So it turns out that the Center City residential market is really hot these days. The Philadelphia Business Journal reported recently that 2,500 soon-to-be-developed residential units will cause the vacancy rate to "shoot up" from 1.6% to a whopping (yes, heavy on the sarcasm) 3.4%. So naturally, we this is where/when we had to be looking for an apartment.

It wasn't easy... Looking for an August move-in in June was aparently much too early, and July just didn't seem to have as much to offer. Many of our responses to craigslist adds went unanswered; many more just to inform us that the apartment we like was already taken (even in one case where we responded only two hours after the original post). Much of what was left in our price range was either tiny or totally dilapidated... but such are the casualties of a successfully turned around real estate market.

But, after much trial and tribulation, we nailed down a great place with about a week to spare. I'll spare most of the gory details, but here are a couple pictures worth sharing.

Yours truly, robotically packing dishes, one at a time. And for this, I'm dubbed a hero.

Washington Avenue - in Philadelphia, it's apparently totally acceptable to park a truck in the middle of the street

This is what it looks like when you pack all you own into boxes and put them in one room of your new apartment.

But all the craiglist headaches, fears of homelessness, and strain of moving (good thing we've got good friends and family), are worth it for a view like this.

We were definitely priced out of the neighborhood we originally wanted to be in... but this one will work out just great. But I'm assuming we weren't the only ones, so the question is... where has everybody landed? Where will they continue to land?