10 Questions You Should Ask When Moving to a New Place
This past week I went through my nearly annual process of moving apartments. I love my new home but am thoroughly exhausted from the effort. Let’s face it, finding the perfect place is no easy task. When you do find a place that calls your name it’s important to know exactly what you’re getting yourself into.
Over the years of moving I’ve begun to curate a list of the important things to consider when making a move. Read on for 10 of the most important questions I’d recommend you ask before signing a new lease.
After 9 years in Los Angeles, Catherine reflects on her decision to move to San Francisco
PHOTO: Tara Freese.
I moved to Los Angeles in 2005, fresh out of high school and ready to tackle my first taste of freedom. The rivalry between the Bay and L.A. was palpable among my friends at LMU, and shortly after starting my freshmen year, I was already homesick for San Francisco. Every opportunity I had to fly home for an extended weekend, I took. Then after opening my eyes to the world and studying abroad in Florence, my perspective changed. My senior year I embraced the limited amount of time I had left in college, took an off-campus internship, and really started to explore the city I had lived in for three years beyond the neighborhood around LMU.
Though I started to find my groove—particularly once I was working full-time at a magazine and working events in glamorous Beverly Hills and exciting West Hollywood—it wasn’t until a couple years after college that I finally admitted to all my Bay Area friends that I loved L.A. I even started to feel a sense of pride in the city (though I will never ever support the Dodgers), especially when people told me how much they hated it.
Many people decide to start fresh after college by moving to a new city; I was not one of those people, though I did face the obstacle of making new friends after my college friends slowly but surely left the area. The last time I really felt like I started a new chapter in my life was when I originally left home. Serendipitously, while cleaning out my place, I found the video from my cotillion and watched it with my parents. My 18-year-old self gave a speech about leaving for college, moving to L.A., and what I’d learned up to that point in life. It was so fascinating to look back at the girl I was before I started this L.A. adventure… and to feel the difference in what I went through then versus what I’m going through now.
Back then I had so much direction and focus: I knew my purpose in moving, I knew what I would study in college, I knew what I wanted to do after (though at that point I thought I would be a high school English teacher first). Now I’m leaving L.A. with more life experience and a better sense of who I have become, though what the future holds may still be hazy (or should I say foggy).
There are times the worst case scenario pops into your head. “Wouldn’t it suck if it rained on our picnic?” And then it does. This week I put my computer to sleep for an hour, and it never woke up the same. Just earlier that day I was thinking about how much a crash would jeopardize my work. And when it happened I was in disbelief over the coincidence. A computer crash is the most feared catastrophe for someone who is self-employed and relies on their beloved laptop for nearly everything.
My first thoughts were of the supposed devastation. My next were of a tinge of relief: in light of my move from Los Angeles to San Francisco, maybe I have a chance at starting fresh. Completely.
Emily Woods Gives Us Her View from the Hill on Life in our Nation’s Capital
If you’ve ever watched House of Cards (and let’s be serious, who hasn’t??) then you’ve probably wondered what life is actually like on Capital Hill. Is it all a carefully crafted political chess game like Frank Underwood implies? The Netflix show certainly had us wondering. To get the insider’s scoop I turned to my college girl friend Emily Woods who has lived Washington D.C. since July 2012. This go-getter moved to the city after graduating from the University of Cincinnati with her Masters in Architecture and an MBA (that’s right, this super sista doubled teamed her grad degrees!). Ever since she’s been rocking out life on the east coast as an architect at one of the country’s leading hospitality design firms. I sat down with her to find out what it’s like to be a Single Girl in the city, if politics really ruled all, and what the perfect day looks like in our nation’s capital. Secret- politics may play a crucial role in the conversation but a great glass of wine doesn’t fall far behind : ) Read on to find out more from this D.C-er! (more…)
How Moving to L.A. Literally & Figuratively Changed My View on Life
Single Girls if you caught our post Favorite Sites for Life Advice then you already know I am a huge fan of the ladies over at Quarterlette. These rockin’ women exemplify what it means to us to be a Single Girl and we couldn’t agree more with their site’s mission to “support, guide & inspire women through their quarter-lives.” I’m excited to announce that today’s post is actually featured on Quarterlette as part of their series The Moving Diaries. The series was inspired by the idea that behind every move there is always a story – an end, a new beginning, a challenge, whatever it may be moves always signal change. This was certainly the case for me when I decided to move to Los Angeles in 2011. The story behind my move was the need for a fresh perspective on life. Yes, the official reason I moved was because of a job offer but the real reason, the reason that had truly compelled me to pack my bags reached far deeper. I’d grown tired of my life in my hometown and needed to do something drastic to shake it up.
Head on over toQuarterlette to catch the full article!
