apartment hunting in new york
a kind of misery i really would not wish upon anyone
i found out two weeks ago from my friends, from whom i have been subleasing my much-beloved LIC studio, that their landlord bought them out of their lease, which meant i’ve also spent the last two weeks in a scramble to find a new apartment. i do technically have until february—historically the best time to find a deal—but i’m anxious by nature, and need things to be settled, even if it means i have to double up on rent payments for a month.
here is a list of the very best new york real estate had to offer me (aka the apartments i seriously considered and/or applied to):
a large rent-stabilised one-bedroom in flatbush for less than 1.7k/month that had a built-in bookshelf, a massive dining/living area and bedroom, and a pantry, as well as laundry in the building—if you don’t mind the fact that it’s owned by the #2 slumlord in the city and as of 2 years ago had devastating electrical fire due to faulty and outdated wiring that displaced 10 families. or the fact that there were something like 600 complaints filed against the building this year alone. the broker pressured me to sign and send money the same night i got the lease because there were “backup tenants” in place, and when i read the lease it stipulated that you had to pay for your own heat and hot water, which i’ve only done when i lived in a $900/month bushwick 3-bed off the wilson street L that had washer/dryer in-unit and central a/c, which this most certainly did not.
a beautiful, reasonably sized, rent-stabilised one bedroom on a quiet stretch of crown heights for roughly 1.55k/month that had an extensive history with bedbugs—18 cases in the last 6 years. when i asked the broker about this, he insisted he had no knowledge of such a thing (the filings are publicly available, my guy), and then told me that the landlord said they hadn’t had “an issue” with bedbugs in “a long time”—even though the bed bug report from literally this april listed two infected units. the broker also told me he “wasn’t going to pressure me into the signing the lease” when i asked him to clarify the history, but did make sure to bring up that if he listed the unit again on monday, it would be rented out monday afternoon, and that there had been another applicant who had tried really, really hard to get the unit, and wasn’t i just the luckiest girl in the world to be picked, to be chosen, by a—once again—bedbug-infested building with 120 complaints this year and a landlord who couldn’t be honest. heat/hot water included (but according to 311 complaints not always guaranteed).
a smaller studio on the LIC/astoria border for 1.4k/month, rent stabilised, in a nice elevator building (with laundry), close to the subway and only a few stops from midtown in a neighbourhood i’ve grown to really adore. but there was a strict no-pet policy with no flexibility, and it was an open house where roughly one hundred million people showed up (against whom, frankly, i have no desire to tussle). the broker, who did very little beyond listing the place and standing there while prospective tenants showed themselves around, was asking for a whopping 20% broker’s fee.
other considerations that soured me to the place: i hadn’t realised this was in an ex-something’s neighbourhood until i walked into the nearest coffeeshop to warm myself with some chai before the open house, only to realise that it was one they’d taken me to last year and had described as an establishment they “often” frequented. maybe i’d rather die than live within 10 blocks of this place? the upside was that the baristas from last year were still working there and complimented me again on my clothes. if there’s anything i love more than being told once that i am cool and fashionable by cool and fashionable girls, it is being told twice.an okay-sized almost 1.7k/month rent-stabilised studio that was towards the very end of the RW line, across the street from astoria park. i didn’t love it but i wouldn’t have had to transfer, and the walk to the train, though long, wasn’t terrible. south facing, with a balcony i would have enjoyed tremendously. i did hate the electric stove and the electric heat, but it didn’t stop me from applying. alas, alack, someone else’s application was chosen. it’s probably a blessing in disguise, because it really was just too far from my friends, and i wanted to find a rent-stabilised place precisely because i wanted to be somewhere for a long time and make a life in the community i chose. it was far even from my queens friends, and i think i would have been really lonely there
a flatbush rent-stabilised 1.5k/month 1bed with a separate kitchen that i really liked, in an elevator building with laundry. not so far from the subway that it was a slog. but terribly slimy brokers. they are real, just horrible, with shady business practices—i had to follow up multiple times to get any sort of response, and when i did get an answer it was rarely to the question i’d asked.
here is the spot i actually decided to move forward with:
within a 15 minute walk to a park and within blocks of quite a few of my friends. 5 min from the subway (and i wouldn’t have to transfer to get to work), on a quieter stretch off a main road. 1.15k/month, rent stabilised, heat and hot water included, no laundry in building but next door to a laundromat. a decent-sized studio with a separate kitchen, not as well laid-out as my current place and the actual living space is smaller and more narrow than the layout i have now, which means i’m going to have to rethink storage and decor, but the landlord is smaller and more involved, the building looked clean and well-maintained. there was a built-in bookshelf and some deep closets. fewer average resident complaints and violations, elevator building, newly renovated, pet-friendly (or well, i have a pet rider). the location within the building was not my ideal, but i found it was something i could compromise on. on-site super, and while there was a bedbug infestation listed this year on their public filings, it was many floors up and in a different part of the building. i didn’t ask point-blank about it, but i did ask about extermination treatments and was told that an outside exterminator came to the building once a month, which put me more at ease, and was something i could chalk up to being bad luck rather than systemic neglect.
