So I am moving a few states away from home. I know that I want to adopt a shelter cat (or two) when I settle in. So here are my options.

1) Get the cat immediately. As soon as my furniture is set up I will go to the shelter and hopefully find the right cat within a week or so. My worries are that the apartment (2br2bath) won't "smell" like me. I also have a roommate that will move in about a month after I will. Will the cat be likely to be really bothered when the roommate moves in?

2) Wait until both myself and my roommate and living in the apartment. Lets pretend it has been about 2 months after move-in for both of us. That sounds nice, but I will be finished with my day-shift training at that point and moving to second shift. I fear that the cat will get on a weird schedule if I don't have the time on first shift time with it to establish routine.

If you were in my position, what would be in the cat's best interest? Of course most shelter cats are really scared/stressed when they first come home, but I still want to make the transition as easy as possible.

For anyone wondering: the apartment is fairly large, I have had 4 shelter cats in the past (2 still live at my parents house), I have a healthy cat budget set aside for all the things I need to buy.