A couple of you asked if we ever figured out why it was so cheap. And that answer to that question is YES. After signing the lease, we came back to do the Etat des lieux, and that's where we realized just how much work we had ahead of us. During our first visit, we'd only seen the potential of the place; during the second, the reality of it all hit us.

A lot of the walls looked like this, which meant first having to scrub them clean, smooth them out and then repaint:And then there was this lovely carpet that had to be removed and replaced:And the state of the balcony:The biggest project though was having to clean, sand, clean again and repaint the nasty shiny pale yellow paint that covered the kitchen and bathroom walls. Also, notice how the shutter switch is taped to the walls - probably half the plugs in the apartment were like that:And here's another example of the paint in the bathroom closet - it was just so darn grimy. How do people live in such filth?
Also, why is it so acceptable for people here to leave their apartments without cleaning them first? Every apartment I've lived in has had to be scrubbed down from top to bottom before we could move our stuff in. The previous tenant here left crumbs in all the drawers, a couple boxes of food in the kitchen and some old tupperware on the shelves. How is that okay?

I think this experience has taught us both that we aren't cut-out to be renovators. I suck at decorating and don't enjoy painting, so it was a pretty long month. Plus I was working poor C pretty hard - most nights we were up until at least midnight doing travaux. I'm telling you, the man has the patience of a saint. Luckily almost all of the hard work is done now, and we mainly just have unpacking to do now. And I'm really happy with how it turned out. Maybe I'll post some before and after pictures once everything is put away.