The Cost of Moving Twice in Six Weeks

I got added to the lease on a Wednesday. On Thursday, my housemate told me the landlord was kicking us out.

In January, I signed the lease on a magic house. It contained two housemates whom I had known since I was gangly and young — people I actually wanted to live with. It was a five-minute walk from the train station. Between the terrace and the train were two adorable, historic corner shops, an old tacky pub, and a friendly ginger cat who would press himself against car tyres, waiting for you to come sit with him and watch suburban sunsets.

I got added to the lease on a Wednesday. On Thursday, my new housemate called. “They’re kicking us out,” she said in a huff. I looked around at my boxes of possessions and knew the magic house was gone.

I live in Australia, and in the state of Victoria, renters can get evicted for all sorts of bad reasons, but they can also be asked to leave because of things that genuinely have nothing to do with them. This was one of those times — we had not been technically evicted but given a “Notice to Vacate,” an official message stating that our landlord needed the house back so they could live in it, and we should probably move away. Moving in one day and being told to leave the next isn’t ideal, but it turns out it isn’t illegal either — my housemates had been in the place for a while, I’d just got caught up in a game of house Tetris by arriving later. Luckily, this type of situation won’t blacklist you from future homes. Our estate agent was kindly and bubbling with praise.

That didn’t change the fact that we had to leave, though — and moving because you’re forced to isn’t cheap. Home ownership is a hot-button issue in Australia right now, because in our capital cities a house is worth at least six years’ of median income ($80,704 AUD, $59,474 USD). I do not know anyone younger than their mid-30s with a home. Of course, renting can demand massive chunks of cash too, especially in situations like this where a lease goes pear-shaped.

We looked for places as a threesome for a few weeks before deciding to split up. One of my housemates found another place and the remaining two of us eventually landed a little apartment—but not after I had blown the majority of my emergency fund on the house search. Here’s what it cost me in Australian dollars; I’ll convert to USD at the end.

Bond: $915 for the first house, and $1,200 for the new one — $2,115 all up. Months later that first $915 was returned.

Petrol: $100 for driving across the city over the four weekends to look at properties.

Ikea: $200 over two trips.

Appliances: Now that we were splitting up we needed essentially two houses’ worth of stuff, meaning there were gaps to fill, including:

– A new vacuum, $200

– Kettle, $20

– Knives and saucepans, $80

– Washing machine, $150

– A refrigerator that would actually fit in our new place, given the one we had was too big: $400

Rent: $600 in double-up weekly rent payments while transitioning between the two houses.

Cleaning: We said a hard no to paying for a professional cleaner, which was a mistake for our mental health — and still meant $20 each on cleaning supplies, garbage bags, and trips to charity shops.

Comfort food: The thing about giving away all your furniture and your fridge is that you run out of places to eat and store food. $50 on take out for those final weeks.

Personal favours: Still paying friends and family off with drinks, lifts and Taylor Swift karaoke.

TOTAL: $3,935 AUD, which converts to $2,900 USD. (Not cheap, no matter where you live.)

The last day of our lease in the perfect house was a Wednesday, a disgusting humid evening spent carting broken chairs and beer kegs that belonged to previous tenants into the street. I had lived there all of five weeks. Things had turned out well, considering—which is a little terrifying, because of how very lucky we were.

This little misadventure had wiped out my emergency fund, but at least I had an emergency fund. We’d been told to leave, but had found other places to go. This was success, with a nearly $4K price tag. Can you imagine what failure in this game would cost?

I can—because until I rebuild my emergency fund, I’ll have to worry about when I might need to move again.

Emma Koehn is a writer from Melbourne, Australia.

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