Our Apartment

Here's a description of the apartment which will be our home for the next few months.

It's furnished. We have couches, chairs, a dinner table, dishes, towels, and sheets. It's great.

We're on Hastings, a busy street that goes from downtown Vancouver out to Simon Fraser University in Burnaby. We're closer to the SFU end.

We are in what's probably called an apartment complex, though it's mixed - at least some of the units, including ours, are owned instead of rented. There are about half a dozen buildings with a central area that include an indoor swimming pool (currently drained), a shelter, and a playground.

Our apartment gets light on one side, but it faces south so we get little direct sunlight. It's quite dark, though the closet doors are mirrored, reflecting some light back. No room has windows on more than one side.

It's nicely furnished. There's a suite of sofas and a chair in leather. There's also a coffee table, end tables, and a dinner table, all of glass and metal. (It will be easier for us to find Sarah's bogeys.) We have a full-size refrigerator/freezer and oven/stove again (yay!). The kitchen, dining room, and living room have hardwood flooring with lots of rugs; the bedrooms and hallway are carpeted; and the bathroom is tiled with mats.

There's a huge TV in the living room but it's quite old and probably long before the HDTV era. Under it is a DVD player and something else; we haven't tried either yet. There's a small boom box for music.

We have three bedrooms, one of us in each. Margo has the master suite. I have a room with a desk, and the bed folds out of the sofa. (This is where you will stay if you visit us.) Sarah has a small desk and a bed.

The bathroom has a marble countertop and the shower has glass doors. Above the counter is a wall-length mirror, so I can finally get visual feedback on how large I get. (Margo and I have been eating low-carb since we got here so it's helping.)

There are a number of kids living here. Sarah has already made friends with some. This is new for us and we're negotiating rules for when and how long she can be playing outside.

There's a nearby laundry room. We wish we had in-suite laundry of course. Payment comes from a smart card that we charge as we need to.

We're near a corner that includes a convenience store and an Italian restaurant. We visited the restaurant last night. It far exceeded our expectations - it has a wood oven, local wines, Granville Island beer on tap, and our food was great - our antipasto had a cured ham that made me moan, as well as a tasty prosciutto and salami. Also nearby is a pizza shop, a spa, and Sarah's elementary school.

We're also close to the Trans-Canada bike trail, and a major bikeway is just behind us.

From Hastings, we can catch a bus to downtown in about 25 minutes. It's also about a half hour walk south to the Millennium Line SkyTrain station.

Margo's already started scouring the classifieds for rentals in Burnaby. They seem quite affordable, and we should be able to secure a three-bedroom apartment for about 2/3 of what we're paying now (though our utilities are paid for). Margo and I are in agreement that we should rent for at least a year instead of buying. Prices are falling, and I really want to avoid being in a negative equity situation. Also, we'll be more confident when Margo is working again. In the meantime, we'll take the difference between a rental payment and a mortgage payment and put that into savings or investments each month.