in DC: desperately seeking an apartment

All good things come to an end, I suppose. After a nice 5 year or so run in my current apartment, all signs are pointing to my needing to find a new place to live. Considering that my lease becomes month to month as of… today, I suppose the sooner, the better.

It’s not really a complicated situation, the unit owner works for the gov’t and has been out of the country all this time. He’s now looking to change jobs which would mean coming back to DC and needing a place to live–my place. He tried to give me as much notice as he could, but his property management company seems content to not notify either of us about too much. So when I asked “Hey, what about my lease?” I was told, “Oh your lease reverts to month to month upon expiration, so there’s no new paperwork necessary.” That statement only sounded about ½-right to both me and the landlord, but I take it as a sign that I best get my crap together and get the hell out. With all that I complain about, I do love the apartment. The building and condo board do have their major issues*, but I still like where I live.

My initial apartment searches are reminding me of everything I hate about this process**, so I am asking, nay BEGGING for any apartment hunting mojo, tips, suggestions, word of mouth references, etc.*** Any help is appreciated. I’m not really locked down to a specific area, though not straying too far from where I am would be nice. I also don’t expect to get the same decent rent that I have now, but one can always be hopeful.

At some point this weekend, I’ll be whipping out the cardboard boxes and packing tape, gotta start sometime and maybe get in touch with moving companies dfw for the bigger stuff. I apologize in advance for the extreme mood swings of crankiness and insanity I’ll likely go through over the next month, and the many IMs and e-mails my friends will get saying “You could use a spare set of knives right? Everyone needs knives!” 😈 **** Seriously though, out of the three: the dating pool, job hunting & apartment hunting, that it’s stressful to deal with, it’s the latter that really gets to me, so any help is great.