Not so much a city girl anymore.

I’m so glad my contract with SMOE has finally come to an end.  I guess what sucks about working for SMOE is if you don’t like your school, you’ll just have to stick it out or find your own alternatives.  SMOE teachers that choose to re-contract are stuck in their school for a total of three years before they are allowed to transfer to another school.  As for me, I didn’t want to stay another day at my crappy school so I decided to sacrifice life in Seoul and move to another city because I wanted to continue working for a public school.  Really not interested in working for private academies. Yes, I went through the long application and interview process all over again. And while filling the application, I realized that EPIK have changed their applications.  City preference was omitted and there was only an option of city or country.  Thank goodness, I found a sneaky way around it and got placed into my preferred city. 

So here I am in Daejeon.  So far everything has been going really well.  I like my school a lot and I like my studio.  This time around, I asked for housing subsidy and found my own place because last year’s experience was more than enough for me to handle.  Housing in Daejeon is a lot cheaper than Seoul so it’s pretty cost efficient.  Decent place for a reasonable price. Believe it or not, I much prefer living here.  I’ve been asked by so many why I moved from Seoul to Daejeon.  To be honest, I think Seoul is over rated.   It’s really not that nice living there but perfect for traveling!  (So if you ever get placed in cities other than Seoul it really isn’t that much of a disappoint.  Though others might go against my words. :P) There is a lot to see and do and food is delicious but the city is just too crowded and big to live in.  Crazy drivers and packed subway.   It takes forever to meet up with friends and from where I lived, taxing home at night from “the happening” (Gangnam, Hondae) would at least cost me 20 000 won( $20).  Just too overwhelming for simple me. But I got to say that shopping in Daejeon can’t be compared to Seoul.  They have everything there and if there’s one thing I miss the most it’d be shopping. 

Searching for my “One Room” in Daejoen.

Yes, I’ve finally found out what school I will be teaching in Daejeon so this Sunday I will travel to Daejeon to search for my place and move in, a week later.  Nothing to worry about because Korea is really fast paced.

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So woke up early Sunday to take a bus to Daejeon.  Visited the school I will be teaching at and started looking around that area.  Yes, I’m lazy and only want to live walking distance from my school so I could get the extra minutes of sleep. The location I’m teaching at is a pretty good area.  Close to two big universities so got lots of restaurant and bars.  Not comparable to my ghetto area in Seoul.  Only down side is, rent cost will be a little higher and size of the place is smaller because market is for university students.  Lucky for me, I have a Korean friend to help me out so things will be a lot easier.  Don’t need to worry about language barrier. 

A little background on Korea’s renting system.

Option one: Paying monthly rent and a small deposit known as “key money” in Korea.  In Daejeon, because housing isn’t that expensive, deposit is only around 500 000 won ($500) and you get it back when you finish your contract. 

Option two: Giving a bigger deposit and saving on monthly rent.  Apparently each 1 million won deposit ($1000) reduces 10 000 won ($10) of your monthly rent.  So if rent cost is 500 000 won and you pay 1 million deposit, your monthly rent will be reduced to 490 000. 

I do know some Koreans put 38 million deposits and don’t pay monthly rent at all.  Apparently, unit owners use that money to invest and make more money.  If you’re thinking about putting a big deposit I would suggest going to a real estate agent so they can check the owner’s asset and debts.  Just to be safe.  I have heard of cases that the owner went bankrupt and ran away with the tenants deposits. 

So here’s two ways you can go about in finding a place in Korea.  

1)     Looking by yourself and save real estate charges. 

If you look around the neighborhood you want to live in, you will find postings by the entrance of the apartments.  Usually, there are a lot of postings.  So if you have a Korean with you, you can just ask them to call up the number. Often, there is someone in the building that can show you around if not, they will give you the code into the building for you to look yourself.  The thing that is annoying about these postings is you don’t know if it’s from the owner or real estate. 

2)     Ask a real estate to help you out.
There are tons of real estate agencies in the neighborhood.  Look for shops that say (부동산) and if you walk in and tell them what you want they will show you several units. I heard that contracting with a real estate is safer than contracting directly with the owner.  Keep in mind that some buildings ask for a bit deposit (you do get it back at the end of the contract though).   The only down side of going to a real estate is you need to pay a service fee.  It’s a percentage of the unit’s price.

As for me, we started off searching by ourselves.  But, while we were searching there were at least 3 real estate agents that approached us and showed us around.  So in the end, I picked one fro the real estate agent and paid a service fee of 150 000 won.