Apartment Hunting in Rittenhouse

So this past week I began the process of looking for a new apartment.  This will be the sixth apartment I've had since graduating college.  Basically, other than spending my second and third year of medical school in the same apartment, I haven't lived in the same place for more than 12 months since leaving for college in 2002.  Now, many of these moves have not been because I disliked the apartment I was living in (in fact, the only apartment I disliked was the one I lived in during my first year of medical school, and that had more to do with its location than the apartment itself).  Take my current situation, for example, I love my apartment, but my girlfriend and I decided to move in together, so we have to find a new place.

We're looking for either a June 15 or July 1 start date, which makes this a little bit early to start looking since most Philly apartments are on 60 day lease termination notifications, but it never hurts to get a feel for the market.  We've decided we want to stay in our current neighborhood (Rittenhouse Square/Fitler Square area), so that narrows things down.  We've discussed our priorities for our new place (I want an outdoor space like a deck or patio, and she wants a tub and washer dryer in unit.  We both would like a modern kitchen, especially a dishwasher.  If possible, I'd love a place with a fireplace, but that's negotiable).  We'd prefer to be in a brownstone or house not a large apartment complex

The Philly apartment market is an interesting thing, even within the same neighborhood, there is tremendous variation in the different apartments.  We're looking at two bedroom places, because last time when I was looking for my current place, some of the 2BR places I saw in my price range were actually more suited for couples looking to use the second "bedroom" as an office or nursery.  In many of these places the second bedroom was tiny, but the living space was great and the master bedrooms were great.  At the time, I was moving in with a roommate, so these types of places were less than ideal.  Now, they'd be perfect.  We'd like the extra space since we've both lived separately so have accumulated a lot of stuff, and figured that as we learned to live together, it wouldn't be a bad thing to have a little extra room so we aren't right on top of each other all the time.  A lot of these places are marketed as 2BR places, but in reality they're 1 BR places.  At the same time, there's also a ton of places that are legitimately 2BR places also in the same price range.  The Philly apartment market is much cheaper than New York, and even Boston and DC.  You also get a ton more for it.  My current place is a bi-level 2BR 2 full bathroom (with tub), we also have a private roof deck and a large kitchen in an awesome neighborhood. 

We've seen a few places so far, all have been nice (some too nice, in fact, putting them slightly out of our price range), and have a bunch more scheduled.  We've mostly been finding them on craigslist, but have also contacted a few realtors as well.  Hopefully we'll find a nice new place to call home.

A Fischer Family Passover

This past week/weekend my family came to town to celebrate Passover.  My mother came in last Tuesday to do most of the cooking in my kitchen and the rest of my family came in on Friday for the two Seders. 

After picking my mom up at the airport, we drove back to my apartment to take inventory of the kitchen (and for her to determine what we'd need to pick up the following morning at Wegmans).  After that, I had to head back to school for class, after which we, along with my girlfriend, finally made it to Amada.  The food was delicious. 

The next morning, my mother and I went to Wegmans to shop for the passover Seders.  She was incredibly impressed that we were actually able to get everything she needed to prepare for the Seders.  After getting back home and putting everything away, my mom began her epic three day quest to prepare the Seder.  That night we, along with two of my friends went to Zahav, an Israeli restaurant down in Old City, which is one of my favorite restaurants in the city.  We did their Tayim (their tasting menu), and everything was delicious.  On Thursday, I turned in my masters paper (wahoo!!) and we went to Zama for dinner.  It lived up to our billing as the best sushi restaurant in the city. 

On Friday my grandpa, dad and brother came in and we had our family Seder.  It was really great having everybody (minus my sister, who was missed) there.  My mom's food turned out great and we had a great time. 

Saturday morning my brother's girlfriend, Jamie arrived. The two of them, Lindy, me, my Dad and my grandpa and I went down to Independence Hall and walked around.  My grandpa is a big history buff and loved it 

We then got frozen yogurt at Sweet Endings and ate it in Rittenhouse Square since it was a beautiful spring day. 

The second Seder was just as good as the first (my mom made brisket, which is my favorite).  It was great getting to spend time with the family.  They all left today, but to paraphrase, next year in Philadelphia...