CHICAGO AREA APARTMENT FINDERS
Apartment People (Three Chicagoland locations)
www.apartmentpeople.com
3121 N. Broadway (Lakeview) 773.248.8800
51 W. Huron (River North) 312.335.8802
619 Grove (Evanston) 847.733.8800
Hours: Monday thru Thursday 9am - 8pm, Friday 9am -7pm, Saturday 9am - 6pm and Sunday 10am - 5pm.
Apartment People, in business since 1984, claims to be Chicago’s largest free apartment finding service. Don’t worry about having money for cab fare because they will chauffeur you to each potential-apartment destination. Apartment People boasts over 70 rental agents at its three locations and deals with apartments in over 28 Chicago neighborhoods all the way from Rogers Park to the South Loop and everywhere in between. Other pluses: Open 7 days a week. That’s a nice option for those Monday through Friday 9-5’ers have only the weekends available. Also, the Better Business Bureau (BBB) sure is a stickler but adding to Apartment People’s credibility is a recent award handed down by the BBB for Apartment People’s outstanding ethics.
Apartment Connection
www.aptconnection.com
1000 W. Diversey 773.525.3888
Hours: Not currently listed on web site or on company answering machine.
Apartment Connection is for those people that opted for the small colleges, say Flagler College in St. Augustine Florida, versus those goliath university types like University of Illinois-Champaign. Apartment Connections admits to being a ‘small firm’ and is newer to the game (started in 1992) and focuses on Chicago’s North Side. So you Sox fans, this apartment finder service really isn’t for you. This service also claims to be free to perspective renters and Apartment Connection covers approximately eight territories on Chicago’s North Side such as Lakeview, Lincoln Park, Wrigleyville, etc.
Craiglist
www.Craiglist.com
If you don’t know what Craigslist is by now, you need more worldly experience before living on your own. Craiglist is an online local community classified and forum that receives 4 billion pages views per month, used by more than 10 million people per month and posts more than 9 million classifieds per month, internationally. If all those numbers are a little overpowering, basically a person looking for an apartment would click on www.Craiglists.com, pick Chicago from over 190 different areas listed on the website and then go to the “Housing” section. As of 10:32 p.m. on May 30, 2006, there were 10,871 housing opportunities in the Chicagoland area featured on Craiglist. Luckily, a prospective tenant can put in particular qualifications such as number of bedrooms and price range to narrow down the possibilities. The plus side: everything is free, at your fingertips and you literally have thousands of possible apartments to choose from and generally can find a better deal when going through an individual instead of a property management company. The down side: nobody is going to drive you to these locations, you will have to deal with coordinating the tours with the owner or property manager and it could possibly add hours upon hours of time and frustration to the pending apartment search.
Apartments.com
www.Apartments.com
Apartments.com is a database of millions of apartment listings in all 50 states. The listings are derived from over 150 newspapers and classifieds throughout the country and updated daily. Like Craigslist, Apartments.com is simply a database; therefore, there are no offices to visit in Chicago where a rental agent will arrange tours and transportation to visit the potential apartments. Although Apartments.com and Craigslist are more accurately described as an apartment finding tool instead of an apartment finding services, Apartments.com features detailed aspects of each apartment, apartment photos and community information—all for free. Apartments.com also includes links on its website to find a roommate, obtain mover quotes and truck rentals, connect utilities in the new apartment, and other handy necessary services required by persons on the move.
Apartment Savvy
www.apartmentsavvy.com
2835 N. Clark
773.348.8921
Hours: Monday through Sunday 9 am – 7 pm
Apartment Savvy, like Apartment Connection, is open seven days a week and boasts to be a free apartment finding service. Apartment Savvy has only one location and focuses on the Downtown, Near North and Mid North areas. The nicest feature of the Apartment Savvy website is the chart under the “Neighborhoods” section that lists the average rent range for 21 different Chicago areas. This comparison chart is a very handy tool for someone looking for an apartment in Chicago, especially someone who is new to Chicago and does not have the instilled-since-birth neighborhood rent scale that so many born and bred Chicagoans grow up with. I encourage any apartment seeker to view this chart when making the decision what Chicago ‘hood he or she plans to call home.
* Editors Note* I must interject and caution readers to check for themselves the “free service” claim by Apartment People, Apartment Connection, Apartment Savvy and/or any other Chicago apartment finder service. This past February, I was one of the totally clueless individuals relocating to the Windy City from a very small, island town in Florida. I was terrified and overwhelmed—as was my Michigan-raised roommate! We went ahead and enlisted the help of Apartment Savvy. My rental agent was helpful, professional and efficient. I told him exactly what we were looking for in an apartment and he quickly generated a list of prospective apartments, called the property managers and drove us to at least a dozen different possibilities for our consideration. There was no pressure to make a decision and he was very patient; however, there was certainly a hefty fee involved for the service once we selected our apartment and signed our lease!
The fee was approximately $300 plus credit check fees for all applicants that were to be listed on the lease. Although I was completely satisfied with Apartment Savvy and paying the fee in order to save myself all the time, aggravation and potential-mistakes of locating an apartment of my own, I caution any apartment seekers to question Chicago apartment locator services as to hidden fees before enlisting their services. Apartment location in Chicago is part of the age-old debate: calling in the pro’s and the higher expense (Apartment People, Apartment Connection, Apartment Savvy) or acting as the Do-It-Yourselfer (Craigslists, Apartments.com) and saving a bit of money, and losing a great deal of time and perhaps patience.
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hidden fees
Written by Guest on 2006-12-20 10:39:23
i work for a locator service. there are NO hidden fees. the way we get paid is by charging the landlord (not the perspective tenant) for the first months rent. its true that we do expect that people will pay their first months rent (hopefully all the other months too. i guess i can see how being from an island town in florida might confuse someone. But, i assure you, rent is not a hidden fee. niether is fee's for application processing. these are very standard things. i've worked for large management compnaies and indipendant owners and they all expect you to pay for your own approval process (non-refundable if your not approved. its not the landlords fault if you have no job and cant get approved. someone HAS to pay for the credit and backround checks.). RENT that is paid monthly is also not a hidden fee. In conclusion... LOCATORS GET PAID FROM THE LANDLORD GIVING THEM THE FIRST MONTHS RENT. THEY DO NOT HOLD DEPOSITS OR APP FEES. RENT IS NOT A HIDDEN CHARGE. THINK ABOUT IT. |
*Editor Note*
Written by Guest on 2007-03-18 14:05:24
I agree with the last comment made by the guest 12/20/06. I too found a great apartment through Apartment Savvy and hence why I'm making a comment because I was shown several different apartments and had asked my agent about how much I would need to come up with in order to take the three top picks I was shown and each was different. I was explained that some management companies don't have security deposits any more and you have to pay some sort of a fee which I'm presuming is what you had mentioned. I guess the best way to be informed is to just ask. I was very happy with the service that I used though and love the apartment I got. |
No hidden fees
Written by Guest on 2007-08-01 14:53:05
All fees that are passed along to clients from locator services are fees that the owner or management company require. If there is a $300 processing fee - it is paid to the management company. |
