The great apartment hunt begins.....

I've sent out appeals to several Almaty contacts to see if they can assist with my current trans-hemispheric apartment hunt. You see, I had the option of living with a host family for the five months of my stay, but in the end I decided that even though it might be nice to have the extra language practice, social company, and personal security that a local family setting provides, I just really prefer not having to share a tiny apartment and/or live by someone else's house rules! I guess my clearly American feelings about personal space are a tad obvious....

Anyway, I'm hearing varying reports from the ground in the City of Apples. An Almaty acquaintance described the current rental market as "expensive," and that a furnished, studio apartment ("one-room" or odnokomnatnaya in local lingo) would cost at least $500 per month. This is not too bad. One American friend who just came back from Almaty in November reported that she was able to rent a nice studio for $600/month, utilities included. This is a decent rate, considering how real estate is kind of skyrocketing over there. This friend was smart too, because she rented from local Kazakh friends (actually her former host family), which pretty much guaranteed that she would get a fair price. When I lived there in 2006, I paid $600 per month PLUS utilities for a really nice, centrally located studio - and after a few months I was able to talk the landlady down to $500 plus utilities. The back story on that deal, though, was that a local friend helped to secure the place by contacting a realtor, then making a pseudo-shady arrangement with the guy to lower the initially advertised price (esentially blocking the realty company out altogether and going under the table with the realtor himself). This just goes to show that (and this will likely be a recurring theme) it's ALL about who you know. Hence the reason why my first plan of attack in the apartment hunt is to beg my local friends to keep their eyes and ears open -- hopefully it will pay off!