so it could be worse. :)

But yeah, I want people to be able to get to me if they want. This is relatively important to me. Behind things like parking space for my car but relatively important. I think. I don't know. I don't think I can cope with all these choices. :-s

[mattclem.livejournal.com]

I take it you also want to minimise the risk of seeing baldy in naught but a towel and a grin?

[chrisvenus]

Hell yes!

[leathellin.livejournal.com]

http://www.ukpropertyshop.co.uk/s/Oxfordshire/letting_agents_Oxford/

Even more choices for you to look at.

[sea-of-flame.livejournal.com]

Oh, sorry - thought you and Krys, possibly with others, were looking for somewhere?

Well, figuring what one person wants is even easier, in theory - no need to consult/compromise!

[chrisvenus]

We are both looking but not for a place together. I realise looing back that I thought I'd made that more clear in the original post but hadn't.

The trouble is the place I want will cost me 900ppm just on rent so I really need somebody else to either share rent with or to tell me to stop being a silly bugger. :)

[arralethe.livejournal.com]

Given what you say about rent, I'd have to say that the city centre thing sounds very bad. Let's face it, it would be nice, but you'll never be able to park and getting to work in the morning would be a nightmare. wimble lived alone in his out of the way place for quite a while and never turned into a recluse.

Part of the problem from what you say seems to be potentially unrealistic expectations, much as I'm loathe to criticise. Go with what's affordable, and what's practical, and then look at what your choices are...

[chrisvenus]

I am aware that my expectations are unrealistic but I don't like any of the realistic ones at the moment. I am notoriously bad for being fussy. I'm sure it will be alright and suspect that I am largely just sulking because I'm not a millionaire and so can't afford all the things that I *want*. :)

[arralethe.livejournal.com]

Sulking?

Bad Chris! No Biscuit!

So at this point I cease being supportive and start telling you to just get on with it, I guess :)

[sea-of-flame.livejournal.com]

Uh - given we're paying £820 for our 2 bedroom flat in London, that seems rather high...

Admittedly we're in Greenwich rather than central london, but even so! Are you looking at the flats over Gloucester Green or something?

[chrisvenus]

That particular one was just behind the castle area. With a parking space. Hey, I have good taste. What I want is unfortunately bloody expensive. :)

[leathellin.livejournal.com]

There are a number of flats around Temple Cowley which might be cheaper. And possibly nice.

[chrisvenus]

supportive is much better. The main problem is that if I can't have my ideal world I don't know what I do want. Parking space is pretty much a must but apart from that I really don't know what I consider must haves and what would be considered luxuries. The trouble is its just expensive living on my own wherever I am. :(

[chrisvenus]

Yeah, that's where I'm probably going to look around next. I did find a nice reasonably priced 3 bedroom place that looked good if I could find parnters in teh endeavour but then I worried when it seemed to imply that only one of the bedrooms actually had a bed... :)

[arralethe.livejournal.com]

Well...my must haves are generally:

1) Bath and shower
2) Fully fitted kitchen with appliances including a washing machine and a fridge freezer large enough to actually store more than 1 pack of fish fingers
3) Relatively painless route to work of not more than 30-40 minutes
(haven't got that at the moment but I can't argue with the house we have)
4) Shelving and/or storage space
5) semi-decent or inoffensive decor that I can change to be more tasteful depending on state upon arrival
6) Affordable with enough money over to pay council tax, leccy, gas (if necessary), internet connection plus decent disposable income

Luxuries would be:
1) dishwasher
2) tumble dryer
3) spare room
4) separate study/computer room
5) entrycom system
6) Lavish decor where I'm scared to spill my tea

start thinking of it in those terms and it becomes a little more manageable. And while it's great to aim for the ideal world, wishing it will turn up and being disappointed when you've not got there yet is not terribly productive at solving any current problems.