Hi, I’m Julie and I am a Brooklyn artist and photographer, or at least I thought I was. Now, I dont even know what I’ll be doing with my life. Lost my part time job as a waitress, art show cancelled and no photography gigs since most of my clients were restaurants. I have also been a superhost for the last year and I have worked so hard on turning my home into what its been for my guests: a unique space reflecting the authentic brooklyn artist lifestyle.
In October 2018 my landlord gave me permission to airbnb my extra 2 rooms instead of getting roommates. Seeing it as the amazing opportunity it was, I gave it my all and invested in what was only a dream I had to work to make come true.
After spending months investing and creatively furnishing in a tasteful and thoughtful manner... I was able to finally make it happen! I was able to pay for a 3 bed 15 mins away from Manhattan. I made amazing lifetime friends all over the world, learned to love with doing bedding laundry almost every day and kept my house exceptionally clean at all times.
Even with all of the criticism from my friends and anybody else that knew, I was able to sell them my lifestyle. Constantly posted visual content on my social media, interacted and continue to interact with my guests, got 3 of my girlfriends to start doing it themselves and even attended to meetings to defend our rights as hosts in NYC.
All the work was well worth it up until the beginning of March 2020, of course. Well, more like January but that was just low season. COVID19 couldn’t had waited for a better time to strike... I had been paying for 50% of the total monthly rent for 2 months before this whole thing happened.
And now, end of April. My landlord is telling me that if I am not able to pay for the month of May (total of 3 months overdue) he might as well take this time to renovate. The unique and authentic brooklyn apartment with crooked floors and vintage ceiling tiles, will be teared down and gentrified.
I feel so incredibly lost at this moment because the life I have built is about to go into storage. And I cant help but feel like I am not only loosing my apartment but also my dreams of having enough time to continue working on my career as a fine artist and will probably be forced to leave NYC behind because of it.
I haven’t had any new bookings since Mid March and haven’t been able to find any roommates at this time.
I really can’t economically recover from this.
Anybody out there with a similar situation? What are you guys doing to survive?
PS. Unemployment is not an option since airbnb forgot to send me tax forms (I requested them) and I get paid cash for my side gigs. And yes, I have been applying for jobs but at this time I dont even have a place to live...
Help?
Thanks 🙏