Two more weeks to go before our move-out date, but already yesterday we had to have a crew move all our furniture. We ran out of time with the search and had to go with Plan B which was to rent a temporary shoebox apartment while we keep looking for the Right One. Our shoebox is located on 32th floor in Yaletown, so there is a view (of course!
) but otherwise the temporary place is nothing spectacular. It is still a relief to be paying 39% less rent for the next 2-3 months while we continue the search. That will easily cover for the cost of moving twice and keeping our stuff in a storage on Powell Street for that time.
It is incredible how much stuff one accumulates in just three years! We were barely able to fit all our furniture into a 10x15' locker. It just didn't feel like that much stuff when it was all still in our 1634 sqf apartment.
The apartment has now been listed for over sever weeks and only five people have come by to see it and none have taken it. A bit surprisingly the very first couple that saw the place six weeks ago came back to see it today. They would make great new tenants for the place, but I cannot understand how they could afford it with a small baby and all. Also, the suite is not the most practical if you have a baby.
I actually feel sad that there is no way for us to be warning them not to overpay for this place. The ask price has come down by two hundred dollars in the recent weeks, but is still
one thousand more than what we have been paying and is definitely still six hundred bucks more than the place is worth. I hope they have done their market study and will not be paying the ridiculous ask price.
Just before we decided to go with the Plan B we did reach out to the landlord one more time inquiring if their mind had changed from having no offers from five weeks on the market. Unfortunately they were still not ready to negotiate one bit and we decided that we cannot keep waiting for them to realize their mistake, so we moved forward with our plan and will so move out.
Unless the couple that saw the place today will suddenly take it, the place will be sitting empty in beginning of May - just like we warned the landlord. Actually everything we told them in our argumentation already back in February has ended up happening, so they must realize that we were not bullshitting them at any point and that they made a mistake. Now their only two options are to a) get lucky and have some rich person show up and just take it or b) keep lowering the price and lose more money.
Neither option will help us anymore and our thoughts are already moving forward. We are very happy not to have any deadline to worry about anymore, as we can now be extending the lease on our shoebox as long as we choose to. We still want to find a new place as soon as possible (500sqf will feel small after 1634sqf and it will be sad not to have your own furniture to enjoy), but we want to find something where we can consider staying for years to come. Moving is such a pain and hassle that we don't want to be doing it again in one year!!