Advice finding an apartment or home to rent (Denver, Westminster: extended stay, apartment complexes)

[jiannarene]

My family and I will be moving to the Denver area in early March. Neither my husband nor I have jobs yet. I have found that it is hard for potential employers to take us seriously with a California address and unfortunately we do not have anyone in the Denver area whose address we feel comfortable “borrowing.” We will both be looking for full-time work – ANY full-time work – as soon as we arrive. We are not above taking a part-time or quick service job if necessary to bring in income.

We have three children. My eldest is in kindergarten. Since we are moving in the middle of the school year it is essential we set up residency ASAP so he will have as little interruption in his education as possible. We were hoping to find a place willing to rent to us without already having income in Colorado.

We have about $4000 saved up for this move and my sister, who lives in California and has an excellent full-time job, is willing to co-sign for us if necessary. We have poor credit. She, however, has excellent credit (mid to upper 700s).

We are not incredibly fussy on the area we live in, just as long as the schools are at least average. I have been looking in the Thornton or Westminster areas as they seem to be cheaper and cheaper is better until we are up on our feet.

I was looking at staying at an extended stay motel but that will eat through our savings extremely quickly and I know will not be sufficient to get my son enrolled in school so this would be an absolute last resort.

Does anyone know of any apartment complexes or private renters that might be willing to rent to us or suggestions?

[meeshell]

I think finding a place to rent without an income will be tricky.

Thornton and Westminster are great choices for you, though. Northglenn is an option, too, it's kinda squished between the two. If you're not sure where you'll be working, I would try to find something near I-25 or US-36 to have easy access to alot of areas.

[jiannarene]

Thanks for the info, meeshell. I will check out Northglenn for sure. I've put together a list of quite a few apartment complexes and am going to start calling them next week. Hopefully someone will be willing to work with us. *crossing fingers*

[80skeys]

I suggest craigslist where you can probably find homeowners who are willing to be more flexible.

[Willy702]

I've been going through a somewhat related situation and posted about it a few weeks ago. Here is what I have been finding the last few weeks:

1. About a third of the places I talked with said no job or employment offer letter, no rental.
2. About a third are willing to consider, but not in your circumstances. They want something like 6-9 months of rent in savings you can show proof of. In other words a savings or checking account with at least this amount over a period of 3 or more months. Doesn't sound like you can meet this requirement. They have told me they may or may not require an additional deposit, but said it would be for no more than one extra month's rent.
3. The last third are your targets and you just have to play into the desperation. If you ask today for a place in a month they probably aren't desperate enough. If you ask them for next week and the place is vacant with no prospective tenant they play ball. I have seen a few places like this, all either the owner trying to rent it out or a management company doing the offering, not apartment complexes. Yesterday a hungry owner was asking me if there was any way I could move in this week and knocked $50 a month off the price. I'm not quite set to move yet so I declined, but its clear there are opportunities for you to work with.

Just embrace this as the situation on the ground, I've been scratching my head over it. There are people with jobs who are far worse off than I am, who wonder how they will pay the rent this month, yet some landlords would prefer to take them. So just call up every suitable listing and mention your situation first and you'll eventually get a few potential places to look at.