Finding an Apartment

As nice and accommodating as my in-laws are (no, that's not a joke, they really are), it can be a bit much living in someone else's apartment, especially with a jet lagged baby. I set a goal for us to find an apartment within a week, knowing this was slightly unrealistic. We started off on Sunday looking in Rechavia. The apartment we looked at was beautiful and recently renovated, but it was expensive and on the outskirts of town in a kind of sketchy neighborhood. Most of the apartments I found were in the same neighborhood, so we decided to look elsewhere, but didn't cross them off the list yet. We really wanted to be responsible and find as affordable of an apartment as possible, so we went the next day to Ramat Eshkol. The first apartment we looked at made the Telshe dorms that I used to live in look like the Waldorf Astoria. I was willing to keep looking, but the more we walked through the streets, the more we realized that we didn't feel like we belonged there. 

We lived in Lakewood for 6 months when we first got married and even there we felt out of place. I'm sure there are other neighborhoods there that would be better for us, but I wouldn't even feel comfortable in the general vicinity. Aside from the issue of feeling like I don't belong there, I was not comfortable from a safety aspect. 

We started our search over, focusing on Sha'arei Chesed, but didn't find anything even remotely close to our budget. While we were looking we noticed a listing that was nowhere near the areas we considered, but looked amazing. The good part about it is that it's a 5 minute walk from my in-laws, so free babysitting! It's also in a beautiful, safe neighborhood with incredible views and closer to my yeshiva than the other places we were looking. On the downside, it's in a mostly French neighborhood and it would be hard to make friends there. We decided to take the apartment anyway, because my wife already has friends not too far away and if I make any new friends it will probably be in yeshiva. Turns out our next door neighbors are American and there are other Americans in the complex, so maybe that'll work out for the best. If not, at least my French and Ivrit will get the chance to improve. BH, we got an amazing deal and the landlord is my new BFF. I'm not sure if I mentioned the incredible views, the pictures don't do it justice, come visit us and see in person! Here's a live webcam from our mirpeset (balcony) that will probably not stay up for very long. 

View out our living room window

Park for the baby