There are nearly 38 million apartment residents in the United States. Each one has their own story to tell and each one chose apartment living for a different reason. I remember my first apartment. It was 1993 and I had milk crates for end tables and a high-voltage line spool for a coffee table. I can still hear the A/C compressor sputter as the unit kicked on. The apartment was small and very old, but it was three blocks from the beach and I loved being able to walk or bike to the sandy shoreline. My apartment was the social center for all of my friends. We would laugh until the early morning hours, and more than once we had a noise complaint. (Hasn’t everyone at one point or another?) It was a great time in my life, but that’s my “first apartment” story. What’s yours and why did you chose apartment living?
Renting an Apartment (& Learning Life Lessons) as a College Student
Many people become apartment dwellers for the first time during their college years. From dorms to quads to off-campus living, the apartment living stories that college students have are as varied as the colleges they attend. During the university years, the most valuable lessons are often not the ones that are learned in the classroom. Residents of student housing learn how to get along with roommates, manage their time, do their laundry, balance work and play, and fend for themselves (for the most part) in society. They learn the lessons they’ll need in order to have a place they’ll one day call their own.
Renting an Apartment for Financial Benefits
Others make the leap to apartment living for financial reasons. Mortgage payments often eat up too much of a paycheck to be considered “affordable,” especially early on in a career. Down payments and unexpected fees for things like repairs and HOA dues are often so cumbersome that they don’t allow for any quality-of-life expenditures. Remember when you could afford to eat out almost every weekend? Thankfully, there’s an apartment for nearly any budget. When financial burdens become less restrictive, there’s opportunity to move to a better apartment and increase your quality of apartment life.
Renting an Apartment for Flexibility & Freedom
Life changes also bring people to enjoy their first apartment experience. The flexibility apartment living offers can give new couples the financial freedom to move in together and still have enough space (and paycheck left over for dates!). The freedom of apartment life allows families to expand as new members are born, adopted, or moving back home.
And while it’s sad to say, not all relationships last. We’ve all experienced a little heartbreak in our lives, and thankfully, apartments are an affordable way to ease that heartbreak and separation.
Finding Your First Apartment
There are hundreds – if not thousands—of reasons people make the decision to find their first apartment. Within its walls, people pursue their dreams, improve themselves, and continue to push towards the future. What is the story of your first apartment and how did the experiences you have there change your life?
Whether you’re looking for your first apartment or your fifth apartment, the team at www.apartmentsearch.com is here to help. Our free online tools help you to find the apartment that’s right for you and we even reward you for doing so. In fact, ApartmentSearch is the only national apartment locating service that pays you for using its services. When the time comes for you to move in, make sure to let your apartment community know that you found them using www.apartmentsearch.com and you could end up with an extra $200 in your pocket.
