apartment saga ending

as some my remember my landlady out of the blue came around to start showing the apartment..

ok.. so first I got a contract with her that I could stay for another six months if I wanted which would give me enough time to look around. Complete with attorney and notary.. very polite. very civilized. She came through the apartment, which I rented furnished, and assured me that I would get my deposit back.

Then I started looking in the neighborhood. Seems that all my braggin on Gazcue is right because there has been a lot of construction of small new apartments which are very small and very expensive.

I started back on the old pound the pavement route that I had when I was first here six years ago. although I pretty much know all the buildings in the walking neighborhood. Plus I am in love with the architecture of the building in which I live and did not want to leave it. But the only other rental here was on the fourth floor which seemed to be going in the wrong direction for a large elder.

One day I passed the janitor for the building walikng just on the outskirts of the 'hood and told him that I was looking for an unfurnished apartment two or three bedrooms, in one of the older buildings and that if he found me one, there was a reward in it for him. This reminded me of the old days in NYC when we used to bribe the supers of the buildings in order to get on a list to get called in case of a vacancy.

The next day, he came up to tell me that the attorney for the ground floor apartmant was there and I should go see it.

It was sold about a year and a half ago and never advertised or anything. But now, they had been putting in a new bathroom and new closet doors.. taking out the gorgeous old wooden ones and replacing them with crap plastic rather than repairing.. ugh.. but....

I started dancing. I have always wanted that apartment. Ground floor. Three bedrooms and one has a seperate entrance so that I could have an English school or tarot card readings.. or whatever...

So I ask how much they want. The lawyer says 20,000 pesos. $500 US.

I, wild with enthusiasm, offer $650.

They give me a contract for five years. They say that I can pay the $650. OR I can pay the $500 they were asking with the increases that they were asking for which means that in five years I will be paying $605 or something like that.

AMAZING

thanks for all the help and the PMs and the good energy

I moved the plants in first to see how well they would adapt.. The place has beautiful light but it is quite open which means I am going to have to get dressed up more... as in no walking around in the altogether.. folks walk right close to my windows since that is where the shade is.. Am planning curtains which will come up to shoulder height and still let the light in.. sorta Cafe curtains..

Now how to figure out what needs to be done here and there. Need to buy stuff for here but probably can have the landlady do it all. I have a great Dominican whom I got working for me back when I was doing heavy journalism.. a referal from Chiri.. and she protects me like a sister... so she is back on salary for the month making lists...

Gas tank...oops.. did not have that..

have thrown out old furniture and mattresses and stove and fridge here.. but am willing to forgoe the 550 deposit and Maria .. the secretaria.. for la gringa... says we can get it all for much less.. a used everything. Honestlyl, I repaired the fridge three times but there was nothing left to do but shoot them!

I have the basics .. cheap but functional furniture and good art!!!

The place will be noisier but more in the heart of things with the comings and goings. Weekends and nights are dead quiet and the back office is really quiet as well...

now the furniture will be all mine and I am secure.

I explained to them how I was looking for a place for the rest of my life.. how I could pay in dollars .. but that I could not sign a lease at $1000 as the prices were going to go up and I would not have the money. So I think that they were pleased with that.. that I was honest.

And they asked for a fiador.. had the form.. but I said that I did not know any Domnicans who had enough money to guarantee that sort of rent. All my friends had less money than I did. And I could not ask them to be responsible for my rent. I was able to give my landlady as a reference which was a great thing. And the lady who runs the building as I have always paid the maintenance on time.

But then, the lawyer, who is a cousin of the owner, explained that I am a foreigner and they want to know who to call//// Well.. I think that by now I probably have my own extension at the US Embassy so I was able to fill out that form for them with numbers from here to Puerto Rico to Rhode Island.

They dropped the requirements down from three months to two months rent..

I promised the janitor 3 thousand pesos but I am gonna give him four..

