Archive for January 5th, 2008
Life & travel in Bangalore
Happy new year. Its been quite some time since I’ve updated my blog. My focus for this year would be to update my blog more often than what I did last year.
I’ve got some things to share about my traveling & house hunting experience in Bangalore. The first thing anyone does after coming to Bangalore (for that matter any place) is search for accommodation.
Firstly go get yourself a newspaper like AD Mag (which is available in any local book store) which will cost you Rs. 10, that should solve half the problem. What next? Go to Yahoo! Maps India and get familiar with the places around your office (or wherever you want to find a place). Once you get a hint of places surrounding the locality you are looking for, just go though the ad’s in the newspaper. Check the distance from your office to the one mentioned in the ad using the direction service of Y! maps. By the time you go through all the ad’s from the paper you will get a rough idea of real estate prices in Bangalore.
You have the distance, route, contact number. What are you waiting for? Just call up and inquire. Chances are very high that by the time you call up, the Flat/Apartment would be already occupied by a person like you (who was early to get there). Go ahead keeping in mind how you will pay the owner just in case you like the place. A friend of mine missed a couple of opportunities as he had not carried his cheque book along.
Traveling in Bangalore can be tuff at times (specially after evening) with rickshaw drivers demanding more money. Its all fine during the day. Try and get into rickshaws with a digital meter. That will surely save you some money & let you track the distance traveled. I haven’t had any bad experiences with the rickshaw drivers yet.
I know that I didn’t mention any of those sites on the web which have information about houses/apartments.
I tried a couple of sites like www.sulekha.com and www.adsbangalore.com. The former wont give the contact information of the person who posted the ad & the latter has very less options for sorting the search results as per the my convenience. In most cases people are are in shock when they receive an inquiry call about the flat/apartment. Either the ad posted is very old or the place is already sold out. A lot of stale content lays in these sites with no one really bothered to update them. Lastly, if nothing works for you, get in touch with a real estate broker. If the broker cant find a place as per your requirements ask for some contact details of other brokers & he will refer you to other brokers. They have a very good network & yes, be prepared to shell out a months’s rent or a healthy amount to pay the broker in case you find a house with their help.