Finding a place to live

On arriving in Phnom Penh I was staying at the elegant and inexpensive (well the last part of that) Burly Guesthouse.  The Burly rates a 3.5 out of 5 on TripAdvisor (http://www.tripadvisor.com.au/Hotel_Review-g293940-d2275223-Reviews-Burly_Guesthouse-Phnom_Penh.html) many of the reviews comment that it is cheap and well located which is probably about all you can say about it.

The first night was spent in a  US$ 8 'fan' room i.e. a room with a fan but no AC.  After one night I decided I was worth an additional US$5 per night and upgraded to an AC room.  Weirdly, the extra $5 didn't just pay for AC (which I probably didn't really need - it is winter here after all!) but the new room was also lighter, quieter and had hot water.  

Needless to say, I was pretty keen to get out of the Burly as soon as possible and get settled into my own place and so we embarked on the adventure that was finding a place to live in Phnom Penh.

I have to preface this by saying that Adri probably (definitely) did the majority of work in finding a place to live.....but I like to think that I contributed at least in part!  

When I was looking to rent out my apartment in Melbourne, I selected a Real Estate Agent and they then pretty much do everything (for a fee of course).  The key thing about this is that I just have one Real Estate Agent.....not so in Cambodia. Landlords don't seem to have a relationship with any particular agent.  It appears that landlords just advertise their property, usually through a sign on the building and then a random selection of agents take people around the properties.  

Over the course of about 3 days we probably saw about 30 properties between us (again I have to mention that Adri did the bulk of the leg work).  We used a few different agents and due to the system here, we got taken to the same places a few times.  For us it seemed that the agents served more of a transport service than anything else, but whizzing around Phnom Penh visiting properties on the back of a motorbike probably did save us some time.

Of the 30 we probably only saw a handful that we liked and we did start to wonder if we were just being too picky!  But some of the places were terrible - no natural light, dirty, inaccessible.  We saw this one place which was in a great location but you had to enter via fire escape stairs which were coming away from the wall!  Another 'western style' apartment had the lounge in the bedroom.  I also saw the smallest lift I have ever seen - more than two people was a squish!

But we did eventually find a place we like that ticked all the boxes - good location, safe, clean, light.  We actually saw this place separately with different agents (we had decided to divide and conquer) so we went back to view together.  The landlord actually offered to pay us $50 to not go through an agent but we decided that they had worked hard for us driving us around so we should try and benefit one of them at least.  I later found out that the landlords have to pay the agents a months rent (more that $50!!) so no wonder that landlord was keen to avoid the agents!

Once we had found a place things went pretty quickly - it's a bit less formal here and we moved in the next day.   It was great to be in our own place and feel that we can get settled.  We are living in an area called Toul Tompong (near the Russian Market) - so far it seems like a good spot with a mix of Western and local places.  I am looking forward to exploring the area in more detail and finding good places to eat, drink and hang out (I have found a few contenders already).

So this is our home in Cambodia....for the next 6 months at least.                                      T

The very pink bathroom 

The bedroom with pink curtains

The kitchen

The dining area (well kitchen really)

The lounge

Another lounge shot with pink curtains (there is a theme here)