So, you’ve finally decided to take the plunge and escape the clutches of the notorious RAs and find your own place off campus. While the desire to break free from dorm life is understandable, you’ll probably admit that dorm life itself has been quite the unforgettable experience. The comforting burger and fries from Burger King at the Jinqiao mall just across the street awaited you with open arms after a stressful day at the AB. The lush green grass outside was a great place to congregate with friends and classmates until those mean guards kicked you off for reasons you still don't understand. Nonetheless, you've decided to get to know a different place in the city and plant your roots elsewhere for the time being while studying at NYU Shanghai. Living in your own place can be a wonderful addition to your time spent in Shanghai, but taking the time to strategize your search and be ready to make carefully thought out decisions are essential in making a smooth transition from life in the dorms to off campus.

Set Your Priorities Straight

What do you want to get out of your off campus experience? Maybe the six subway stops or bus ride to school is something you wish to avoid in the future? Perhaps a commute of that magnitude would be worth it if you could live closer to the city center in places like People’s Square, Jing’an Temple, or Xintiandi. But if you would rather walk to school everyday, then maybe an apartment near Yuanshen Stadium or Century Avenue will tickle your fancy. Wherever you decide to finally settle down, you need to make sure you give yourself enough time to weigh out your options and try to imagine what life will be like living in a certain area where your apartment is. Sure, you may love your new shared apartment with your own bathroom and personal space, but is 15-20 minutes to and from the subway station each day something you want to deal with? How about dining options? Do you like to cook? Is there a supermarket in your area with products and items that you will actually use, or are you going to have to travel somewhere else every time you need to shop? Or maybe you like to eat out a lot, but there is only 小笼包 xiaolongbao and 麻辣烫 malatang within walking distance from your apartment. For some, that would be a deal breaker, but for me, it’s a deal maker. I can’t get enough of that stuff.

Who to Live With

Some people like living on their own and doing their own thing. I, on other hand, will go crazy if I can’t have a conversation with someone at least every few minutes, so I of course chose to live with a group of my friends in a larger apartment. Remember when you were a freshman and you filled out a sheet that was guaranteed to find you a roommate to best fit your lifestyle? You know, that angel who had high standards for cleanliness, didn’t smoke, was quiet and went to bed early just like you? Some people get lucky and have fantastic relationships with people they live with. Others find themselves in a world of trouble when they live with someone they have a hard time sharing the same room with. If you find yourself in this situation in the dorms, you may get lucky and be placed with someone else if you can’t work anything out. But when you sign a long term lease with a few of your friends, living with someone who was once a close friend may quickly become someone you can’t stand. Being in a situation like this will put a serious strain on your relationship, and although you can’t always be in control and predict what will happen in the future, think really long and hard about who you want to be living with. You love hanging out with your best friend, but be honest: Can you really stay best friends when you’re in 24/7 contact? Maybe you can. You decide.That isn’t to say these situations are completely negative though. Within the first few weeks I found myself finding new ways to communicate with my friends in order to make sure things didn’t turn too sour. In my apartment of 6, we hold house meetings fairly often to discuss issues that concern the group as a whole. We voice our opinions and concerns about issues regarding shared and public spaces, rent payments and other pressing issues. For us, the issue that caused the most tention was the adoption (and, ultimately, return) of a puppy in our apartment. Some loved it, some couldn’t stand it, and in the end we decided to find it a new home--but not without hurting some feelings, and causing more than a little stress in between. We all learned from this experience that communication is key in order to understand everyone's stance on an issue. Living in a group of individuals with diverging interests is challenging when, after all, the apartment doesn’t belong to you or me: it belongs to us. Decisions that affect the group as a whole must be discussed carefully and thoroughly.

The Devil is in the Details

Once you have found the apartment that best suits your needs, you will be presented with a little contract that binds you to anything and everything that is said upon you entering the apartment. As a foreigner you will most likely be presented with a lease that has both Mandarin and English, but know that in the eyes of the law the Mandarin version of the lease will always prevail over the English version. That means you need to check very carefully, preferably with a native speaker of Chinese to see that everything is in order and that there aren’t any clauses grossly in the landlord's favor. In our lease, the rent amount in English was 25% higher than the amount written chinese. Why you ask? Because the person who paid before us was paying significantly less and they forgot to change the number in the Chinese version for our lease agreement! This detail came in handy when bargaining down our price.There was another clause in that said “you must follow all the rules” while living in the property, yet there wasn’t a specific list of rules. You wouldn’t sign something so vague without knowing what the rules were, right? We requested the addition of an appendix to see what the rules were and what we were getting ourselves into. The best part is after being such sticklers about the lease, when we went to register at our local police station we discovered that the address on our lease was apartment 285 when we lived in 287. We had to get a new copy of the lease and go back another day! Like I said, the devil is definitely in the details.

Regardless of the issues that arise when finding a new place to live, know that any difficulties or bumps in the road that you come across, while uncomfortable in the moment, will serve to season your wits and make it that much easier to adjust to change in the future. Living off campus in my shared apartment has added another dimension to my time here in Shanghai. I chat the mornings away with the old Shanghainese guards outside my apartment while munching on a crispy 煎饼 jianbing while my friends head out to get a burrito at La Coyota just a block away on West Jian Guo Road. Whoever you are, Shanghai has something for everyone. And as always, wherever you find yourself in this huge, awesome, Chinese-yet-international megacity, make sure to search and explore other areas outside your neighborhood and your comfort zone. You will learn a lot more about the city, and more importantly, a lot more about yourself while doing it. This article was written by Ivan Marks. Please send an email to [email protected] to get in touch. Photo Credit: aquaspace.com.cn