Guest Blog: Apartment hunting in Tel Aviv

Shelter being one of the most basic necessities of human survival, picking the right apartment in Tel Aviv is crucial.  Location, roommates, air conditioning and arnona (municipal tax) are all critical factors in the decision making process.

I heeded the advice of some of my Israeli friends and logged onto Homeless.co.il and Yad 2.  It seemed an easy enough task: choose a darling apartment from the hundreds of listings. What no one told me is the speed at which darling apartments are snatched up. To meet friends for a one-hour coffee break is to have missed out on eight apartments being posted and rented.

But I managed to compile a list of prospective homes.  I roamed the streets of Tel Aviv from the port to Florentine, seaside to city center. The cheap ones always came with an insurmountable flaw; no fridge, no windows, no door. And the expensive ones always came with a catch; no smoking, no friends, no fun. 

I encountered some of Tel Aviv's most colourful citizens. There was the performance artist whose room was wallpapered in Britney Spears posters. And the goth girl who painted spiders on every piece of furniture.  The stoners who couldn't remember making an appointment for me to see the apartment.  And the young lawyer whose fridge and cupboard were completely filled with different varieties of honey.

I rode up elevators that could only accommodate delicately-boned children. And I walked down crumbling stairwells advertised as having that "original Bauhaus charm."

The process was not only physically demanding (the walking, the walking back, the climbing), but egotistically draining. It is a job interview that not only takes into account your work history, but your age, physical appearance and propensity to party. You must plaster a smile on your face from the moment the door is knocked until it is shut behind you. I quickly analyzed every question posed to me and tailored the answer according to the inquisitor standing before me. If the apartment had ashtrays, I smoked and if not, I didn't. If the shelves held alcohol, I drank and if not, I didn't.  I had to carefully consider how to answer regarding employment, immigration and marital status. One wrong answer and I could be given the pity pad of paper to write my number on, among the other undesirables.

But the very worst was the double-booked apartment viewings or open houses; cramped Tel Aviv apartments full of competitors vying for the love of roommates and the lease. It's survival of the fittest, having to strike a fine balance between appearing nice to the current renters and dissipating the tension between myself and perspective renters. The first few times I was put in that situation, I chattered away nervously about my cleanliness, my quietness, my ability to stay out of the house all day. Undoubtedly I got handed the pity pad as I didn't get any calls back.

After several stand-offs with checkbooks blazing, I learned to smile and keep my mouth shut.  I let the more novice apartment seekers put their foots in their mouths, leaving me to swoop in with a witty comment and a measuring tape to see where my bed would go.

Eventually, after two weeks of viewing twenty-seven apartments across the greater Tel Aviv area, I found a renovated place complete with two bathrooms, laundry and air conditioning on a quiet street near Kikar Rabin.  The roommates were nice, the floors were swept and there was a lease on hand for me to sign.

A week into my one-year lease, everything is looking good.  But it means only fifty-one more weeks until I have to do it all over again.