Finding a room in London

Yeah, finding a room in London is A PAIN!!!
First you need to find a website to look for the room. In the Internet era there's no better way and probably the only one.
So I subscribed to uk.easyroommate.com. I also paid to be a premier member and see people's phone number. Wasted money! I never had a reply from anyone on the website and really I spent quite a few hours writing messages email sms and whatever. No way.
So I went to gumtree.com as more than one person suggested to me. This is really the way go. You get the latest advertisements inserted directly from the people renting the rooms. Of course you need to read carefully and pay attention because lot of the ads are from agents. I have no idea what can happen to  you with an agent but really, I don't want to pay someone to find a room I can find myself. Of course if you are busy and have a job, than it can be helpful.
Anyway I started calling them by phone. No answers! Argh! What the hell they want me to do? I felt kind of disappointed. Then after some try and fail I finally understood: you need to send them an sms! Probably they have really a lot of people calling them and they can't answer all. Probably they are working and can't answer. With text I started getting replies and now I'm starting to see (or viewing as they say) some rooms. Yesterday I went to see a room near Elephant and Castle. Ok not so near depending if you consider 20 minutes walk "near". The house outside and also the area itself wasn't something you call nice. Anyway the flat and the room inside where really nice and also the landlord was really a kind person.
Today I'm going to see some others rooms and then I will decide. Booking an hostel here during the weekends seems something like a mission impossible. If I won't find a room before Thursday, I will sleep in a 15 beds shared room in some touristic area near some crowded touristic place. I really hope to not need to do this!