I graduated college with a sizable amount of debt! Between paying student loans, health insurance and car insurance, I barely had enough in my budget to afford a cheap dwelling to live in.
- I chose my living arrangements based on the cost of rent and ended up in a rundown location within walking distance of my task.
I’d found an entry level position that didn’t pay genuinely much and needed to trim my expenses in every way imaginable. I lived with a roof that leaked, squeaky floors, low water pressure and questionable electrical wiring for several years. The refrigerator wasn’t frosty enough to prevent meat from spoiling and the toilet ran all the time. The oven smoked so badly I had to take the batteries out of the smoke detector. I tried actually attempted to run the air conditioner appliance because it used too much energy… Whenever the cooling appliance started up, my electric bill basically doubled. Also, the air conditioner appliance filled the dwelling with such a musty smell that I regularly got a headache. It dripped water, tended to make a loud sound and struggled to put out enough cool air to make much of a difference. Sadly, I had no choice but to rely on the heating appliance in the winter months. I’d bundle up in layers of sweaters, set the thermostat as low as tolerable and shiver. The heating appliance was genuinely inefficient, seemed to run non all the time and spewed a good deal of dust. Whenever it started up, the lights flickered. I worried about air quality and safety complications, but my landlord wasn’t helpful. When I finally got a pay raise at work, I found a better dwelling to live in.