Looking for a house or apartment to rent in the UK is normally fairly straightforward. You register with the local agencies, let them know what kind of thing you're looking for and they show you details of what they've got on their books at the moment. If nothing takes your fancy, then you keep your eye on the website and they let you know about places that meet your criteria before they make it to the website. When you find things you like, you give them a call and arrange a viewing. If you like the place, you tell them you're happy to take it, pay a fee for them to run credit checks on you then, assuming the credit checks are fine, arrange when you want to move in.
It all seems so easy in comparison to the system down under. Here, you don't register with anyone... in fact just popping into the local real estate agent to ask brings forth puzzled looks and confusion! No, here you trawl through a website (www.domain.com.au) on which everyone advertises their properties (both real estate agents and private landlords), check the inspection time (each half-decent property will usually have one, or if you're really lucky, two 15 min inspections), turn up at the appointed time with all the other interested people, pick up an application form if you like what you see (or even if you don't!), then ensure you submit the application immediately if you want to stand a chance of securing it. A word of advice... ensure you prepare your application pack (excluding the actual application form) in advance. You will need to scan your last 3 payslips (or if you've just started work, a copy of your employment contract), if you've been renting, a copy of your current rent ledger, your passport (and visa grant notice if you're not from Australia), plus anything else that may suggest to the agent that you're their ideal tenant... a nice cover letter is often considered mandatory too, although never requested!!
I was going to take a look at a lot of different properties around Wooloomooloo at the weekend... the suburb is on the harbour, right next to the Botanic Gardens and very central for everything. However, I then saw a couple of houses in Leichhardt with inspections happening and decided I really should check them out first. This is number one in the downsides to inspections... they all happen on a Saturday morning, so it's not possible to check out more than one suburb per weekend. And then you might only get to see several properties if the ones you're interested in have inspection times that are far enough apart for you to race between them and arrive in time!!
The first property I saw was a 2-storey semi, unusual out here unless you're looking at properties in Paddington which are full of the beautiful old terraces, mostly all restored to look beautifully periodic from outside and fresh, modern and extended inside. This one looked fine from the outside and was huge with 2 receptions, kitchen, laundry, 2 bedrooms, upstairs sunroom, bathroom, toilet, courtyard and massive garage which would fit not only the car, but probably all your contents from the house if you wanted to store them!! The only problem was that although freshly painted, it was quite shabby and smelt strongly of damp. For the price, it definitely wasn't a goer.
From there I went to the other end of Leichhardt (at a fairly brisk jog!) to see a 2 bedroom, detached, single storey house. This was much smaller with single reception, kitchen with room for a small dining table, laundry and two small-ish bedrooms. It did have a garden with grass and rotary washing line and beautiful varnished wooden floors though! I really liked it, particularly because of it's detached status... I could put a piano in here and not annoy the neighbours!! I took an application form and started pulling together all my paperwork. Although the agent, when quizzed, said the market wasn't moving particularly quickly at the moment, I still got the feeling that anything decent would get snapped up quickly. Although I was the only person viewing at the first place, there were at least 2 other groups looking around at the second one. This is what makes the whole process so difficult... it's not possible to take a look round a few places in different areas, then decide on the one you want. You can't even use your whole weekend, because no-one, it seems, does viewings on a Sunday! So, whilst you consider your options, the best idea is to get an application in. The one piece of good news is you don't pay anything for the agent to check you out, so putting in an application is your best means of buying a bit (a very little bit!) of time before they say your application has been successful and you need to pay a week's rent in order to secure the property.
So, Monday at 10am I'd submitted my application and by the same time Tuesday I'd received a call to say that although they'd received several applications, they were happy to progress mine! The only issue was a moving in date - I didn't want to move until 15th July, they wanted the property rented and suggested 28th June (10 days time) as their best offer. I asked if I could think about it as I was about to go into a meeting and they said fine, but could I get back to them by lunchtime!!
I'm not sure quite how anyone who is working finds the time to find a rental property. Just trawling the internet is a massively time-consuming job and if you're looking in more than one small area, that job becomes exponentially bigger. I am very lucky that I have a wonderful mum who offered to do some trawling for me... what better than to make use of the 9 hour time difference and wake up to a bunch of new property links in your inbox, all picked by someone who knows you better than you know yourself!!
So, needless to say, I didn't get back to the real estate agent on Tuesday, but instead waited until Wednesday morning. By this time, my mum & I had ascertained that there were lots of great looking places in Glebe and Woollahra... 2 of my preferred locations. The only thing was there weren't generally detached houses, although there were semis, townhouses or terraces available. So it was a question of deciding which was more important and given that both the bedrooms were fairly compact in the Leichhardt place and I'd be taking it on far earlier than I wanted, then the answer was no. I rang the agent first thing Wednesday, apologised for not getting back yesterday and gave my response... he was actually really appreciative of the fact that I called at all, do presumably people don't phone back to say no and the agent just goes ahead with the next preferred candidate!
The plan is now to spend some time reviewing suburbs and narrowing down my search to particular roads I'd be keen to live in so my viewings can be a little more targeted. I'm sure I won't know what to do with myself one day when all this is sorted and I actually have "spare time" on my hands!!
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