There is a stereotype about Italy that generally assumes that everything takes forever, that there is a huge amount of bureaucracy and red tape, and that it’s difficult generally to get anything done.  We’ve never really found that to be the case, and this trip is starting out to be no exception.

We arrived here on Monday the 9th of May.  On Tuesday we met up with the real estate agent/rent broker.  We wanted an apartment as close to the “Centro Storico” (old downtown) as possible.  We looked at a number of apartments, but none were in the area we wanted, and those outside of the area that looked promising were going to be too long of a wait.  Almost as an afterthought our agent showed us an apartment that really wasn’t “ready” yet.  It has been in the process of being remodeled, and while close to ready, it still has some rough edges.  But it has all new electrical wiring, new radiators and newly plastered and painted walls everywhere.  But it’s without a kitchen (i.e, the room for the kitchen is empty).  We can continue to eat in hotels for the time it takes to finish that up.

So, by Wednesday we had pretty much decided that we wanted this specific apartment, and here we are, Saturday morning, with keys!

There are still things to be done.  But we have a bed, a dresser, a dining room, a functional bathroom and keys.  Pretty quick if you ask me.

Here’s the guest room/den.

Come visit – and bring furniture 🙂