I did give him a big bottle of Brahma and a kiss on the cheek.

I already know two of my neighbors.. It is a more bustling builidng since it is three bedrooms.. the teenagers live there so I can play the music a bit louder..

after all.. I do not have a car .. and that empty slot next to my apartment is where the Satuarday morning car hood open clinics take place.

The only thing that I have lost is the hammock on the balcony but they said i can put up hooks a la Mexican style so I will be fine

i have a month in which to move.

lucky girl

fly... it is Tuesday...

suarezn said:

Congratulations...but I don't get the offering more than advertised. I know you're trying to secure a "long term, fixed rent"...but you do know you're in The DR and if prices go up enough they will ask to renegotiate...just as Barrick Gold :cheeky::cheeky::cheeky:

Plus trust me apartment prices are not going to go up at a higher rate than USD devaluations, so your 500 USD today will probably be worth around 25 k pesos soon enough.

Had it been me I would have offered 15,000 pesos. You know they're expecting people to negotiate. They feel they just won the lottery so instead of 20k pesos they're getting 26k plus a month at the current rate and going up every month.

Click to expand...

I know that what you said is absolute logic but these folks seemed really naive to me.. as if they had not looked in the paper yet to see what the prices are. To get a 100 meter apartment in Gazcue now for $500 is out of the question. Certainly not one in a decent building. She said she had not put it in the paper.

I wanted to be sure that she did not GET to the paper.. or that someone ELSE did not get the apartment.

They are renting out 50 meter apartments here for 1000 a month....

in the brand new european style blue glass torres...

the 100 meter places are all consistently over $800

I was pretty much resigned to having to go up to $700 to start and $800 to close.

My landlady will be able to get $700 a month for this one after I leave/... I pay $600.. plus the maintenance

So I am getting a place which is 300 sq feet bigger for

$150 US a month LESS

I felt that I knew what they had better than they did

but we are run down sorta a building.. we have trash.. we are a bit broke and dirty.. old car in the lot.. not so pretty

But the MOST amazing architecture and construction

the place is designed to the path of the wind.. complete east west floor though... one block from the sea

My mother awoke from her grave especially to come live here with me

i would have paid them a thousand and eaten Ramen noodles

The thing that stunned me, Suxeran, was that even though I had offered $660, they reiterated the offer of $500.

This was done in Spanish though my friend.... from the attorney to the secretary.

So they had a gringa who had OFFERED MORE.

And they said. well, yes, Senora, We will accept your Six hundred and fifty dollars but what we really were looking for was five hundred going up increments.. this means that they are fair and just people.

so after my bouts with robbers and theieves


i have stumbled on a tribe of honest women

but five hundred is absolutely fair.. they bought the place three years ago and sealed it and sat on ti

aside from ripping out the equisite closiet doors.. glad i was able to save at least half

they did nothing except put in more prison bars

which i am removing

but they are HONEST WOMEN

The grandson will come down to get hte rent when he brings the maintenance down to pay

so once we get the LLAMA family to pay the RESIDENAILA CLAUDINA the sixty thousand pesos in back maintenance that they owe.. we can pay the back garbage bill and get the place painted.. ...

then everyone else can rent their places out... and we can clean up independencia..

sounds like a plan

there is this gorgeous open air haitian art gallery that i have been heklping with on the corher of pateur and independencia

grab a cappuchino at villar hermanos
and go sit there in the garden

we are movin up here

now turning about 1950s harlem

please alert the gay black community in philly

they bought it for 4 million four years ago

there is one on the ground floor
now for sale at 3.9

hurry hurry

that is dominican pesos

so four years ago it was at 35

now it is at 40

someone do the math

but it hovers around one hundred thousand.. a
very very sound investment

looks like i am going to open up my real estate rental agency

how does the Jewels of Gazcue sound to you?

I already have the logo

only kidding

just running my own life is too much work for me

fortunately it is a work of fiction