Uh,.. in my dreams!
ith moving to Berlin still many months away, we have already started to keep an eye on the market. Berlin is a highly desirable city and while the rental rates are not anywhere near San Francisco or Manhattan, it is still, from what we hear, a highly competitive process to score a good place. Something like preschool transcripts and every award you have ever received should be included on your application (yikes). So while the reality is we might end up in something closer to a cardboard box, considering our crazy dog, less-than-stellar German and sub-4.0 high school GPAs, we are still beginning the process with optimism - and a wishlist for the perfect apartment.Here at the tail end of winter, it's easy to understand why good natural light tops the list. Coming from sunny California, German winter is one of the most difficult things about living here (after the German language and their affinity for paperwork, of course) - it's long, cold and very grey. Having blue skies any time within a good six-month window is reason enough for calling in sick to work. Seriously. There's a reason that come spring, people will literally strip down to their underwear while biking through the park just to stop for five minutes and soak up some precious vitamin D. So it's easy to understand why maximizing what sunshine we do get - grey haze included - is key.
These Berlin listings look like they would indeed be a dream come true...
OMG, are you dying? I'm dying. I want to move in here right now.
... unfortunately, short of robbing a bank, they will likely have to stay just a dream. Aside from 'penthouses' - which often get the best light - being a bit of a financial stretch, they also have the added burden of being of the top of what is almost always here in Germany an elevator-less building. On the plus side, we would have fantastically in-shape asses.
Our natural light reality will probably look a bit more like this:
This is very similar to what we have now and I love the light we get in our apartment. While we don't have any floor-to-ceiling windows (that's right, no balcony - boo!) and have just as many grey days as Berlin does, we still somehow manage to feel like we're not living in some dark little box. I think the high ceilings really help combat this as well (adding to the list...). Here's to sunny days when we arrive in Berlin and many windows with which to enjoy them!
Photos from listings on null-provision.de and immobilienscout24.de
Daily Drop Cap by Jessica Hische
