Leasing advice (Boston: sublet, apartment complex, leasing agent)

[jamesia]

I'm making the move to Boston from Texas in December, woohoo!

However, I'm now in the process of leasing, and I'd appreciate some advice. The lease is for a room in a shared apartment of a current Boston resident, which I found online. I'm to send my name, address, move in date, and date of birth, which will be used to draft a contract with a lawyer. The contract will be sent to me, which I'd read, sign and return with the security deposit. Then the space would be held for me when I arrive, at which time I'm to pay the first month's rent.

I'm not sure what the best way is to proceed from here. Does anyone have experience with this kind of thing? It's a lot of money to send to someone I've never met...

[Kouraj]

some advice from a leasing agent in the Boston area:

Don't send money to someone you haven't personally met, and don't put money down on an apartment that you have not seen with your own eyes. Its way to risky otherwise. I have since hundreds of apartments in my time as a leasing agent and many can be really scary. Mainly because bad property management, or downright filthy tenants. pictures are deceiving.

I do recommend:

1) do you have someone that you can crash with for a few days?
2) set up as many appointments as you can for the first 2 days that you arrive and from those places make a decision. There are only so many apartments available at any given time on the market. try to see everyone.
3.) very important to meet the person(s) that you plan on living with. Some people will give you nightmares Most importantly, you want someone who carries themselves similar to yourself. If your neat and the other person hasn't cleaned a day in their lives, they have misc people coming in and out the apartment at all times or worse living in the apartment free of charge, and mostly inconsiderate. these things are hard to tell from meeting someone, but meeting them and seeing how they live will help.

good luck and enjoy this great city!

[eevee]

Originally Posted by Kouraj

some advice from a leasing agent in the Boston area:

Don't send money to someone you haven't personally met, and don't put money down on an apartment that you have not seen with your own eyes. Its way to risky otherwise. I have since hundreds of apartments in my time as a leasing agent and many can be really scary. Mainly because bad property management, or downright filthy tenants. pictures are deceiving.

I do recommend:

1) do you have someone that you can crash with for a few days?
2) set up as many appointments as you can for the first 2 days that you arrive and from those places make a decision. There are only so many apartments available at any given time on the market. try to see everyone.
3.) very important to meet the person(s) that you plan on living with. Some people will give you nightmares Most importantly, you want someone who carries themselves similar to yourself. If your neat and the other person hasn't cleaned a day in their lives, they have misc people coming in and out the apartment at all times or worse living in the apartment free of charge, and mostly inconsiderate. these things are hard to tell from meeting someone, but meeting them and seeing how they live will help.

good luck and enjoy this great city!

100% agree w/ the above. what you, jamesia, are proposing sounds like a SCAM. I would never send money to a person I've never met. and, as someone who has searched for roommates, I would NEVER consider one I've never met! if you do this, you're going to come to Boston and found out neither the apartment, lawyer, or "roommate" existed and that it was just a ploy to steal your money and possibly even your identity (if you include important info on that contract such as SSN# and date of birth)

you're either going to have to set up a lease w/ a well known apartment complex that can do short term leases from out of state, or, most recommended, take a trip to Boston to find an apartment and roommate. I know it's expensive (I just moved from Boston to Chicago and had to take a trip out there just to look for housing. I stayed at a local hostel, which made it a bit cheaper though), but it's better than being scammed.

you really need to make a trip out there and look for a roommate and room in person. you can get a room in a hostel for cheap if you can't crash w/ anyone in the city. honestly, the clock is ticking for you if you want to move in by December, and you may not be able to snag cheap airfares, especially w/ Thanksgiving coming up. I assume you know what area you want to live in, but you need to check out that area yourself to make sure you're going to like it and feel safe there. you'll have to go on CL and come up w/ a huge list of potential rooms for rent in that area (given your time restraints, you may want to expand your search area and consider other areas, w/in reason). this is going to be tough, not only b/c you're looking for a 12/1 rental (and it's already 11/2) and there aren't that many rentals out there (at least not as much in Sept), but b/c it takes so much time to find a suitable room, and some people don't like renting out to out-of-staters. lucky for you, Boston is small, and if you stick to close neighborhoods, you should be able to come up with a good game plan and see 1 room or more per hour. plan on spending at least 2 days looking, and check out backup options like complexes w/ short term rental options where you can hopefully afford a studio, or even the Y which may still offer short term housing (though there may be an application and wait list). as a last resort, hostels may late you stay up to a month or so in some cases (you'll have to check out storage units and rent one if you're bringing a lot of stuff w/ you)

if you really want to proceed w/ the offer you have (again, NOT RECOMMENDED!! it just sounds too much like a scam, especially if you found it through Craigslist or other similar site), here are some things to look out for:

-make 100% sure the address your sending your stuff off to is a legit address, not a PO box or a box from a company like Mailbox ETC or The UPS Store (and part of the benefit of the latter two is that the address for their boxes look like regular addresses. people can even request a lower number box to give the impression it's located in a small apartment building, or use the word "apt" or "suite" in the return address. I know, I did it all the time when I had a box w/ MBETC!).

-contact the landlord yourself, and preferably, send your stuff to the landlord (again, check to make sure he and the address exists. you may want to stick to a LL that manages several apartments and can provide some type of official letter head stating who he is)

-contact the lawyer and make sure he exists (call up whatever law firm he works at personally)

-don't give out very important info on the contract. don't give out your SSN#. if they claim they need it to run a credit check, offer to do it yourself and send in the results (may or may not work even if they're legit)

-ask for LOTS and LOTS of pictures. pictures won't guarantee the place is legit of course, but perhaps you can ask for specific pictures (for example, ask for a picture to be taken w/ today's Metro in the frame). anyone willing to rent to someone from out of state sight unseen should be willing to do this to verify the place is legit

-I have no clue what payment method you could use to avoid the risk of scam, but you'd be better off getting a MO and keeping the receipt. do not send in a check b/c if it is a scam, they will now have access to your routing and checking account number and can charge items to your account

again, to reiterate, I suggest not going with this plan, it just sounds way too much like a scam, and if you found it on CL, it probably is.

[kharing]

I agree with the others. The fact that a "lawyer" is involved makes it sound like a big scam. Why not sublet an apartment for a month or so - that way you can get a feel for the neighborhoods and then sign a lease.