WatchNot that I would ever move there, but I happened to be browsing HotPads.com the other day and was trying to compare 2 bedroom apartment rentals with New York City, using it as a benchmark for a "real city".
I was very surprised at the number of apartments, even in Manhattan, renting for $2500 or less. It seems to me that just yesterday, nothing other than a basic studio in a not trendy part of the isle would start minimum $3800!
And yet here were the classic hardwood floored and high ceilinged dwellings renting for much less. Brooklyn, too! At $2500, a working couple with just decent jobs could easily afford an apartment "in the city".
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Bronx, NY
This is completely anecdotal and your 3800$ studio in a not trendy part of town assumption is just wrong. Substance of posts, especially new threads, matters!
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Kent, WA
John Bailo's website
UES
7 E 78th Street
New York, NY 10075
2 beds
1.0 bath
775 sq. ft
$2,375
http://hotpads.com/search#lat=40.77623148020691&lon=-73.96381795406342&zoom=21&previewId=2d7gghrjndd49&previewType=listing&detailsOpen=true&dupeGrouping=building&listingTypes=rental,sublet,room,corporate&bedrooms=2,3,4,5,6,7,8plus&highPrice=2500&includeVaguePricing=false&resultsPerQuad=24
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Your UES listing contains a warning: "This listing is priced well below other similar units in the area. Use common sense when interacting with this (and any) listing - NEVER SEND MONEY ORDERS OR WIRE MONEY." Rental listings include many dangerous scams.
NYC needs at least a million more housing units, but zoning and planning restrictions have artificially restricted the supply of new housing. Developers build wherever they are allowed, but they are heavily taxed with requirements to purchase "air rights" and to pay for below market "affordable" (i.e. political patronage) housing elsewhere. The market is overpriced due to bailout money (artificially inflated demand) and zoning (restricted supply).
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Last time I was back in the states I went to see my former employers who are renting a 1 bedroom apartment a couple of blocks west of Penn Plaza in a mixed use building for 3k a month. They are using it as an in the city office, but it's a pretty good looking place if you wanted to live there I thought. My old boss says there are quite a few places renting in the garment district. I like that part of the city, even though it's a little gritty still.
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Kent, WA
John Bailo's website
What about this one...no warning.
http://hotpads.com/search#lat=40.7762517916622&lon=-73.96408081054688&zoom=21&previewId=1xkxbth83k34c&previewType=listing&detailsOpen=true&dupeGrouping=building&listingTypes=rental,sublet,room,corporate&bedrooms=2,3,4,5,6,7,8plus&highPrice=2500&includeVaguePricing=false&loan=30,0.04,0&resultsPerQuad=24
Or click on any of the hundreds of yellow dots on the map.
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Thanks - I had not tried HotPads before but there do seem to be many listings around $3/sqft/month which is less overpriced than I had expected based on recent history. Craig's List numbers look similar, though HousingMaps.com looks surprisingly sparse.
Housing quality can vary widely within NYC though. "The City" refers usually only to Manhattan; the outer boroughs are separate counties and were separate cities. Access to multiple subway lines can be vital, as commuters living near only one line can be stranded if that line closes for repairs. Noise transmission can be a major issue, like living inside a badly tuned guitar with dozens of strangers who all have different schedules. Also anything with an initial rent above $2k/month is likely to be excluded from rent stabilization, so the initial rent might be a tease followed by a dramatic increase when the initial 1-year lease ends; moving annually is not fun so people who want stability tend to prefer stabilized places.
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curious2 says
What on earth is "air rights"??
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Kent, WA
John Bailo's website
2 Bedrooms at 1606 Second Ave for $2,000
Upper East Side.
1 Bath.
What's going on in NYC?
These rents seem impossible...and the violent crime rate is going down too!
http://www.renthop.com/listings/1606_second_ave/4n/2236664
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They'll be 10x inside of a year. You only have HOURs to get in on the rentals goldmine and the exploding rents that will increase every month for the next 1000 years and fund your great grand kids' conquest and rape of entire galaxies.
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John Bailo says
NYC is becoming way too civilized for me. Times square doesn't have any drugs or hookers any more and actually is pretty clean and nice. People are moving to the south bronx that don't even own guns. Flatbush has theatres and antique stores for christ sakes without a single drug shooting to be seen. White people are going to the Apollo to see Bruce Springsteen. What's the world coming to?
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woppa says
Shows you what u know!
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Baltimore, MD
Can we get someone who actually lives in NYC to comment on rental prices in various parts of town there?
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Kent, WA
John Bailo's website
bob2356 says
Netflix just added the TV show NYC 22. Rookie cops on foot patrol in Harlem...salad bowl of wild street youth and middle class people gardening in the front lawns of their townhomes. I suspect as you say it's true, that the "forbidden zones" are now being gentrified. Which means that everything else is much less of a...fortress!
https://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/NYC_22/70197059?locale=en-US