Finally, a New Apartment

Being sick and homeless in a foreign country truly sucks. As September came to a close, I was displaced from my humble, little abode in Palermo Hollywood. I thought finding a place would be easy and in the back of my mind, I had this fantasy of finding an amazing place for next to nothing. Afterall, I had been in Buenos Aires for a month and had, I thought, some things figured out. In my attempt to find this amazing place for next to nothing, I started visiting Inmobilarias, which are basically real estate agencies. I finally found an Inmobilaria in my neighborhood which had a couple of very nice furnished properties in the same neigborhood. One of the properties was a loft in an old, renovated brick building. There were several other lofts in the building as well, in addition to an outdoor pool and a gym. This is paradise I thought.

As I began negotiating with the Inmobilaria, I moved into a hostel. The hostel, as it turned out, was a complete dive. Sleeping was impossible with all the street noise and after a couple of hours in bed, I started feeling itchy. Was it bed bugs, or me just being paranoid? I had flashbacks of my European travels some fourteen years ago. Finally, after falling asleep, I woke up an hour later in a cold sweat and a terrible sore throat. Where did this come from? Was it the bed bugs? At 9:00am and with one hour of sleep under my belt, I checked out of the hostel seeking a more hostpitable environment for a person with the flu. Afterall, I wasn´t twenty-one anymore. Luckily, right down the street was a very nice boutique hotel, the BoBo. If I was going to die, it was going to be in high-style.

If you need a hotel in Buenos Aires, I highly recommend the BoBo. Complete with AC, cable tv, wireless internet access, and an excellent restaraunt downstairs, I dug in for what would be six, pricey nights. Each day and night was basically the same. I would wake up several times a night to change my cold-sweat drenched t-shirt and to painfully drink several glasses of water. In the early afternoon, I would go the Inmolibaria and try to negotiate a better price for my fantasy loft. Later in the day, I would search for other apartments on the internet. After six days, I moved into my new place, and it wasn´t the loft. It´s a tiny but totally acceptable apartment on the 7th floor of a building on Thames and Soler (only one block away from the BoBo). I still dream of the loft though, and oh, that pool. Ah well, at least I´m healthy, bed-bug/flu free, and have a home.

P.S. If you´re looking for a short term apartment in BA, avoid a headache and stick with a company like www.bytargentina.com, which specializes in renting to foreigners. I´m sure there´s a way to rent an apartment through local landlords, but it involves much more time and energy than I´m willing to invest at the moment. If anyone out there has successfully rented a nice apartment at a good price through a local landlord or Inmobilaria, I would like to hear from you.