As of this morning I officially live in two places at once... yup, signed a lease for a place in Menlo Park, going the double-rent route for various reasons. That is, we're staying in the Santa Cruz house until the end of August, but we'll be slowly moving over the hill during that time (and Sam will make use of the lab over there, but mostly I just care about having lots of time to organize and decorate...). Meaning this will be a VERY expensive month for us, but I think it's well worth it.
The house is AWESOME. I'll post pictures as soon as I can take them (Monday) because I'm just too excited. It's a 1930's-era duplex a block away from downtown Menlo Park and is by far the cutest, most liveable place we've seen since we started looking. Let me recap...
A month ago, we thought the best possible place for us was a $2000/month converted poolhouse literally across the creek from campus. Despite the fact that it was a one-room studio with less than 600 square feet of space and two walls entirely made of windows, which look into the backyard of the main house. Oh, and it didn't have an oven. We were stoked about it but before I even had a chance to see it in person, someone else made the cut. Our first experience with the competitiveness of the market.
Shortly after that, when I was actually back in Santa Cruz and visiting places together was a possibility, we really went for it. Then the #1 place was the 500 sq. foot studio (which actually had a wall between the kitchen and bedroom, a feature we found quite refreshing) with a decent side yard, a garage (!!!) and a really weird green concrete front 'yard.' We were, again, stoked, but the guy was on vacation and we still have never heard back from him (meaning someone else got it and he didn't bother to tell us). That place was $1500/month, a total steal for Menlo Park pricing. The same day, we saw a remarkably bright and cute apartment in a good Palo Alto neighborhood for $2000/month, but despite being told that we were 'top of the list,' we lost out to someone else. Probably someone who actually has a credit score (I don't).
Despite the disappointment of not actually getting any of those places, we felt pretty good about our options after seeing them. Then for some reason we had a string of pretty shitty spots. The bottom of the barrel was the $1350/month top-floor unit in a duplex behind a small house, in northern Menlo Park. The yard between the two buildings had some discarded kitchen appliances for decoration, there were some really funky jury-rigged electrical situations inside, and all the power/phone/whatever cables came right to the front corner of the house - as in you could stand on the balcony/front porch and just reach out and grab them (I did not actually do this). The view from the front door, living room, kitchen, etc. was of these cables and the backs of some similarly craptastic houses.
But then... then we found the holy grail. Okay, it looks kind of dumpy from the outside, mostly because the roof looks like it was abandoned in the middle of being re-shingled, but it's surrounded by glorious plants, and the inside is all lovely, rich hardwood floors. The living room is a remarkably decent size, with a working wood fireplace; there's a charmingly tiny dining nook attached to the kitchen, which has a gas range; and there's a little alcove in one wall of the hallway which was built there to house, yup, a telephone. 'Cause that's how they do in the 1930's. Even better than that: there's a wooden bench built onto the porch, with storage under the seat for firewood; this can be accessed through a hole in the dining room wall, so during those bitterly cold Menlo Park winters (I know, I know) you don't even have to go outside to stoke your fire.
I should probably say that if Sam were writing this, he'd list his favorite features starting with the garage. That's perhaps the one thing that has been giving us major trouble in the housing search, is finding a place where we can store all those bikes without cordoning off part of the living room. Which is why it's a dream come true that we not only found, but managed to secure a place which has multiple rooms (after all those studios we were starting to think it couldn't happen for our budget) AND a garage AND a backyard. And the perk of gas cooking.
So the place is at the top of our price range, $1950/month, but the landlord pays water and a weekly gardener. We both think it's well worth the price, not only for its innate fabulousness, but for its location (literally one block from Trader Joe's and a Sunday farmer's market, not to mention the entirety of downtown MP) and the subsequent easy bike route to campus. In driving around looking at places, we quickly discovered that it's much more pleasant to get to campus from Menlo Park than just about anywhere else in the surrounding area. This is mostly because MP is south of El Camino Real and west of Page Mill/Oregon Expressway, which are the major roads that make getting to Stanford from Palo Alto kind of a pain. I'm sure locals would disagree, but keep in mind that I've been commuting by bike for 4+ years and I'm still not comfortable in heavy traffic on Santa Cruz streets. I was having heart palpitations watching people ride on El Camino.
