Uba, if you can swing living alone, DO IT! It is soooo worth your sanity. As to finding a place with cats...some suggestions for someone that has rented with cats many, many times. Look for smaller complexes, if you are looking at apartments. Easier to let one or two out of ten do something, then having to face 100 tenants. Second, look at places EVEN if they say NO CATS. All of mine always said, "no cats". If you really like the place, and the owner likes you...I find that most people want responsible tenants over keeping cats out. Do not tell them over the phone that you have two cats...they will pre-judge you.....get to know them a little bit...tell them upfront...once you meet and have a feel for them.

I am in no way advocating lying/hiding the fact that you have cats. But, just like most things in life, people pre-judge. i.e., you might have hated lawyers before, or thought they were all scum...now that you know me, and see that I am perhaps the coolest person in the whole world...and love all pets, and most people...you might look at lawyers differently. Same thing with cat people...(in case some one misses the sarcasm...I am just kidding, I am not the coolest person in the whole world, just one of the top 100).