What is reasonible rent for an apartment in SL?

I've been considering getting an apartment in SL lately. I don't require a whole lot of space so I'm looking at apartments with a 50 to 100 prim limit. I don't want to have to spend over half of my sl job pay on an apartment but so far all of the apartments I've looked at require 250L or more. Is there anything out there that's cheaper and that would allow me to decorate my own place?

Your smarter financial play is going premium.

L$300 a week in stipend = $59.80 USD a year
Tier-free 512m = saves $60 USD a year for 117 prims

Cost of average 512 m parcel = L$1500 ($5.77 USD one time)
Cost of yearly premium membership = $72.00

$77.77 USD in = $119.80 in value received

Isn't the land free now with the new home deal for premiums?

That's not in full swing yet, but yes. A new Premium account would get a free 512 m2 plot, AND a house, AND an allowance of 117 prims, tier-free.

There are some catches. You can't terraform. You can't re-sell the land (but I think you can abandon it and buy another 512 parcel with your allowance). You have to use the house LL gives you (you have several choices of style).

It's a pretty good deal for new residents, and it will impact the low-end rental market in some way. We don't know yet if that impact will be negative (everyone living in Linden homes instead of renting) or positive (Linden home residents moving up to larger and nicer places).

Another possibily is that content creation for low prim furniture takes off in a big way, all that spare land on mainland gets picked up by new retailers setting up shop?

My *guess* is, both. Cheaper rentals might lose out, other than skyboxes, for privacy reasons, especially on mature and adult land.

But once someone gets their teeth into ownership, they might eventually want to 'move on up.'

Hey that's not a bad idea actually... get the house and decorate it... then abandon it and go use your 512 sq meters somewhere else. Knowing the Lindens... the abandoned land will probably sit there for a couple years before anyone notices and returns your stuff, and you could keep on using it the whole time. Hmmm...

For what she wants to pay, it is not cheaper to own. She only wants to pay 250L/wk. $77.70 is20220L (@260L/USD), and that is 80 weeks at the rate she wants to pay.

There are plenty of cheap rentals out there. She can find lots of places that will rent at that rate, or less, if she tries.

Actually....in the Old New York sim there's a building with low rent, low prim units and it's very cool. If you're looking for something that has an authentic feel to it.....check it out. Look for Old New York.....and Staten Island. These 2 sims combine to create the city and it's a fantastic area. I believe the building that has the low rent units is the Chelsae building.

Talk to Sarah Nerd and say Des sent you, from official forums. She had an offer of four apartments for free just because she likes life and activity around, and she's a real class act. They are all taken, last I heard, but in the event of a cancellation you'll be all set.

Almost anywhere else, I'd say a free apartment is a real risk, as people do that and then get tired of it, and dump the land. But I think she will stick with this, she's been in the business for ages (not so much for business any more) and has a great reputation for being incredibly decent.

There's also roleplay sims.

In Karamoon you can rent a room in one of their hotels for 50L a week, I think. You have to dress in theme when outside the room, but conceivably you could just log in and out of there.

The Berlin 1920 sim also had rooms for rent very cheap, at least, last time I visited.

VJ Developments does nice rooms with 50 prims for 99L.

Here: http://sites.google.com/site/vjdevelopments/Home

Ami Rents starts off 20Prim/50L a week and goes up from there. Most of them are Skyboxes that are pretty far from each other so you don't have to listen to other conversations. They have changeable walls...

Lol the only thing I don't have is the location but I'll edit as soon as I can log in tonight.

But the post mentions stipend. Net of stipend, an annual premium membership costs L$60 per week. That's a pretty good price for 117 prims in a Linden Home, or much the same for owning a 512.