Apartment opening in nearby Porter Square (x-post)

[rigel.livejournal.com]

Cross-posted to many Boston and Camberville groups, as well as my personal LJ.

Singularity, our amazing Porter Square apartment, is looking for one more friendly, responsible, geeky housemate to fill out the apartment as of 9/1/2009! Do those terms fit you or someone you know? If so, please contact us!



The Apartment
As mentioned, Singularity is a gorgeous second floor apartment in the heart of Porter Square. We've lived here in some configuration or another for something like seven years now, and have an excellent relationship with the landlord. Presently, the rent in the rooms opening up ranges from high 600s to mid 700s a month.

More about the apartment . . .

• Location - The house is on a quiet tree-lined street off of Elm Street, the main thoroughfare between Porter and Davis Square. The walk from here to Porter is a bit over five minutes.
• Space and Amenities - We have a nice-sized living room and dining room, a big kitchen with modern amenities including a fairly new stove and a dishwasher, and a free washer and dryer in the basement. We also have two porches in good repair that have served us well in social situations.
• Furnishings - Most of the common rooms will be pre-furnished with our things, but we'd love additions to the place! Come see; it's pretty swank.
• Landlord - The landlord only owns this property. He's kind, respectful, attentive, timely and cares a lot about his tenants; he's offered us a lower rent (the price listed is the lower price) than he would offer to new people, and he's had us over for dinner a few times in the seven years we've lived here.
• Geekery - The apartment would come with everything we own, including a full entertainment system (with Playstation III, XBox 360 with Rock Band 2, and Wii), a laser printer and tons of board / card games, and wired and wireless Internet options.
• Misc. - No pets. No smoking, even on the porches; you'll be asked to do it on the curb.

The Tenants
We're all young professionals (a coder, and an admin for a video game company) or graduate students (in library science). We all enjoy the arts (acting, writing), cooking, recreational gaming (board / card games and so on) and general puttering around on the Internet. We also have individual interests: Beobai likes cooking, rigel is (temporarily) part of a work a capella group, and so on.


You!
We're looking for someone who . . .

• Pays rent and other bills on time, and takes responsibility for managing the cost breakdown of one utility in the house.
• Keeps the apartment clean. We're not obsessive about it, but we like to think of our place as a home as much as possible, and that includes keeping it tidy. Feel free to check our posted chores list for more information.
• Is open-minded! There's a reasonable amount of bi/gay and/or poly within our housemate set, and we prefer to live with people who are comfortable with that.
• Is communicative. We try to address any house concerns in a forthright, tactful manner that respects everyone's perspectives, and we expect the same behavior from our housemates.
• Preferably, is geeky and somewhat social. If you prefer to keep to yourself or aren't into what we're into, that's totally fine. But we welcome those who indulge in our hobbies and would enjoy our occasional get-togethers.

So, that's us. If this sounds like your cup of tea, please feel free to reply to us here or ask us for an e-mail address at which to contact us. Thanks for reading, and we look forward to hearing from you!

Comments

[diatomacearth.livejournal.com]

I think it's considered discriminatory to specify "no children" in a housing ad.

Really?

[nvidia99999.livejournal.com]

Looks like you'd prefer for people with children to waste their time and go check it out, so they can be turned down anyway. Nice logic.

Re: Really?

[diatomacearth.livejournal.com]

Ooooooh, you've cracked my secret code! Curses!

Re: Really?

[rigel.livejournal.com]

Hey. Since this seems to be of interest, I've added a post to the community to talk about the issue. Would you mind taking the discussion there? I just don't want folks to see the number of comments and think I've a lot of interest in the apartment already when it's about this.

Sorry for the trouble, and thanks!

[rigel.livejournal.com]

On the practical end, we simply don't have a child-friendly house. Our outlets aren't protected, for one, and we'd have to do a lot of shuffling around (and probably asking permission of the landlord) to make the house child-friendly.

On the more esoteric end . . . I'm not the landlord. I'm a tenant indicating an opening in an apartment. I'm pretty sure the Massachusetts Fair Housing statute (http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=ocamodulechunk&L=4&L0=Home&L1=Licensee&L2=Division+of+Professional+Licensure+Boards&L3=Board+of+Registration+of+Real+Estate+Brokers+%26+Salespersons&sid=Eoca&b=terminalcontent&f=dpl_boards_re_conted_re19rc01_fairhousing&csid=Eoca) specifically applies to the person renting/leasing the apartment, which I'm not. I'm also speaking to a strong preference rather than a requirement.

That said, I've edited the wording to indicate it's a preference.

