Apartment know how

Before you sign your lease
— Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Is parking provided? How about utilities? What comes in the apartment? Just because you think it’s there doesn’t mean anything. Who does the repairs?
— Don’t let the apartment complex pressure you to sign the lease.
— Watch out for hidden fees.
— Call the Fort Worth Police Department to see how much crime has been committed at the apartment complex in the last six months.
— Call the Fort Worth Better Business Bureau to see if any complaints have been filed at your complex.
— Contact the Tarrant County Bar Association to see if one of its representatives can look over your contract before you sign it.

Site seeing
If you don’t want to visit an apartment locator in person, help is still just a mouse click away.
— (www.aptratings.com) Find an apartment locator, read opinions of more than 37,000 apartments nationwide, find a roommate or rate your own apartment.
— (www.rent.com) Here you can search a database of more than 2.4 million apartments and homes. But to access the site, you must first log onto the system with your name, e-mail address, address and password.
— (www.apartments.com) Similar to (www.rent.com), but you don’t have to log onto the Web site first. Searches are done by clicking maps, but it offers limited search results.