Apartment Choice

Call it affordable. Call it cheap. The fact is that those people renting apartments in Columbus enjoy some of the least expensive rates in the United States, according to Apartment List , a listing website that tracks the industry. August data show that Columbus, out of 100 markets nationwide, has the fifth- lowest median lease rates , with a one-bedroom averaging $640 a month and a two-bedroom going for $760 monthly. The lowest — or cheapest — rents on the list are in Wichita, Kan., with $560 for a one-bedroom unit and $750 for two bedrooms. It is followed by Fayetteville, N.C., Fort Wayne, Ind., Toledo, Ohio, and Columbus. Rounding out the Top 10 most affordable cities in terms of apartment rents are Huntsville, Ala., Winston-Salem, N.C., Cleveland, Ohio, Oklahoma City, Okla., and Des Moines, Iowa. Other Southeastern cities on the list and their affordability rankings are Montgomery, Ala. (15), Knoxville, Tenn. (31), Birmingham, Ala. (34), Tallahassee, Fla. (42), Jacksonville, F...

The long retail spine of Sydney Road, Brunswick, just north of Melbourne's CBD, was once a prosperous trading outpost on the way to the goldfields. These days it's a bohemian mix of variety stores, op shops, halal butchers and Lebanese bakeries. Take a side street to the west, however, and a different picture emerges. Sandwiched between Sydney Road and the Upfield train line is an area undergoing rapid and widespread transformation. Light industry is fast being replaced by mid- rise apartment buildings , their inhabitants attracted by the short commute into town and cheaper prices than in the city's south-east. The quality of these units is, on the whole, depressingly bad; think poor ventilation and bedrooms that "borrow" natural light (a weasel word for being dark and windowless). The occasional jazzy façade tries feebly to make up for otherwise cheap construction amid a chorus of greys. At ground level, carpark roller doors alternate with mean pocket garden...