Apartment search advice?

Hey everyone! I’m using my other account to ask this only because I didn’t really feel like using my main one tbh but anyways lol I’m looking for some advice on my apartment search. Hopefully this could reach a leasing agent that’s very familiar and can give me another angle on my search.

To make a long story short, I’m looking to move out on my own, but I just admit that my credit isn’t currently the greatest due to being displaced with an addition to Covid occurring that really fucked up my ability to pay my credit card. I’ve tried to look at this from many different angles keeping that in mind, but I desperately need to move out. This is where I’m currently at:

1. Asking my father to co-sign for me on an apartment (however, he lost his job about 2 months ago and is struggling to find new employment—he says that because of his employment status, him being a co-signer wouldn’t really help and may actually hurt my chances, but I’m not sure if that’s entirely the case?)

2. Just applying to a few apartments and hoping for the best.

Thing is, I’m looking for “look and lease” specials. Some combine application/admin fees while also doing a few weeks rent free (and even sometimes the security deposit is waived too I believe?) and I’m really searching for that because it’ll help me save money tremendously that’ll set me up to make on time rent payments from the beginning.

So I guess my question comes down to my first option: would my father being unemployed matter as a co-signer? I’m very unfamiliar with all of this.

I have an apartment in mind that has a promotion running and on top of that, my current employer gives me a 20% discount on the apartments. I would love to apply but I rather see if my chances of approval are better with my dad. Or if there’s another avenue I can look at, I’d greatly appreciate any info! Because I’m trying to move ASAP 😅