Astoria is a nice spot to live! I'll send any leads I can find your way. I definitely know of a two-bedroom that currently has one spot open for July 1, but that leaves out your other friends, of course.

The first time I came to NYC, I tried to do a Craigslist house swap for it.

I was amazed by how many people there expressed interest, to the point of committing to the time, swap, etc., and then when I did not hear any followup from them, said, when I contacted them, "oh turns out we can't do it, sorry."

I eventually gave up trying.

Well, it was hell when I was apartment hunting in the 1980s in Brooklyn and Manhattan, so not surprised it is still awful.

Is there any way to do an AskMe about this? That may draw a wider response.

Messy people = somewhat bad
Hallway renovation/construction = genuinely bad
Bedbugs = really very very bad
Constant drum circles = HELLMOUTH-LEVEL VORTEX OF EVIL.

Signed,
Resident of the (apparent) drum circle capital of the West Coast.
(With much sympathy and best wishes for your speedy relocation)

Lemme guess. Portland?

The people-wrangling is the hardest. Everybody has to be ready to go at the same time!? In New York?! Impossible, I say, Impossible!

OH HAI I HEARD YOU ARE LOOKING FOR A ROOMMATE TO LIVE IN ASTORIA?

I may be that person. I'm kind of desperate actually to move out no later than July 15 (dealing with sketch situation as well that is making me uncomfortable) as you can tell by my all caps. Anyhow, as long as you are not weirded out by living with a metachat/metafilter person I may be that person who will move in with you. Hell, I lived with a mefite for two years, so he's my reference.

Contact me at dakkdari at hotmail dot com. Or you can grab me on aim at filerror404.

Also, ThePinkSuperHero might've be thinking of me up there. I just have to say, I feel your pain. Basically I've been trying to find a roommate to take over a bedroom in my, "pretty OK by what I've seen out there" 2br apartment. It's been a disaster.

I've had issues with flaky ass people. The worse is the people who promise to stop by and set up a time, then just don't show up. Not even a quick text or email saying "sorry, gotta cancel/found a place."

The past month and a half of roommate searching has made me deeply hate my life and New York =(.

Either way, I'm looking to move out at this point because of that because all these people promising to stop by, promising to get back to me have just left me in this precarious end-of-the-month situation. And, yea, I'm not going to be stuck with a whole apartment. I am also seriously over wishy-washy people. Like, officially.

So far apartment hunting itself hasn't been without its weirdass moments either. I had one dude whose face all of the sudden contorted and went off on a mini-rant about an old roommate who bounced checks AT me when I asked if he did credit checks. I was basically asking to make sure there weren't any hidden fees, and some landlords in this city require it. I get that he was probably traumatized by a terrible roommate experience, but he was talking to me like all of the sudden he'd just realize I'm some scammer trying to scam him out of money just for asking.

Also, ThePinkSuperHero might've be thinking of me up there. Of course I was :D