Mission Impossible: One Week to Find an Apartment

I’m about to go on the adventure called finding an apartment. My application for the dormitories got rejected and now I have less than a week to find a place to live. Let the fun begin!

Now there are many off campus housing options for Korea University. There’s Crimson House which many foreigners like, but I wouldn’t be able to stand it because there is no kitchen. The others include Allive Livingtel and a few others with kitchens. Now these would be great, but sadly, their websites are in Korean and I doubt that the landlords, if I call them, speak English. Since I don’t speak enough Korean to reserve a room or have a translator help me, those options are unavailable to me.

This leads me to taking to Google! First I look for One Rooms (원룸), and I find a few but the key deposit (which is not returned) is too high, so it takes those out of the picture.

Next I search expat forums, like iaminkorea.com. I find many people looking for roommates but most of the apartments are too far or I don’t meet the requirements. I even find a few that would be free to me as long as I act as an English tutor to the owner’s children. I find this move to be a little too risky and don’t know how they will treat me or how many hours the father wants me to put in, so these are all out.

I’m beginning to get frustrated because I can’t find anywhere close enough to where I live, but then I remember—craigslist. I go onto craigslist to the South Korean section and find many people looking for roommates. I find a few that are appealing. There are several in the area of Hongdae, which is a great part of Seoul, but the negative is that it’s 40 minutes by subway away from Korea University. Also, if I miss last train, then I would have to pay about $7-$10 to get home. The deals on the rooms though are great, so I’ll keep these apartments on the backburners.

My next mission is goshipages.com, which is usually a pretty great place to find affordable housing near the university, but since I'm so close to school starting, all the goshiwons are full. 

After a few hours of searching though, I finally find a place that is relatively close to Korea University, and has the amenities that I require (bed, kitchen, laundry machine, ect.). The other plus is that I would have a large window and room all to myself. The place is big and I’ll be sharing the apartment with 3-4 other girls. Korea University is only 15 minutes away by bus and subway so it’s out of the way, but close enough. The residents in the apartment also go to Kyung Hee University, a top university in Korea. I figure that this will give me a great experience because not only will I interact with students at Korea University, but at Kyung Hee University as well. The room is a little more than I want to pay, but there are so many positives with this one room, that I’ll just bite the bullet and take it. I don’t think that I’ll find a better place.