This post title should seem terrifyingly familiar to a post I wrote almost exactly six months ago…

As of today, I have been in my new place for exactly thirty days. Move-in day did not go smoothly and a couple of things had to happen so that I could be comfortable (more on that later). But for the most part, closing in on the end of the month, all was well and I was getting more situated. That all changed last Thursday when I stepped out of my room to go to the kitchen…

As I stepped out of the door, the carpet made a crunching sound under my feet and felt…wet. As I got further down the hallway, the carpet felt dry and no longer made the crunching sound. So I walked back to the wet area and realized the carpet was much, much wetter than I initially understood. Other than my room, bathroom, and the external storage closet, the hot water heater closet is the only other space on my floor. As my bathroom was dry, I opened the hot water heater closet to find the water heater leaking, and almost an inch of water on the concrete floor. I quickly texted my roommates and grabbed a bucket to stem the flow of water.

SERIOUSLY? HOW? WHY? And in WHAT terrible Tyler Perry film am I trapped?

I cannot begin to explain how sad and depressed I was in that moment. Over the next six days I spent countless hours on the phone making appointments with plumbers and other contractors, only to be no-showed by several. I have two amazing housemates (more on that later) but we were consistently turned down for service by contractors because we were not the home owner for liability reasons. This was made further complicated by the fact that the home owner lives in Asia and does not have home owner’s insurance, so she is reluctant to spend very much on repairs. (I found out through some housemate chats that a year ago one of the air conditioners broke and cost her quite a bit. This house was built in 2006 and, unsurprisingly, without some maintenance and tending, it is around this time that thing begin to wear…) This process was made all the more vexing by the fact that the landlord initially seemed to take no level of responsibility, never checked in on what was happening, and was only in contact with us after we initiated communication. Ugh.

So after four days of no hot water and even more days walking around on a soggy, soaking wet carpet, a new hot water heater has been installed, the carpet has been ripped out, and the floors are drying.

It is from this place that I write. After the challenges at move-in, I was planning to write a post entitled, “The True Cost of Cheap Rent,” however, that has taken a backseat to this past week’s ordeals. That post, along with several others as I approach my second blogging anniversary, will happen in July.