[diatomacearth.livejournal.com]

Not sure about the specifics of it. Whether the house is child-friendly or not, though, I'd be careful about wording that--same as I'd be careful with phrasing when indicating that a house is not well-equipped for people with disabilities.

[turil.livejournal.com]

Why don't you want to make your house child friendly?

[talonvaki.livejournal.com]

I love how it's perfectly okay to say "no pets," but say "no children" and it's OMG notify the authorities! time.

Kids will do more damage to an apartment/home/residence than any animal could ever hope to.

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Children and their parents, OTOH, are recognized as people, unlike cats, dogs, birds, fish, etc.

Adults can do more damage to an apartment than kids can.

[diatomacearth.livejournal.com]

Children, contrary to the belief of many hardcore childfree people, are actual human beings with rights. My stating that it's discriminatory isn't my personal agenda--it's an issue of actual law.

[whaler.livejournal.com]

This isn't really a housing ad so much as people looking for a roomate though.

[rigel.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

[sonofabish.livejournal.com]

Being a new stepdad and all, I have to say that this is a far different situation. This is a roommate situation and I'm assuming only 1 room is available, so IMHO separate guidelines are at work here than if one were to be looking at an apartment and they said 'no kids'.

Which I kinda had happen. I scoped out a place and walked through with the landlord, things were going ok, and then when I mentioned I had a kid, well.... suddenly things didn't seem to be so ok, and after, he wouldn't even return my calls. If I had the time and inclination, I would have gone after his ass, but I have bigger fish to fry at this time.

Which is a long-ass way of saying we're comparing apples and hand grenades here. My feeling is no harm, no foul, play on.

[rigel.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I'm hoping the conversation will die down now (since I've made a place for it nearby).

[sonofabish.livejournal.com]

Bwahahahaha. Not only is this the internet, this is Davis Square. (http://community.livejournal.com/davis_square/) Nothing ever dies down here. And even if it does, well, someone could ask about the parking, can you hear airplanes, and how close is it to a burrito joint?

Openminded?

[turil.livejournal.com]

I'm very openminded about kids, about chores, about paying rent, about communication...

You, however, don't sound so openminded. Except about people having plenty of sex.

Re: Openminded?

[rigel.livejournal.com]

I understand and appreciate that you have strong opinions on children, and others' willingness/desire to live alongside or with them. I'm sorry if our choice not to live with them, as much as we enjoy their presence, offends you. At least, I'm gathering it does, given the phrasing of the question, "Why don't you want to make your house child friendly?" (We simply said we didn't have a child-friendly home, making no comments as to whether we'd change that. It's simply not our home to make alterations to.)

That said, I'd like to ask that you not bring my or my co-tenants' sex lives into this discussion, especially as an example of the one thing we're presumed to be open-minded about. It's off-topic, and seems geared towards implying misplaced priorities on our part, specifically using sex as an example. I'm not certain why, exactly, but given that the phrase "open-mindedness" was placed in our post next to our sexual orientations, I kindly request you to stop. Outside of it seeming geared to insult, it infers that something with which we identify (being gay, bi and/or poly) leads us to be interested in "people having plenty of sex."

Please stop?

Re: Openminded?

[wavilyem.livejournal.com]

Based on my personal experience, it seems only reasonable to infer misplaced priorities on the the part of poly individuals. But I suppose that statement is off-topic for a post involving a living situation such as yours and I too should stop posting.

Moderator note

[ron_newman]

I don't consider this type of personal insult to be acceptable behavior here on davis_square. Please refrain.

Re: Moderator note

[turil.livejournal.com]

You consider that a personal insult? Honestly? My very polite opinion here about someone not appearing to be openminded is something you really want to censor?

Re: Openminded?

[juldea.livejournal.com]

If she has that much sex, I think it's quite a good thing she doesn't like kids! Who knows what crazy, pansexual, whose-body-part-is-this orgies the kid might get sucked into?

Re: Openminded?

[cos]

Your attempt to derail the post seems to have succeeded. Your comment here is a good example of why some people we'd love to have on this community stay away from it.

[intuition-ist.livejournal.com]

foo... if you had 2 spots available, i would've been interested.

[rigel.livejournal.com]

Aw, sorry. We did originally, but one filled up. If that situation changes and you're still available, keep us in mind!

[freetobeme18.livejournal.com]

Hey Rigel! Sorry you still haven't found anyone. I read your post awhile ago, and considered it (I am in fact vaguely looking for a housing situation for the fall), however it is unfortunately out of my price range (budget cap = $550 for rent.) Best of luck, though! I'll try to spread the word! ^_^