Finding a home
The next important thing, at least for me, was to get
a home. The usual procedure is that you stay in a hotel until you find a place
to live. In my case that did not work since I was accompanied not only by my
wife, but also by our little son and two cats. Hotels do not like pets, and
they are also not large enough to have the pets like the hotels either. With
the help of a relocation agent, my company found me an apartment for the first
month. That only came true the day before we left for New Jersey. Plan ahead
is the motto here.
In the NJ area, rentals are usually 6 months to a year, with the exception of
summer houses on the shore, that can be rented on a per week basis (at high
cost) in summer and often for several months in winter. We found one apartment
owner willing to rent his furnished place for a month, and it worked out great
for us. The amount of options and control on the selection of this apartment
is zero, but it will always be more pleasant then staying in a hotel for a month.
The housing situation in New Jersey was new for us, and I will therefore describe
it below.
At the time of my assignment (1994) the real estate market was quite slow. As result, many people preferred to rent. Secondly, Americans are used to move regularly for their jobs, so there is quite a business in the relocation of employees over the USA. Since this is a good business, landlords of the more attractive houses have no problem in finding tenants. Usually, they will put the house on the market about 2 months before the tenant leaves and, if it's a really nice place for the right price, it will be gone in two or three days. This means, that you have to be full in the race at least six to eight weeks before your planned lease date. If you are not able to be there that early, or if you (or the company) are not willing to spend over a month in a hotel, life will be tough in the first two or three weeks. My advice is to start immediately, to be able to scan the better part of the market. If you start later you may get stuck with the 'dogs' or the expensive houses. One thing you need to realize: If you do find an ttractive house shortly after you arrive, you may not be able to to the down payment because you do not yet have money in the bank. Why not? Because the social security number has not arrived.
In my case, our two cats made things even more difficult, because at least 30% of the landlords say 'no' to pets Some do because they are afraid that something might happen to their house, furniture, or carpet, few because they are allergic to pets or are afraid that a next renter may not take the house because there wre pets. You may find help from the real estate agents (Some key names in New Jersey: Century 21, Burgdorff, Schlott, Weichert).
Each agency typically only deals with its own area (commission basis), and may not be interested to hand you over to their colleagues (in the same company) doing the real estate in the area that borders theirs. This means, that you may have to call five offices of the same real estate agent to get a good idea of what's going on. Some companies (e.g. Weichert) have a separate group that only deals with rentals, with offices that have a much wider range. In my case, Weichert did transfer me to another rental office when the initial office could not come up with a decent house.
All the rental and real estate companies make use of the same Multiple Listing Real Estate and Rental books. These books are usually issued once per 14 days, and contain all the places for sale or rent in an area. They are only for use by the Rental Offices. In the last few years, most of the lease property will also be listed on various public web sites. As soon as there is a new edition of the book(s) or a new web site listing, all companies will go for the attractive listings, so there is a good chance that the house that your agent mentioned was already taken by another one. If you happen to arrive in the US about a week after the last update (like we did), you may find that there are not many nice places left. If you are lucky, you arrive at the moment a new edition appears, and may find a nice place for a fair price within a few days in the area you like. In our case, we also found a nice home, but only after checking a dozen or so 'dogs', several houses above the preferred price range, as well as houses that were outside the initially planned area, requiring a longer commuting time.
In some areas, the Rental books are available on-line, and new houses are put in immediately, which eliminates the former 14 day rush to the real estate agent. In addition to the on-line listings and books, many Realtors will also have a their 'secret' private listings. You will only find these by contacting them. Some landlords both register with the Realtors and advertise in the newspapers as well. That means: If you get the place via a Realtor, you pay a fee (about one month or 10% of one year rent), and if you get the place via the newspaper, you do not have to pay extra. Go to the nearest supermarket chain and take the free real estate and apartment guides, and also check out the local newspaper. Check with colleagues if there are days in the week (usually Sunday and Friday) if there is a special newspaper section devoted to real estate and rentals. Another option is to approach people who advertise their house in the 'for sale' segment of the newspaper with the offer of a long-term rent. With the current slow housing market, they may accept a long term lease over leaving their property vacant. There's a lot more info you can browse for at the same time while you seach for a home: You'll also find multiple free second hand automobile shopper guides and advertisements about 'garage' sales. At these events you may be able to pick up some nice articles for your new home, ranging from furniture to great bicycles for next to nothing. Having been to many garage sales, just for fun, I bet that in every American household there is at least one home trainer and a bicycle that was given by a family member as a gift and that never ever has been used.