From plastic tables to super-duper washers: The tenant’s dilemma when renting in Cuenca

Renting in Cuenca is a bit like dating; you have to decide whether you want someone who comes with baggage or someone who expects you to bring all the baggage yourself.

Furnished apartments are the quick-and-easy choice. You can walk in with a suitcase, flop down on the sofa, and congratulate yourself on finding a place that already has a frying pan and a mismatched set of mugs.

But that convenience usually comes at a price. Rents run higher, and you’re at the mercy of whatever the landlord’s wife thinks qualifies as furniture. Sometimes it’s a sagging sofa that looks like it survived a decade of heavy use by a Saint Bernard. Sometimes it’s a “modern set” from a showroom, gleaming and uncomfortable, designed more for appearances than human anatomy.

One acquaintance of mine learned the hard way about furnished rentals. He moved into a place that came with a sofa from a second-hand store—“hardly used,” according to the landlord’s wife. Within a week, he was covered in mysterious red lumps on his wrists and lower back. At first, he thought it was an allergy, then maybe shingles, until a doctor gave him the diagnosis: bed bugs. He ended up tossing the sofa onto the curb at midnight and spending more money on fumigation than he had saved in rent. His conclusion was that furnished might be convenient, but convenience can bite back.

The unfurnished route is obviously cheaper in monthly rent, but you pay the difference up front. You’ll need to buy at least a bed, chairs, and a table, unless you enjoy eating off cardboard boxes. Sofas, armchairs, desks, rugs, lamps, and veladores can come later.

One bonus is that Cuenca apartments usually come with built-in storage to hang clothing, along with a set of drawers for socks and undies.

A trip to the local furniture shops reveals the full spectrum — from lovingly hand-crafted hardwood pieces that might outlast you, to mass-produced MDF wonders that warp the first time you spill soup on them. You can also get furniture made to order, often cheaper than what is in the stores.

Cuenca does have bargains if you’re patient, but once you’ve outfitted a whole apartment down to curtains and towels, you’ve effectively tied yourself down. Every piece of furniture becomes a small anchor. Suddenly moving across town requires a moving truck, a furniture dolly,  a crew of able-bodied men or women, or a fire sale on Facebook Marketplace.

That said, you can start really cheap. A plastic chair and table from Coral or the Feria Libre, plus a two-ring gas stove and a tank will get you through the basics. Many people do just that when they first arrive.

But a bed is another matter. Buying the cheapest mattress you can find is usually a false economy. You’ll wake up sore, spend more replacing it, and wonder why you didn’t just spring for something decent in the first place. In Cuenca, you can rough it on plastic furniture, but you’ll pay dearly for skimping on sleep.

The sweet spot depends on your stage of life. New arrivals who want to test Cuenca on a trial basis often prefer to rent furnished, even if they pay more. Long-term residents, especially those who can drive a hard bargain at the mueblería, usually end up better off unfurnished.

But either way, you’re making a choice between higher rent or higher commitment. Furnished is like renting freedom at a premium; unfurnished is investing in stability, but at the risk of locking yourself into a heavier footprint.

A word of warning, though: some newcomers think they can dodge the whole question by going through Airbnb. That might have worked during the pandemic, when prices were desperate and taxes were easy to avoid. Not anymore. Rentals through Airbnb now include SRI, Ecuador’s version of VAT, so they’re not the bargain they used to be. The days of finding a cheap long-term stay by clicking “book now” are gone.

Personally, I find that when you’re older, furniture owns you more than you own it. In youth you don’t mind buying a sofa, because you’ll happily leave it behind when you move to Quito, Miami, or Mars.

In retirement, every stick of furniture feels like it’s plotting against you—too heavy to move, too good to give away, too old to sell. I proved that point when I bought a new super-duper washing machine. I sold my four-year-old twin tub for $2.50, which so alarmed the rag-and-bone man and his wife that they were convinced something must be mechanically wrong with it.

The truth was I was delighted just to have it hauled down the stairs for free, and the $2.50 was pure profit to me. And that’s the real cost in Cuenca: not what you shell out each month, but how much freedom you’re willing to trade for comfort.