Getting started in the USA

So, you have your visa, you have your tickets, and you are getting on the plane to go to the USA with the hopes of working and living there. It is a daunting task, but it has been done before. Don’t forget, the USA is a nation of immigrants. Italians, Germans, English, Poles, and Russians too. Immigration has been a tradition in the USA since the first immigrants arrived, probably across the Bering Straits from what is today….. Russia!

One of the main things about moving to a new location is finding appropriate housing. That is where our focus will be.

If you have family in the USA, you will probably be going to stay with them at first, but remember the old maxim; guests and fish smell after three days. You will soon want your own place.

We in the USA refer to an ‘American Dream.’ That is the dream all people have of owning their own home. In America, as everywhere else, that is a dream people have, and they work hard to realize it. Usually though, a person needs to rent for a while before you can buy. The advantages to renting are myriad. You don’t have taxes to pay, you don’t have as high maintenance costs, there are a lot less responsibilities when you rent a house than when you own a house. Also, practically speaking, most lending institutions want a 5 year track record of employment before they will lend money to someone to buy a house, so renting is usually going to be the best option in the beginning.

The variety, costs, and quality of housing in the USA varies greatly. Usually, the larger the city, and the closer it is to a coast, the more expensive the housing costs. For example, in New York City, housing is very expensive. It is not at all uncommon to find a flat that is 1 room for more than $1000.00 per month. And that is if you can find it! New Yorkers are notorious for their ingenuity in pursuit of housing. One of the oldest manners to find an apartment that is vacant in New York is to go to the morgue, find out who has just died, then go to see if they lived alone. It is a very competitive market for the renters there. The reasons are simple. Very little space available in relation to the number of people who want to rent. To a similar, though less intense degree, the same can be said of California. Due to the lure of the beaches, the glamour, and the lifestyle, California is a prime real estate area in the US, and if you are going to live there, expect to pay $1000.00 or more for almost any small apartment.

On the other hand, the middle of the country is considerably less expensive. The USA is a big country, and to give specific examples that will work for everyone is impossible. In light of this, I am going to outline the costs, and procedures of renting an apartment, or a house, in a very typical city away from the coasts, in the middle of the USA. The examples I give can be extrapolated to other areas with a varying degree of accuracy, but if you stay in the middle section of America, it is going to be fairly accurate.

Much in the way Americans think of Moscow when they think of Russia, or Paris when they think of France, many people think of New York when they think of America. There are a lot of other places that can offer a person a wonderfully full life, sometimes preferable to the megalopolis feel of the Big Apple. I want to introduce you to one of the alternatives to New York for the person who is going to the USA. The city I will choose is St. Louis Mo. Now, most of you have probably never heard of St. Louis, but it has a small Russian community. In the last census, there were over 13,000 people who identified themselves as Russian or having Russian ancestry. It has an Orthodox church, museums, opera house, historical significance, sports teams, and a lot more to offer. The St. Louis zoo is one of the preeminent zoos in the world. The Missouri Botanical Gardens, Gateway Arch, historical neighborhoods, and surrounding areas like Hannibal, (Birthplace of Mark Twain.) make St. Louis a culturally rich environment for its residents.

St. Louis has 2.5 million people in the metropolitan area. The average income is about 26,000 dollars per year, which ranks 26th of all the metropolitan areas in the US. St. Louis issues about 75,000 new building permits per year, which ranks 24th among the 270 metropolitan areas in the USA. The population breaks down as 81% white, 17.6% black, and the rest a mixture of Hispanic, Asian, etc. Among the universities in St. Louis are St. Louis University, a Jesuit college which features St. Louis Childrens hospital among it’s many services to the community. There is also University of Missouri, St. Louis, which is the branch of the state of Missouri’s college, and Washington University, home to it’s world famous law school. In health care, Barnes Hospital has long been recognized as one of the leading centers for cancer patients, as well as heart transplants. Economically, St. Louis has a very diverse economy. Home to TWA Airlines, Lambert Field is one of the busier airports in the USA. General Motors, Chrysler, and Ford all have automobile plants in St. Louis. Budweiser breweries, the largest brewery in the world is headquartered in St. Louis, as is Ralston Purina and many other international corporations. In short, there is a lot to do, jobs to be found, and resources for a full life in St. Louis.

Now, how about finding a place to live.

The easiest, most affordable way to get started is to rent an apartment. This is a very simple, inexpensive procedure, and can be accomplished in a day or two. Simply pick up a newspaper, look under the rental section, and find the ads where apartments are advertised. Go to the location, talk to the staff, tour the property, and if you like what you see, fill out an application. Sometimes there will be a fee of anywhere from 10-50 dollars for the application, usually refundable if you don’t rent there. It will take the application several hours to process, maybe even as long as a day, so my suggestion is to go check out the neighborhood. Go to the local police department and ask the officers what the reputation is of the apartments you are considering moving into. They can sometimes tell you things you may want to know. Sometimes an area that looks wonderful during the daytime can transform itself into a gang and drug infested territory at night. Go to the local school and see what it looks like. Is it well kept? Do you like the general appearance. If it is open, go inside and meet the principal. Check the availability of stores, transportation, healthcare providers, and anything else that might be of particular interest to you. Once you decide to move into a place, you will usually be required to sign a lease of 6 months to a year, and you want to make sure that the area is right for you.

You can look on the web for apartments, to give you an idea. A site that is helpful, but in English, is www.apartments.com. Some of the examples of prices and what you get are:

Village Parks Apartments: $660.00 per month, 2 bedrooms, 1 bath. 915 square feet. There is a living room, kitchen, and dining room. The apartment comes with refrigerator, stove, garbage disposal, carpeting, air conditioning and heat. You have a balcony, deck, patio or porch. Free unlimited parking, pool, clubhouse, tennis courts, and there are cable hookups.

If that is a little too expensive, you may want to go with:

Tempo Apartments, $550.00 per month, on site laundry, health club, pool, internet hookups, wheelchair access, clubhouse, storage space, volleyball court and tennis court. A one bedroom is 647 square feet and comes with a living room, closets, bathroom, dining room and kitchen. The kitchen has an electric range, garbage disposal and refrigerator. The apartment also includes cable hookups, carpeting, a patio or balcony, and full use of the communal facilities.

On both of these examples, as with most cases in the US, you need to be responsible for your own utilities. As a rule, electric, gas, and water will cost about 100-200 per month, depending on the size of your family and how economical you are with things. Cable tv is somewhere between 30-100 dollars per month, depending on whether you want the minimum package or, like me, you want all the sports packages added. Then you have the phone bill. Basic phone service in the US costs somewhere around 50 dollars per month, but long distance is a commodity that varies greatly in price. The way I would recommend a new immigrant to the US to handle long distance is to buy pre-paid phone cards from a local store and use them. That way, there are no huge surprises on your phone bill at the end of the month. The cards are inexpensive, and easy to use. I have bought cards that allowed me to call Russia for as little as 6 cents per minute.

Next month, we will talk about moving in, getting things organized, schools, stores, and your new style of life.