Hey DQ,
I've travelled around the world and have a huge tip to offer you.
Couchsurfing .
There's also another good site called
hospitality club which is much the same except even bigger. I've used both to meet people in countries I visit and even stay with them for free. Sign up is FREE and the people offering themselves up as hosts WANT to meet you. I've used it for a couple years without any threat to myself.
How does this relate to apartments?.... because this is how I met people who lived in cities outside of BsAs and were willing to help me hunt down affordable places to stay. Argentines are very big on the "introduction" process and having a local go-between works wonders. Not just any go-between, but a local. The accent is different in BsAs than Cordoba for instance, and people from different cities can actually pick each other out. If you have a local as translator/helper and they speak the local accent, it's in your favor. Rather than being a foreign guy, you become a friend of someone in their community. This is also how I met other Argentines easily. They'll take you to bars, asados and their family homes to meet the parents.
I lived in Rosario and found a place through the local paper with the help of a couchsurfing friend. I rented a tiny room with private bath and use of a shared kitchen for 380 pesos a month (I found out later that everyone else was paying 320). My opinion about apartment or room hunting is to zero in on the people who are asking in Pesos and not dollars. Also avoid the most popular "tourist" areas, since you're just going to get bled for cash, even outside of BsAs.
My other big tip is hostels. I travelled all over Argentina and Latin America staying at Hostels and consider it to be one of the best parts of my adventures. It's an ideal way to meet other travellers and also live cheaply. The downside might be that you're around other tourists a bit too much but that's where the couchsurfing thing gives you the "real" Argentine side of things. To find hostels, just do a search on sites like
Hostelz or
Hostel world. If this is something you can tolerate or enjoy, then ask about monthly rates because the savings can be huge.
