KOBANI, Syria (North Press) – After the February 6 earthquake, Bashar was forced to leave his apartment on the fourth floor in the city of Kobani, and reside temporarily in an apartment on the first floor until he is able to find a typical Arab house (a one-story house with a central courtyard) to rent and reside in.
Bashar Maghari, 25, a resident of Kobani and a father of two, started searching for an Arab house after the earthquake, which caused great damage to some buildings.
Maghari said that his children are terrified after the earthquake.
Residents of Kobani are afraid of living in apartment blocks, after the damages left by the earthquake, as some apartments were damaged. Most are looking for one-story houses.
In a previous interview with North Press, Shakheda Muhammad, Co-chair of the Chamber of Engineers, said that they have detected 250 affected buildings, including six uninhabitable ones, in Kobani and its countryside.
Maghari told North Press that he was living in his fourth floor apartment before the earthquake, but his children’s fear of earthquakes and the damage and cracks in his apartment prompted him to leave.
“I am currently living in an apartment on the first floor with my relatives; I am looking for a one-story house to rent,” he told North Press.
He said that he had not “found one yet,” because most residents are looking for similar houses, which are too few in number.
Permanent tents
Maghari indicates that some of the residents of two-story buildings were temporarily forced to live in tents, pointing out that many residents of Kobani are leaving their apartments due to fears of other earthquakes.
Similar to Maghari, Omar Youssef, 45, a resident of Kobani, is afraid to move to his apartment, which he recently finished installing all utilities in, due to the continuing aftershocks resulting from the earthquake.
Youssef, a father of seven, lives in a house in the city of Kobani, which he has rented more than a year ago, until he finished installing his apartment.
“I can’t live in my apartment, the earthquake has caused people to live in a state of panic, most notably the children. I will stay at this rented house until the situation settles,” Youssef noted.
Fears of apartments
He said he would stay in the traditional Arab house as a tenant until aftershocks stop completely.
Youssef notes that there is a lot of demand for Arab houses, especially since most residents left their apartments to live in villages or in tents that they set up next to their buildings due to fears of aftershocks.
Jalal Bargas, 34, an owner of a real estate office in Kobani, said that prices for selling, buying and renting apartments were more expensive before the earthquake than those for Arab houses.
However, he said, the situation is different now, as most residents want to reside in Arab houses, and even those who rent apartments do not consider residing in the second or third floor.
Expensive rent
Bargas points out that apartment leases before the earthquake cost an annual $300 on average, but that now they cost around $100.
“Arab houses, on the other hand, used to cost $100 before the quake, but now they cost between $300 and $500 per month, as residents are forced to reside in them,” he says.
In addition, apartments used to cost between $10,000 and $12,000 on average, while Arab houses would cost no more than $6,000. “However, after the quake, prices for Arab houses spiked to the level of that of apartments.”
He attributes these shifts to the fact that the earthquake caused cracks in apartments, which made people avoid residing in them for fears of further tremors.
“Between 10 to 15 people come to my office every day to ask for Arab houses for rent. They express their readiness to pay any amount of cash to reside in them,” he says, noting that those who do not succeed in finding one install tents.
Berges attributes the low number of Arab houses in Kobani to the devastating battles that the city had gone through in late 2014 and early 2015, and to the fact that many owners turned theirs into buildings.