New Orleans Real Estate

Renting a home in New Orleans
Almost every day I get folks looking for a place in New Orleans. It can be confusing and quite a daunting task, especially since one has to wrap a culture, place, smells, bugs, people and so many things hitting ones senses while you are still trying to figure out how to eat a crawfish.

Here are a few tips;

1) Pets: Please note, most places do not accept pets, specifically dogs and dogs of certain breeds and size.
Bugs, fleas and associated partners flying insects thrive here all year long being in the sub tropics and all…and pet / flying pest management can be testy. If a decent place with hardwood floors and all the fixings does take pets, expect to pay a very high deposit and expect to not get it back..because hardwood floors and 100 yr old doors are hard to come by.

2) Neighborhoods: Unless you are here it is pretty much impossible to really get a feel for the places…so a bad picture would be sketchy, and most Realtors do the minimum with pics and rarely video.
3) A home relative to what one is used to: New Orleans is special…part of that special is most of the rentals will be renovated homes that are 50 to 150 years old…this means modern conveniences are adaptations of old with new. If one would like a modern recently built place you may pay substantially more for rent. The really good deal is the last place which will not last long. The CBD is only 5 miles from the campus and one can take the street car but maybe too far away.

To help with budgeting:
1) Washer and dryer in the unit: +$100 to a comparable without one
2) Off street parking: +$50 a month to a comparable without parking
3) Central Air & Heat: +$100 to $300 a month to a comparable just with window units

Last but not least, one pays electric and gas in most all cases. The number 1 question is, “what are the utilities a month?” and that all depends on the end user. Expect utilities to run $80-$200 a month depending on the age of the building and renovations done.

In New Orleans, priority #1 is location and neighborhood. Without a car consider a place close to groceries like Whole Foods.
This is a biking town, and many folks even with cars will ride their bikes or take the streetcar on St Charles. The streetcar is more a moment of Zen vs a bullet train..but many use it as their basic transportation. The street cars in Midcity although regular can be erratic on weekends on nights keeping to their own secret schedule.

Parades are part of the culture and greatly impact our lives here. As such the demand means apartments on the Parade routes may demand more than the side streets…so do some research on “where de pass” before you make your final decision.

Need help finding that special place? Call us at (504)615-2333