When I told my colleagues that I moved into a basement apartment they wondered what went wrong. How did a nice middle class former homeowner end up in a basement? People say I should spin the story and call my home a garden apartment. But I call it what it is, a basement.
I gave up homeownership more than twenty years ago. After my husband died, I sold our ranch house in Jackson, Mississippi and moved with my youngest daughter to Wayne, Pennsylvania. The first apartment we rented was not a pleasant experience. The young mother who lived beneath our apartment complained when I swept the kitchen floor at 9 a.m. She said I kept her from sleeping in. That’s one reason why I’m happy now living in a basement. No one lives under me to complain.
After my lease ran out on that apartment, my middle daughter joined us and we moved into a furnished, stucco house built in the 1920s. It had its quirks. For example, the sun had turned portions of the royal blue shag carpet bright purple. Heat poured out of the vents upstairs, forcing us into t-shirts and shorts in the middle of winter, while the downstairs remained freezing cold.
After my youngest went off to college and my middle daughter got her own place, I moved into a one-bedroom on the second floor of a bland, brick apartment building. Youngest said it was cheaper and she wouldn’t be home that much anyway. This sufficed for many years. When my youngest was home from school, she slept on a single bed in the bedroom with me, and neither of us minded.
One night while living in this apartment I had a surreal experience. I woke up at 2 a.m. to hear a voice. “Help…Help…I’m in four.” I could barely hear him, but I became convinced he was in trouble. I threw on a robe and ran downstairs to apartment four. The door was unlocked, and as I entered a man called out, “I fell out of bed and I can’t get up.” I found the man lying on the floor in the bedroom. I called 911 and waited for the ambulance. Turns out, he had Parkinson’s disease. His arm had gotten stuck between the wall and the bed. Days later his friend thanked me with a box of four tomatoes.
Two of my daughters eventually settled in Atlanta, so I decided to move down. I moved into an apartment across from a Waffle House and next to a gun shop. Crime was a problem. My neighbor appeared to be on crack. I could hear her slurring her words, and her eyes were wide and eerie. Living next to a gun shop was a constant reminder that I might be a victim, so I moved into a more upscale complex with a pool. I felt I was living a life of luxury. My sunny apartment overlooked a lake. I still only had one bedroom. I just didn’t want to pay for two.
As the years went by, my nice apartment complex went downhill. My neighbors had mostly been retired people, but suddenly management was willing to rent to anybody. I cringed at the litter neighbors left in the parking lot and so many cars leaked oil everywhere. Still, I stayed.
And I never missed homeownership. When my husband was alive, we owned five houses. Dealing with the endless leaky faucets and freezing pipes and keeping the lawn mowed … I viewed homeownership as a burden. It was never a symbol of success or an American dream the way it is for some people. Even now, I see young adults scraping and scheming to pry into giant houses and giant mortgages. I just shake my head.
Finally, I got a notice that my apartment complex would be turned into condos. My youngest daughter found my basement apartment through a friend. I live in Georgia, not New York City, so it’s not like you see people’s shoes walking by your window. The house is on a woodsy lot down a dead-end street. I have an outside entrance.
My landlords are a nice young couple. I sometimes care for their dogs when they are out of town. My basement apartment is cool in the summer and heats up quickly in the winter.
A common downside to apartment living is washing clothes. Usually it’s a coin operated laundry room and you need to have plenty of quarters on hand. So imagine my joy when I found out my basement apartment has a washer and dryer. I would say the only downside is not having a dishwasher, which is fine when I cook for myself but an ordeal when I have company. Another problem is that when guests come they have to sleep on the couch. No one seems to mind though.
Across the street, some gigantic new houses have sprung up. The homeowners don’t have to worry about keeping up the yard or cooking or cleaning. They hire people to take care of that. Still, when I see a large house, I see all the work that would go into keeping it up. That’s not how I want to spend my time. Because I have lived in a rented apartment for so many years, I have had countless hours to spend doing things I love like reading and cooking and talking endlessly on the phone to my daughters.
That’s why I don’t regret my permanent exit from homeownership. That’s why I don’t think there’s any shame in living in a basement apartment. To me, living in a small, rented home means freedom, a life unencumbered.
