Baghdad - Post Report Question and Answers
What is your housing like? What are typical housing sizes, locations, and commute times for expatriates?
SDA housing is fine; think beige Courtyard Marriott or a Residence Inn. Bathrooms are spacious but difficult for tandems (hot water, etc.) Best commute ever! - Apr 2019
Direct hires live in Staff Diplomatic Apartments (SDAs). Currently no roommates, not sure if/when that will change. You will have a two bedroom apartment to yourself (unused bedroom = living room). It's completely adequate and honestly way more than needed. - Jul 2018
Containerized Housing Units (CHUs) only. While this makes the commute great, be sure to guard against being available for work 24/7. - Jan 2016
SDAs, or staff diplomatic apartments, are where most embassy personnel live, usually with a roommate. Apartments were made for one person, but house two (up to four if you are short term!). There is also the "East End" which houses most of the contractor personnel. - Feb 2014
Officers, unless they are married with a spouse at post or high-ranking, live in jerry-rigged two bedroom apartments (they were designed as one-bedrooms, but space constraints mean that people live two - or four, depending on the length of your assignment - to an apartment). The walls are very thin so be prepared to know a lot about your roommate's personal life, perhaps more than you would really like to know. The SDAs were built with really cheap materials - less the 30k blast-resistant windows, which are inoperable - and the breakers often flip, resulting in a weekend without electricity in half the apartment, for instance. There is only four minutes of hot water, so you will have to work out an arrangement with your roommate for morning showers. Furtniture is fine, sort of like a Howard Johnson's. Bring stuff to spruce up your room and it will feel a little less depressing. - Jan 2014
The commute is the other highlight of life in Baghdad. A 5 -minute walk, tops, from your housing to your office. Housing is mostly shared apartments for FSOs (tandems and 1s and above get their own place); hooches and windowless rooms for contractors. - Jan 2013
Same as other posters described...shared apartments for FTEs. Contractors are a little worse off, but they do have their own room. - Nov 2011
SDAs, East End, Man Camp. You will be sharing space unless you are very, very senior. It sucks. The SDAs are divided into 2 rooms. One of them, the original bedroom, has built in closets but it is significantly smaller than the other room. The 'other' room was meant as a living room. It's quite a bit larger and has two windows instead of one. It will have a standing bureau instead of a built in closet. The "living room" is a tiny windowless area that I find incredibly depressing. The kitchen is ridiculously overdone and ultimately useless for anything other than storing water and booze or making coffee. I am not a contractor but I do security. Man Camp is closing and until new housing is built, many of the WPPS personnel will be doubled up in CHUs. Some of them are wet, some dry. I know they're doing it by seniority. it's been a serious morale killer. This is supposed to be a temporary thing and decent housing will be in place by spring of 2011. - Sep 2010
Trailers or Embassy Apartments. - Aug 2008
