A year ago we were trying to find our first apartment here. It was about as pleasant as a migraine.

Now, the one-year lease is almost up, and we’ve been trying to sort out what we should do next. Shall we go or shall we stay? And if we go, where to?

Here are our options:

Stay. Teeny Apartment has issues. Mold, leaks, insects and teeniness. But it’s where we are, and we should never underestimate inertia. Plus, if this was cheap a year ago (comparatively), it’s really cheap now, because the Abu Dhabi real estate market has finally caught up with the rest of the world and is in freefall. The inflated rent we paid a year ago? Might be able to get it slashed by 30 percent or so, and this would really be a money-saver. Plus, I should say, this apartment has a great bathroom/shower in a country where these concepts are rare. And the idea of a place so small we literally could not bring in another chair … it keeps us from collecting too much stuff, right?

2. Move into a tower. Unlike Dubai, up the coast, Abu Dhabi historically had very few tall apartment buildings, and fewer still with amenities. But that has changed fairly rapidly in the past six months as a bunch of new units came on line. Within a 15-minute walk of the The National offices are about three 20-story towers,  and each has a big pool, a nice gym, a jacuzzi — and new, never-lived-in studio apartments for about 20 percent less than what we’re paying in the teeny, moldy, buggy apartment we’re now in. Have to consider that.

3. Move around the corner. We like this neighborhood. It’s quiet. It’s dull. It has the rubbery running track around the high school. We actually aren’t sure we dislike the landlord. The Teeny Apartment had issues, but when we could specify them, the landlord was pretty good about doing something about them fairly soon. Maybe we could go anywhere else in the building (because this is the smallest place) and get a bigger place and pay less than we are now. We like being a $3 cab ride from work. We like that it’s residential.

So, what did we do?

We went with No. 3: we are moving around the corner of this place.

We think.

Again, we are dealing with local property people, are they are at least as cheesy as they are in the States. And maybe even slower to acknowledge a collapsed market.

The landlord was on the premises about three weeks ago, and we looked at four other one-bedroom apartments in this complex. A dark stinky one on the second floor. (Nope.) A dark messy one on the third floor currently lived in by the landlord’s “engineer”, whatever that means. (Nope.) A messy one with about three refrigerators in it on the third floor with old furniture stored on the landings. (Nope.)

The fourth, however, looked promising. A one-bedroom, ground level, with a separate entrance, a patio bigger than the one we have now and an interior at least half-again as big as what we have currently. An actual kitchen. Room for a dining table. Already wired for the internet. Already furnished with the same stuff we have now. Literally the same style couch and chairs and bed.

So, we looked at a couple of places outside the neighborhood … that were just wretched. (Try staging your apartments, UAE. I mean, really.) Some neighborhoods north and west. We checked out one of the towers that so many of our colleagues have moved into, and we liked the “new” thing and we liked the price of the studio, and we liked the idea of the gym and the pool … but we could not invent a way to create two living spaces in that one room. We could not put up a wall/fence/curtain that would enable one person to be sleeping in the dark and the other awake in the light. Just not possible, the way it was laid out, and that really put a dent in our enthusiasm.

We thought about Just Staying. Leah actually broached this a time or two. But she always came back to the mold and the bugs, and would veto herself.

So, again, we opted for the place that’s about 30 yards away.

The landlord began by offering it to us for about 5 percent less than we’re paying for the current tiny place. “Ground floor, separate entrance, very nice,” he said. I don’t know what part of “our budget is 10,000 dirhams lower than that” he didn’t get. He almost immediately  knocked off 5,000 dirhams. And we left it there.

We then began a waiting-out game. (I think it was a game. Or maybe he just forgot.) Market tumbling, the guy apparently has at least four vacancies in what seems to be a 16-unit building.

I began to create bargaining scenarios in my head. “My wife really wants to go the towers in Al Nahyan Camp. She likes the pool and the gym and you and I both know a brand new studio there costs less than what you want.”

A week, 10 days later … nothing had happened. No calls in either direction. Our lease here is up on December 9. I called the caretaker Mr. Masul (Mr. Mohammed apparently is gone forever.) to check on the landlord’s number, and within minutes the landlord called me.

I said I was interested in staying, in going to “the one on the ground floor with the separate entrance with two doors and I can pay you” … the same reduced rate I had offered three weeks before.

He said, “What is your budget?” I said “what I just offered.” I again invoked the new towers with the pool and gym. At some point he said something like “OK.” And I said, “so, the one on the ground floor with the separate entrance with double doors” for the price I budgeted. And he said, “If my partner agrees.”

Partner? First I’ve heard of a partner. So, are we done? He asked that I give a copy of our current lease agreement to the caretaker, which I did. I wrote out on a note attached to it … which apartment we wanted and what I was paying. That was three days ago.

Has this gone forward? Are we done? Or is he just stringing us along, thinking he can get another Dh5,000 a year (about $1,300) if he waits long enough, perhaps too late for us to move into the tower. (Even though we agreed the studios in the tower were too small, and we weren’t willing to pay for the one-bedroom.)

Maybe we are done. Because tonight, when Leah was home but I was still at work, the caretaker brought by two women to look at the place we are in right this moment.

Is that good or bad? I think good. Maybe. At the least, we all seem to agree we are leaving this apartment. (Leah said that the two women, apparently mother and daughter of about 30 and 50 commented that “the bathroom is nice” …. “but it is very small.” Well, yeah.

Hmmm. Maybe what I do tomorrow is find Mr Masul and ask him when we can have the keys for … and I take him to the apartment door and point … “this apartment?”

Because we need to move in about 10 days.

I hope this is over. Less money, bigger place, easy move. This is what I want now. I guess we will find out very soon. This could be far easier than last year … or even worse.