Big Sunny Room in 2 Bed Coop Apartments (Shared Housing)

This one won’t be for everyone: Do you want to have _a_ family around, just not _your_ family?

Our two-parent, two-teenager household lives between two apartments in the same building. One of them is not full-time occupied—there's a little washer... and dryer, a guest room we use, and your room. You could think of your (sunny, prewar) room as like a finished basement or a garage? It’s part of a family home, but it's often empty.

Foot traffic:
We’re in and out 24/7 for laundry and storage and zoom meetings and sleepovers, but then it’ll go quiet for a few days. Sometimes one of us camps out for a weekend. Sometimes kids hang out watching videos (with headphones). Sometimes our literal guests stay in the guest room. But you would be the main person there every night, and the main person with shampoo in the shower. None of us live there full time, though eventually one or two of us may.

Your room:
Your room is 12 by 15 feet, 180sf, though some of it is taken up by a six-foot wide, 30-inch deep closet that goes up to the 9-foot ceiling. That leaves 165 sf of open floor. There are two sunny west/southwest facing windows. They look out on multi-lane traffic, plus a lot of trees and sky. Unfurnished. The wood floors are beautiful, but a building noise-reduction rule requires rugs over 80% of them.

Shared spaces:
The living room, kitchen, and bath are shared. There isn’t a tv in the living room, or shelving, or decor, and for us that’s ideal. Keeping it minimal for now. We'll be in and out of the bathroom and kitchen. We store some things in the kitchen, but it’s not our million-meals-a-day cooking environment.

Utilities:
The room has a new window a/c. In heat season, with radiators, you’re more likely to be too warm than too cold. Half of gas, electric, and wifi has been about 75/month, probably higher in a/c season.

Building:
The building is a family-oriented walkup coop, fairly diverse, and lgbt friendly. Four(?) of the 40 apartments are supportive housing for developmentally disabled adults. There are multiple outdoor spaces, including front yard and courtyard, plus a long, skinny back courtyard (or is it an alley?) where people do some vegetable gardening. Take a raised bed in the spring, there is no waitlist. The front yard is basically decorative, but the courtyard is comfortable. It’s shown in aerial view in the photos. There’s a commercial laundry room in the basement. And just to repeat the word walkup again, it’s a walkup. Building quiet hours are 10pm to 9am, and we have to take them seriously because the super lives directly below this space.

Neighborhood:
You can walk around the block and hit laundromats, delis, coffee, and takeout without crossing the street. More coffee, some bars, and a bookstore within a few blocks. Bigger grocery stores and more serious restaurants 5-10 minutes walk. Ten minutes to Greenwood Cemetery or Prospect Park.

Transit:
We are 0.3 miles to either the Fort Hamilton F/G (the directions say 8-minute walk ) or Church Ave F/G (9 minutes). The B and D are farther, 0.7 miles (16 minutes), but the bus often gets you to them quickly. There are two Citibike racks within a block.

About us:
Nerds for sure. Our current employers include: a bookstore, a publisher, a parenting group. The kids are pretty mild for teenagers. So far. Our main need is to feel comfortable running into you, and to sense that you're comfortable running into us.

About you:
We enjoy students and artists, and we plan to enjoy meeting you, whoever you are. We'll have to collaborate on cleaning and maintenance—are you ok to collaborate on cleaning and maintenance? And you'd have to live with unpredictably in-and-out housemates. Also with kids. You’d want to be better than ok with kids. You'd want to feel comfortable being part of a household ecosystem, even just as a satellite.

Long-range stayability:
If you were happy and comfortable, and you wanted to stay, it might be possible to get past the building’s two-year sublet limit. If one of us eventually slept full-time in the guest room, then the limited-term "sublet" could become a longer-term "roommate” situation.

Possibles and impossibles:
Couples, impossible. Loudness or hosting hookups or parties, also impossible. Basement bike storage, possible. Storage in closets outside your room, impossible. Small, lovely neutered dogs maybe possible? Cats, impossible (allergies).

How-to:
Because we’re a family and because it’s a coop building, this takes more oomph than an average shared rental.

Steps:
1. Phone call? If you wish.
2. Come see.
3. If it's any kind of match, come meet the kids.
4. If that works, we'll send you the application form.
5. Enter the paperwork tunnel: Do you have two school or work-related recommendation letters? Great, PDF them. If not, have a boss and/or family friend write some. Filed taxes? Great, attach the top page. Ditto bank statements. Ditto pay stubs.
6. Send it all back and the board will approve it. (We're on the board.)
7. Sign a lease. Read More