Housing Update

So I know many of you have been wondering what actually happened with the potential scam I was involved in. Good news, it wasn’t a scam! Turns out it’s completely legit for an agent/landlord to ask for all of the rent up front in cash, go figure. It took me a few trips to the bank to get all of the cash on hand. Had to go to the main Barclay’s branch and give them my passport to make such a huge withdrawal. After waiting for about 1.5hrs, when it was my turn to get my money the guy handed me stacks of 10s and 5s. Yes, 1500 GhC (~1500USD) in small bills! I had these huge wads of cash that made my heart thump as I walked out the bank trying to catch a cab, hoping no one could really see through my purse as I imagined they all could. That aside, today I finally made the deposit and by next Wednesday should be able to move in! In the end, I refused to pay all 6 months so negotiated to put down 2 months rent so she can furnish the place, and then pay month-to-month after that.

I’m really excited about the place, I think it’s cute – pictures coming soon! It’s pretty much one room in a larger house shared with other expat types on extended business trips. Only thing that’s not so great is that the owner has these two large guard dogs that bark fiercely when she’s not around. She claims that once they “know me” it’ll be fine. I’m of course really skeptical about this as I’m generally terrified of animals. Yeah, all animals. But at the point I realized she had these two huge dogs (they were caged when I first saw the place so I had no idea), it was already time to hand over the deposit, and I didn’t have the energy to start the apartment hunt over. She also made a good point in noting that she couldn’t run her business (renting out rooms) if her dogs attacked/killed all her customers. This was quite a convincing argument, so I obliged and the deal is done.