Being a Swede in the US

NYC

    Last year we took a trip to NYC. We wanted to check out the city, but W also went for a workshop and I renewed my passport. Because as a Swede in the US there are only so many places you can renew your Swedish passport, and NYC is one on a list of two, yeah a total list of two places in all of the US where swedes can renew their Swedish passport, New York and Washington DC. There are mobile passport centers each year, but they usually get booked several months in advance. Last time I renewed my passport I timed it with a trip to Sweden, because flying to NYC or Washington DC from Fairbanks, AK, is equally expensive to flying all the way to Sweden, if you include cost of hotels etc. 

Fall in New York City

    While W was busy with his workshop I explored the city some more. I have never liked New York City unfortunately, but now I will have 2 years to learn to love the city. We are excited about exploring the city and finding our new favorite spots. During the time there this last fall I walked on average 9 miles per day. I am not much of a subway person, but maybe that will change once we move there. It's not the first time I have been to New York though, I was there when I was 6 years old, well if that even counts, but I have strong memories from that trip. I went there again when I was about 20 years or so, but I only spent a couple of hours in the city, and that didn't really add any positive vibe of the city. 

Central Park

    The best part about Manhattan is Central Park. While exploring the city through google maps I have learned that there are a lot of green spaces around New York city and all of the city's different neighborhoods. Even walking around as I did this past fall, I found a lot more green space (as in trees) than what I was expecting. The favorite green space and probably one of the places I will hang out around the most is Central Park. While I was walking around there, there were definitely some places where I was the only one around, which is suprising since NYC is a pretty big city. It could also have something to do with the rainy weather during that specific day...

How do you Move to NYC?

    The last couple of weeks we have been scratching our heads trying to figure out what the best way to move really is. How are we going to move? I think we have settled on shipping our larger furniture, like the bed and bookshelves with a pod. That seems to be the most reasonable way, but we will see if we change our mind before the move actually happen. We are planning on going to NYC at the end of May with a smaller load of our stuff, and store that in a storage area outside the city. When we make the big move a couple of weeks later we hope that we will have a lot less stuff of course. 

Where in NYC are we going to Live?

    Well, that is a pretty easy question, but the details are more complicated. We are going to focus on Manhattan, and the area around and north of Columbia University. There are plenty of neighborhoods up there, Upper West Side, Washington Heights, Harlem, and Sugar Hill. North of that we have Hudson Heights, Fort George and Inwood. Those places look pretty nice, but they are unfortunately a little bit to far north. There are plenty of parks around there though, which would make that area ideal. We have screened the internet on how to get an apartment in New York, and Manhattan is of course to no ones surprise the most expensive place to be. While New York City is one of the most expensive US cities to live in, it is does not have the highest rent. Can you guess what city in the US have the highest rent? I'll give you the answer at the end of this post. Due to travel time to work we have to be around that area, unless we want to commute for more than 1 hr. The northern part of Manhattan have fewer skyscrapers, and fewer tourists, and I think we can find a nice place around there. In addition to actually finding a place you have to be careful about the ads you see online, there are many scams, and many people use false or stolen images to bait you and then tell you the place isn't available any longer, but then they say: here is another place, which more often is not a great place at all. You read stories about bedbugs, high crime areas and everything in between. Some people hire brokers, yeah brokers that charge 10-20% of the annual rent as a a fee you will never ever see again, in order for them to find a place. Some people pay 3000$/month for a studio apartment. We hope that we can get by without a broker, and still find a decent place. Time will tell. 

    What's your favorite place in New York? Have you spent some time at the northern part of Manhattan? So what city in the US have the highest rent? Well it is not too surprising but it is San Fransisco, CA. At least if you are comparing the median rent for 1 and 2 bedroom apartments.