Plan B, C and D

The West Village apartment didn't happen. Poo!
It seems the 'just stepped off the boat' factor is a large, negative one when competing with US residents with credit histories as long as their arms, landlords reference letters and social security numbers. I know the Melbourne rental market is nutty, but here providing a personal guarantor, offering to pay $100 more a month, or prepaying 6 - 12 months of rent up-front is par for the course.
I've pulled the pin on apartment hunting today because it chews up too much precious weekend time and I need to do some fun touristy stuff before the work week begins again. Yesterday we wandered around Downtown again, with the chihuahua, Ramone, and looked at 3 places, only 1 of which I actually fit my criteria and before we'd left the building another interested party had already offered $1200 more on the annual rent. I'm now going to start looking myself on Craigslist and contacting real estate agents directly, and will put the word out at work.

If you're one of those people who was going to put me in contact with all the people you knew in New York, now is the time! I need to follow every path to find somewhere to park my 'dangerous Aussies' stubby holder collection.