Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Finding a new apartment

We decided a while back that if we are to stay in Kuwait for a while longer we needed to change things up a bit. This meant basically finding a new apartment. We've been living in Mangaf at the lovely Warba Beach Resort (not really a resort), but it's gotten a bit old, the area that is. Anything of interest is further down town, so we thought we might find a place in Salwa to be nearer all the stuff. It would mean about 15 minutes longer of a drive for me, but hey, no big deal.

Anyway we spent several weekends driving around Salwa looking for "for rent" signs, but came up with nothing. There was one apartment complex but it reminded us too much of the same situation we had in Warba and we didn't want to repeat it. Also, we couldn't find anything for cheaper rent than we are already paying (500 KD) and we felt we really wanted to save some money especially as we are now renting a car. Since we couldn't find what we wanted in Salwa, we decided it would be good enough to find a place in Mahboula which has tons of apartments and is a little closer to town.

We found some good candidates online at Justlanded.com and called the agents. We made arrangements for a couple of viewings the next day and were very pleased to locate a two bedroom unfurnished apartment for only 260 KD. In addition it did not require a deposit and there was no penalty for breaking the lease. This is quite unusual in general in Kuwait. We put our money down and were told the contract would be drawn up the next day. BTW, the usual fee for an agent is half one month's rent.

Unfortunately due to some other news we decided we had made a mistake the next day. We are still attempting to get our money back, but I'm told Kuwaiti law is on the side of the landlord in this type of matter. If we get our money back it will be a surprise.

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