zerosleeps

The old theme used here on zerosleeps was getting a bit tired. I was always happy with the customisation I’d applied to the underlying Twenty Ten theme for WordPress, but that was a couple of years ago and things move fast on the Intertubes. For example, the old theme wasn’t responsive in any way, meaning that whether you viewed the site on a desktop browser or a mobile device, you got the same thing. Embarrassing.

So what you’re looking at now is something I worked on last weekend. I figured I might as well go for a style overhaul while I was fixing other problems. I’d love to tell you that what you’re looking at was lovingly hand-crafted by me, but I lack the creative wit: the theme is called Moustachey and it was created by MeanThemes. It solves the responsive layout issue (if you’re using a desktop browser look at one of my recent photo posts and make your window really narrow to see it in action), and adds a few new post layout options which I’ll no doubt be experimenting with over the next couple of posts.

The process of finding an apartment to rent in a city goes something like this:

• scour the big real estate websites looking for whatever it is that you’re looking for
• contact the agents for the places you’d like to view
• visit the apartments at the arranged time
• rinse and repeat

Pretty straightforward. But here’s my advise: expect nothing from real estate agents. Don’t expect them to return your calls. Don’t even think about emailing them. Don’t assume that they’ll show up at the viewing time.

Now don’t get me wrong - not all realtors are useless. In fact some of them are bloody brilliant, and that’s kind of the point I’m heading towards. Last time I went through this I viewed two apartments in the same building. They were identical units, with the only differences being the floor they were on - one was on the top floor of the building with slightly better views that the other one, and the rental price reflected this.

But the realtor for the more expensive apartment was shit. She didn’t care. Conversely, the realtor for the identical-but-cheaper unit was brilliantly eager to show us around and tell us all about the area.

And here’s the punchline - we would have absolutely gone for the more expensive apartment if the bubbly realtor was the agent for it. There’s no way we wanted to deal with her competitor. And if I was the owner of the more expensive unit and ever found that out I’d be super pissed off about losing potential tenants like that.

So real estate agents, how about being a bit nicer to potential clients eh?

A wee notice found in the car park in our building. I’m not sure this is the most neighbourly way to solve a parking dispute…

I bought a car. I think we all knew pretty early on into this whole Australia thing that I wasn’t in a hurry to return to Scotland.

Nobody knows what the “RH” stands for on this sign.