Jill's guide to finding a Montreal apartment

The Rapper and I have been looking for a 2-ish bedroom apartment in Montreal for under $800 a month, that takes dogs. I think apartment hunting is a fairly stressful enterprise in most cities, and every city has its own apartment language, standards and secret systems you need to learn fairly quickly if you are to score the pad of your dreams. The following are my observations of how Montreal works for people such as The Rapper and myself.

The basic layout:

A “4 1/2” apartment:

4 rooms of some kind, and a bathroom. Probably one of the rooms is a kitchen, and another is a livingroom. “Aha! 4-2=2, so this must be a 2-bedroom apartment!” you think. Not so fast. What you could be dealing with here is a 1 bedroom with a double living room, meaning, someone drew a line across the middle of the room to make it look like there was once a wall there. Or there might be a “dining area” or some other nebulous alcove that swells out of a wide spot in the hallway— like a closet with a window or an outdoor shed, off to the left of the fire escape.

A “5 1/2” apartment:

Same one bedroom as above, only now you have two questionable areas. One is a laundry room slash child’s bedroom. The other is on a funny angle, the water heater and hydro box take up 50% of the available floor space, and the ceiling caps out at 5 feet.

Price range:

$600-$850:

The apartment is in a post-industrial armpit. Neighbors include the Home Depot, train tracks to the North and South, a building fondly remembered as “The Old Tire Factory,” and several wandering young men who need to ask you something, they just can’t remember what it is. There’s no grocery store nearby, but you can purchase concrete where the dép should be. You will tell your friends “its kind of in between” two other well known neighborhoods that have actual names. Signs of gentrification are nonetheless visible, and you can buy an apartment of the same size in this neighborhood for $250,000 or so. You have in common with your neighbors a jubilant disdain for the higher rental prices in other cities, especially Toronto, because that’s what people do here.

$851-$1400:

The apartment is in a cute neighborhood full of hipsters and the businesses that cater to them. This is Montreal, so that means fantastic coffee, books, bagels, chocolate, $40 hand-printed t-shirts and the constant company of writers, filmmakers, graduate students and degenerate drifters such as yourself. There might be a large farmer’s market within lackadaisical cycling distance, and you are certainly at the epi-center of a triangle of natural and health and food supplement stores. Signs of gentrification are nonetheless visible, and you can buy an apartment of the same size in this neighborhood for $250,000 or so. You have in common with your neighbors a jubilant disdain for the higher rental prices in other cities, especially Toronto, because that’s what people do here.

$1401-$3600:

The apartment is in a once-cute neighborhood that was popular and affordable 5-50 years ago. Now the only people there are the last people to move in, just as everyone who made it cute and popular scattered North, East and West. The floors and moldings are polished hardwood, your appliances match, the tile in your bathroom is a particular shade of sage/slate/fire-engine-red that reminds you each morning that you have made it. The neighborhood is adjacent to something the listing describes as “trendy” and you have a concierge, a basement pool you never use, parking, and 24-hour surveillance. Signs of gentrification are nonetheless visible, and you can buy an apartment of the same size in this neighborhood for $250,000 or so. You have in common with your neighbors a jubilant disdain for the higher rental prices in other cities, especially Toronto, because that’s what people do here.

$3601+:

The apartment is a penthouse in the Old Port. You are an expat diamond baron who only visits on weekends to maintain your Canadian residency. The rampant touristification of the neighborhood below troubles you not because you always approach your pad by helicopter. Rent? Why bother when you could own the whole block if you wanted to? It’s so lonely not having anyone to have anything in common with. So you rag on Toronto for sport.

Glossary of Listings Terms:

The Rapper is learning French— and he’s doing very well, although its still not fast enough to make our Pizza Lady happy. Quebecois listings shorthand is still a little alien to him. So this list is as much for him as it is for you, dear reader.