Love is sweet

What is it about real estate transactions that makes me feel so alive? Maybe that it feels like falling in love, so replete with possibility. Buying or renting, it makes no difference. To me, it’s an opportunity to start over, to try something new, to wake up every morning to a different way of life.

This all sounds like a very hopeful beginning but I assure you, the apartment search in Paris didn’t begin that way. This story started where so many good ones do – on the internet. I’d scanned hundreds of listings and had identified a handful I wanted to see, those that fell both within the boundaries of my desired neighborhood (the Marais) and within my budget (the ultimate deciding factor in such a sought-after neighborhood). For those of you who don’t know the Marais, it’s charming little neighborhood contained from the hustle and bustle of so much of Paris. Victor Hugh, ironically, wrote Les Miserables while living in a large apartment overlooking the Place des Vosges, a picture perfect park, in the center of the Marais, bordered on all sides by identical, belle époque buildings. Today, the Marais is known for 2 things: gays and Orthodox Jews. I love that these two populations have chosen to share a neighborhood that consists of roughly four square blocks. Rainbow flags and Stars of David as far as the eye can see. But I digress . . .

I sent inquiries to the agents representing these properties and the phone started ringing off the hook. They wanted my business. Well, sort of. The first agent told me he couldn’t help me because with such a budget it really didn’t make sense to rent – I should buy. When I explained that my company would be paying the rent and really had no need for residential property in Paris, he agreed, begrudgingly, to help me. I haven’t heard from him since. The next agent said he would show me his apartment but if I didn’t end up signing the lease, for any reason, I would pay him 50 Euros for his trouble. For the first time in my adult life I wished I knew how to swear in French. There was the agent who clearly explained that I was to meet him in front of a property at 13:30 (1:30pm) then left me a voicemail at 1:15 to tell me he’d grown tired of waiting for me to show up and was throwing in the towel.

There was the agent who’d gushed about how perfect his apartment was for me – a 2 bedroom in the Marais, completely remodeled, within my price range, and available for the 6 month lease I sought. I’ve said it before but it bears repeating – if something seems too good to be true, it is. Without exception. Still, I went. I can’t say why. It was almost the worst apartment I’ve ever seen, a close second to the subterranean place I saw in New York when I moved there so many years ago. The only thing that made that NY apartment worse was the patio that was directly below a street grate. I imagined sitting there with a glass of wine, enjoying the evening as passers by dropped cigarette butts on me. Again, I digress . . . This was a corner unit, he’d made a big point of this on the phone. It was at the intersection of two alleys. Picture Chinatown alleys – chipping paint, constant streams of unidentifiable liquid pooling into puddles, laundry hung out windows to dry. Two bedrooms, yes - that I can’t deny. I tried to remember how I’d described to this man what I was looking for and how he might have misinterpreted that to mean this. Dark, dirty, noisy, chaotic, wretched – I don’t recall having used any of those words, in English or French, so I chalked it up to his mistake.

Then there was the last agent. I arrived at the place with low expectations. I’d been through the ringer. I overlooked the fact that he was twenty minutes late and made no apologies. After all, this street was perfect, exactly where I wanted to be. Two blocks from the Place des Vosges, walking distance to the action but a few blocks removed. Quiet, insulated, but close enough. The building stands behind a gate and a courtyard. It has an elevator. The unit has six huge windows, six or seven feet tall, and dramatic striped curtains framing each. The bathroom has been remodeled with a pedestal sink and wall to wall glass subway tile. It has more closets than I could possibly fill; new appliances and streamlined cabinetry in the kitchen. And above it, it just feels right. On the logical side, it’s all wrong. There is only a partial wall between the living room and bedroom, which will make hosting overnight guests more intimate than I’d anticipated. There is no second bedroom, something I had really hoped to find. There is no bonafide dining area – just a tall bar table and stools in the “kitchen,” which is really part of the living room. But I just felt good in there. It felt like home. In love and real estate you have to trust your instincts. Your head doesn’t know how to make you happy, it only knows how to make you rational, and rationality is too often at odds with happiness.

I took an application and will drop it off tomorrow. If they approve me, this will be my new home, at least for 6 months or so. The adventure is becoming real and I couldn't be happier.