Sublets in Chicago for Visiting Students?

April 3, 2004 4:14 PM

Two very nice friends of mine-- art students from London-- are coming to Chicago for 6 months beginning next September. They are planning on finding a shared apartment through the internet. This sounds like a recipe for heart break to me. Is there a good way to trade apartments, or even a way to find out about sublets in Chicago. Even a recommendation for a less expensive but safe and integrated neighborhood would be great. I used to know the city well, but I image it's changed a lot in the last ten years. Any ideas I could pass on?
posted by gesamtkunstwerk to travel & transportation around Chicago, IL (6 answers total)

what kind of rents are they looking to pay? how far are they willing to travel every day? are they going to school while they are here, and if so which one?

that will help for neighborhood recommendations.

oh, and craigslist is a great resource.
posted by sugarfish at 4:49 PM on April 3, 2004

i'll second craigslist, its very good.
posted by sgt.serenity at 5:22 PM on April 3, 2004

You can generally find cheap apartments, mostly sublets, through uchi.marketplace. Most of them will be in Hyde Park, of course.
posted by kenko at 5:49 PM on April 3, 2004

My usual approach is to find either a hostel or in-town friend to stay at for a week or two while furiously searching the town for an adequate apartment.

The one time I did use the internet to find a place before arriving in town, I ended up in an over-priced building-job with perhaps the most annoying man I've ever had the misfortune to meet, much less live with. (6am, monday, march 4, 2000: crash as bathroom sink breaks off of wall, followed by steady stream of high-pitched obscenities in an upstate-NY accent for the next three or four hours. "What a fucking COD-JOB!")

If you're a really good friend, I'd reccommend offering them floorspace long enough for them to find a real dwelling.
posted by kaibutsu at 3:36 AM on April 4, 2004

Thanks for the responses. I will definitely tell them about Craig list. Does anyone know if Bucktown is still a nice, not too expensive neighborhood?
posted by gesamtkunstwerk at 10:52 AM on April 4, 2004

A friend of mine lived in Bucktown for about two years before moving back to New York. I visited the place a couple of times and found it to be a pretty nice, fairly inexpensive area, which is going through a round of gentrification that reminds me a bit of places in Brooklyn like Carroll Gardens. Lots of new restaurants and young people. This was in 2002, by the way.
posted by lackutrol at 3:18 PM on April 4, 2004