Did you have a hard time finding a place to live when you moved out of your parent’s place to go to college? Or did you find a place easily enough but it did not turn out like you had expected? I, for one, know how you feel. My college housing application was lost in the mail and I did not find that out until registration in June. I suddenly found out that I had to find an apartment and a roommate so that I could afford the apartment. Luckily at Northeast, you can fill out a personality survey and they will send you a list of people who are most like you. Of course, you could find a roommate easily enough, but then towards the end of July, lose said roommate to campus housing, like me. Oh, the pitfalls of moving out of your parent’s house.
It is actually pretty easy to find a place to live in Norfolk, Nebraska. Finding a good place to live, on the other hand, is a different matter entirely. Never sign a lease without going to look at the apartment or house first. Do the windows leak? Are there mouse droppings on the floor? Does the place just look rundown? Also, make sure to ask the landlord or manager plenty of questions. How much is the rent and deposit? Is there a washer and dryer on the premises? What kind of people live in the building? How long is the lease? “The more questions you ask, the better,” my mom told me when we made an appointment with Midwest Brokerage. If you can, take one or both of your parents with you because they have more experience with that kind of thing. They will ask the kind of questions that you would not even think about.
When you are trying to find a place to live in Norfolk, you could stop at a realtors place like Dover Management, Midwest Brokerage, and Triple B Management. You can also check the classifieds in the Norfolk Daily News, search online, or even just ask your friends if they know a good place to live. My brother and his roommates are hoping to get into a place that one of their friends told them about. “We have to call back in May,” my brother told me. The place they are looking at has concrete in the walls and ceiling, has bedrooms for all three of them, and only costs $600 a month. You could also ask campus housing at Northeast Community College for a packet called “Northeast Community College Off-Campus Rentals”. It lists houses, apartments, and rooms for rent in it with the information that the landlords send in. The packet is updated 2-3 times a year so the information in it is as accurate as possible.
If you want to live on campus, though, make sure to send in your housing application as soon as possible because it is first come, first serve. And make sure that they actually receive your application since the postal service can be unreliable at times. You can get a tour of the dorms at any time and there are plenty of perks for living on campus: less money spent on gas, making new friends, and living in a friendly environment that fosters your educational growth are a few examples. “We do a good job of creating a home away from home,” Pete Rizzo, Director of Residence and Student Life, said to me, “and we have an awesome resident staff.” The phone number for student housing is 402-844-7151.
Moving away from home and finding your own place to live is never easy. It could be the homesickness, the roommate, or the place but there will probably be a problem that you did not foresee. I did not think that the girl who I signed the lease with would move out before even moving in. I did not expect her to point me in the direction of a girl in one of her classes who was looking for a place to stay. I also did not expect that my new roommate would have her boyfriend practically live with us and then did not understand why I had a problem with that. I moved out after only three months because I did not sign up for two roommates, only one of which paid for anything and even then in the least amount possible, and I was tired of being treated like I did not exist. Now, I live in a one bedroom apartment and I like it that way. So one more word to the wise, be careful who you sign a lease with.
