Briathrail // Albert 2MNG

WHERE TO FIND RENTAL LISTINGS

In following my personal criteria closely, I chose three tools to use for searching:

1. PropertyGuru – it is still the “premier” rental lookup platform in Singapore. It has robust search filters, lots of pictures, and at least many of the listed units are from verified and registered property agents. One advantage it has in its filter is the ability to restrict search by area.
   
2. Rently – it is a new-ish rental lookup platform similar to PropertyGuru. It also has passable search filters (not as robust as PropertyGuru), lots of pictures, but unlike PropertyGuru that tries to emphasize that their platform has verified property agents, Rently goes by just putting a verification badge on “verified” landlords. But at least their UI is more friendly than PropertyGuru. Also their filter has the ability to show a big map of Singapore with all the rent listings marked.
   
3. Facebook Groups – this one is the “Wild West” of rental lookups. There’s no filters, the listed prices can be dubious, pictures can be grainy, and the listed are a mix of a) main tenants looking to fill an upcoming room vacancy, b) families looking to have an extra master/common bedroom be monetized, and c) scammers. PropertyGuru and Rently also has scammers – extremely low chance but never zero, while Facebook Groups don’t have that kind of vetted environment.

For Facebook Groups, I chose to subscribe to these:

1. Property/Rooms For Rent/Sale ❤︎ Singapore
2. PINOY/KABAYAN SINGAPORE ROOM FOR RENT
3. Filipino Room For Rent Singapore – Go iLiveSG.com
4. Pinoy Room For Rent in Singapore
5. Rent Room, HDB Flat, Apartment, Condominium, Landed House in Singapore
6. Room For Rent In Singapore
7. Pinoy SG Rooms for Rent
8. Singapore Room Rent

I did go 50-50 on the targets – 4 of them are free-for-all listing for any race while 4 of them are specifically aimed for Filipino OFWs in Singapore.

My filters for PropertyGuru and Rently followed my wishes closely as well – sort by newest, SGD 1800 max (although I set my low to 800), move-in date by November 1, any property type, rental type either room or studio.

I spent time from middle of August to early October on those 3 platforms, always looking at them during free time, work commutes, weekends, any time I could have the headspace to spare. I settled into a routine where I just “like” or mark/save as a favorite any listing I found passable during the weekdays and use the weekend to take a closer look and filter more out and decide which ones should I call to visit and inspect.

I have to say, weeks of this sucked, mentally. I’m a “settle this shit early and be done with it” kind of guy. For me who was anxious to settle this urgent matter ASAP, the inability to pin down an acceptably good location wore down on me until the first week of October when I spotted one that checked a lot of my boxes with minimal caveats, and I settled on it right away.

All in all, I ended up visiting/inspecting 7 other places before I settled on the last one. They checked some of my boxes, but they had serious compromises that made me go “hmmm good, but allow me some time to decide” because I felt something was off.

Moving was also such a pain. I’ll talk about that in the next few pages in great detail.

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