1. Floor-to-ceiling windows.
Maybe it’s because I spent five years washing windows, but when I see “Floor-to-ceiling” windows advertised as a key selling point and I see windows that are not in fact stretching from the floor to the ceiling... I get angry. Like this awful, awful example on Craigslist.
Here’s what floor to ceiling windows actually look like, grabbed from a 2 second Google search. This is a super common window layout in Seattle high-rise apartments built in the last two decades. A million times nicer than the *luxury* garbage that’s being built locally and offered for a similar price. The windows are a key part of elevating the design.
2. Poor room layouts. Now this one is going to be dependent on the needs of the people living inside, but as I was scrolling through floorplans I realized some of these places seemed to be designed without ever once giving a single thought to the inhabitants.
Here’s an example. There was a 2bd/2.5bath townhouse I came across. Upstairs, behind three sepperate doors you had two bedrooms, and the half bathroom. Downstairs... You had a full bathroom next to the garage and another full bathroom at the other end of the floor. This place was built in the last decade.
WTF?! Having to go downstairs to shower, and having to share a half bathroom with a roommate when there are another two bathrooms basically wasting space? Ugh.
Here’s a *good* layout as a pallette cleanser. 2bed/2bath apartment. The entire left wing is a master suite. Bedroom, walk-in closet, private bathroom. The entire right side is a master suite. Bedroom, walk-in closet, private bathroom. Maximum separation for maximum privacy, and full suites for each person. It’s even symmetrical!
3. It seems like there is absolutely nobody currently building apartments at any price range with anything other than shit-tier workmanship and materials. From $600 1 bedrooms to $4500 1 bedrooms, these places are all using the same contractor-grade fixtures, cheap carpet, thin underlayment, rental-spec appliances, etc. And they look like they’ve been put together by a couple of drunk apprentices. Nothing like having a just-built luxury apartment complex charging $3000 a month for studios that have shower pans that are angled away from the drain and windows that fail within a month of installation...
4. All the cool industrial lofts are gone :( I count... Zero on seattle CL. I want to live in an old brick school. A firestation. An abandoned warehouse. *sigh*. Someday.
And number 5. You’d think prices would drop given economic disaster, insane unemployment levels, world-wide pandemic, etc. That does not seem to be the case. Maybe they’re just not rising *as quickly*
Woo-hoo.