Housing Recomms

[ak!]

Hi everyone! I'm just about to relocate to Singapore in 3 weeks from now, and trying to understanding the housing market/landscape. I'd greatly appreciate any housing location recommendations based on some of the initial aspects I was able to jot down below.

Also, I'm relocating from Washington, D.C. where the go-to resource to find housing was Craigslist. It seems that option might not be as big in Singapore (relatively speaking)- so any suggestions on resources to scout for housing would also be helpful. Thanks so much in advance!

- Approximate monthly housing budget: $1.4-$1.8k

- Workplace: Around Raffles Place

- Housing: Looking for a furnished place, shared housing/apartment/condo, preferably roommates would be young professionals as well

- Transportation: would prefer to commute to work via MRT during regular business hours

- It would be awesome to have work, home and gym close by to have a basic minimal work-life balance. I actually took to high intensity interval training this past year, and hoping I'd be able to make some time to continue, so distances/connectivity matter, though I understand I'm on a rather limited budget so might have slim pickings

- Proximity to coffee shops would be helpful too- I tend to work over the weekend on my separate startup project and it's always nice to get out of the house for some good coffee close by

[ak!]

Not anymore, but thank you for checking!

[JR8]

Unfortunately this one somehow slipped through during the Xmas/NY lull...
Did you find a place? It'd be interesting to know how you approached it. As I reckon planning to join a flatshare, before you're in-country, must be something of a challenge.

[ak!]

Oh yeah, it was definitely a challenge! One of my learnings back when I moved to DC was that reaching out to potential roomies on Craigslist to schedule a Skype/FaceTime call before meeting in-person really helped me understand the local people, neighborhoods and the overall market landscape. So upon landing it helped to at least have a high level understanding to narrow down my options.

Singapore's real estate market is of course as you would know heavily driven by agents, which was quite different from my previous experience- thankfully I didn't have to use one since one of the people I reached out to on Craigslist (they were the tenants themselves) were open to meeting once I landed in the country, and it all worked out from there.

So overall, while there were extremely slim pickings on Craigslist, working on reaching out to people before landing actually helped get a head start in scheduling viewings in the first couple days itself.

Happy to help anyone who might want to chat more about it- feel free to direct message me!

[JR8]

Good stuff, it's great it worked out for you. Many people arriving are looking for whole units so we don't get to hear much about new arrivals and the process of joining a flat-share. I'm sure that info will be useful for others.