i did also seriously consider moving in with friends of friends—all extremely lovely people with whom i feel sure i would have gotten along very well and whom i am aiming to hang out with and get to know now that i’ve met them—but the rooms were very small and i’ve furnished out my life with things i’d rather not give up. i’ve also gotten used to the routine of living alone, cleaning when i want to clean and cooking when i want to cook, so giving up in-unit washer-dryers and big beautiful modern kitchens and paying the bills on my own to live alone felt like a reasonable tradeoff.
this was actually the first time i had to look for an apartment by myself, and it was a sharp learning curve, especially now that the persnickety family cat who doesn’t like other animals is living with me. but here is what i’ve gathered:
be clear with yourself about what your goals are in an apartment. i was very specifically looking for a rent-stabilised unit in a pet-friendly building with good-to-decent management so that i could stay for a very long time and pay about the same in rent every year. i hate being forced to move, so it was my number one priority. the other thing i wasn’t willing to compromise on was having a separate kitchen, because i cook a lot and did not want to be sleeping in my kitchen. i also needed a place where my cat-daughter could be comfortable, since i’d be putting her through the trauma of a second move within a year of the first.
OTOH, separate your need-to-haves from your want-to-haves. because my current apartment is a smaller building with fewer tenants, we have free laundry in the basement—i would have loved to have had that, but it was something i was willing to compromise on. i’m chinese, so i only believe in south-facing buildings for the all-day sun, but was willing to be flexible as long as the unit didn’t only have north-facing windows (no direct sun). i wanted a higher floor, but figured that as long as the apartments were a half-floor up and not street-facing, a ground floor apartment would be okay, since i don’t leave food lying around for insects and i have a cat who would take care of rodents, which left flooding and privacy as the only real concerns.
something that really helped me—and won’t be possible for everyone, but it did very much make my life easier—is having the ability to walk away from apartments. because i had already been okay with double-paying a january rent, it lent me a lot of flexibility to not feel pressured into saying yes to the first apartment that would have me, and to walk away from brokers i felt were being pushy, or not entirely honest.
know (or get familiar with) the area you’re looking in, and know what’s available in them, and the range of rent that would be available within. i wanted a rent-stabilised unit, so i learned very quickly how to identify the ones with the highest likelihood of being what i wanted in the neighbourhoods that i wanted them in, even if the broker did not explicitly advertise it as such
start looking early. not even because you want to commit as early as i wanted to, but because looking at apartments and dealing with brokers with about a month’s worth of cushion is a great way to suss out the housing market and to figure out how to filter a scummy broker from an okay one (i hesitate to say a good one because i uhhhhhh don’t believe there are good brokers in new york city)
streeteasy is your best friend, but be prepared to have all of our particulars (name, yearly income, credit score, move-in date, pets, number of applicants, email, phone number) ready in the first message. refresh it a few times a day. when i first started looking for places, i wouldn’t get a ton of emails back because i used the form inquiry on the website, but brokers are filtering through a lot and need that info up top
similarly, also have your documents prepared (tax return, last 3 months of banking information, paystubs, employment letter, landlord references if necessary, picture ID) for when you do want to apply
don’t be afraid to follow up to the point of being obnoxious. i routinely double emailed a particular broker and essentially harassed them into letting me see an apartment, and i ended up getting approved for it. of course, as it was the slumlord’s building i did not in fact end up signing that lease, but it does work
in that vein though, i do prioritise a friendly and responsive broker. why should i give you my hard-earned money if you can’t give me the time of day?
you also need to be flexible about apartment viewings and schedule them around the broker’s schedule rather than your own.
don’t sign a lease for any place you haven’t been to personally. double check everything. make sure the unit you are applying for is the unit you saw. confirm with the broker about whether there is a fee, and how much it is. have everything in writing. check carefully for signs of droppings in an apartment. check to see how long it takes the water to run hot. check the water pressure. check to see if the water runs clear. double check the building’s history via vetted websites—streeteasy is not always reliable1, augrented doesn’t always have complete information (plus i’m really not sure what their AI is meant to do or how it assesses anything), and openigloo you have to pay for to read reviews, but HPD online is your very best friend, as is the 311 portal.
DON’T send money until you’ve vetted the broker and the landlord. read google reviews, read yelp reviews, read openigloo reviews. check reddit. look the address up on google news to see if, for example, it is operated by a slumlord (not always a dealbreaker, unforch, but still good to know). discern what kinds of scumminess is bearable and normal (an unfortunate reality of the nyc real estate market) and what kinds are open scams.
read your lease. read it closely! it’s a legal document. know that your lease also can’t cut you off from the housing rights inherent to you as a tenant.
in lieu of the revolution coming and housing being nationalised, this is the best i’ve got. hopefully i will not have to do this again anytime soon, because i actually cannot count how many times i was driven to tears by it, and how many times i said fuck it, i’m moving back to georgia and saving up for a mortgage. god.
GOD!
i saw a listing for my current apartment that stated that it was rented out for 3k/month in 2023 as a gut-renovated 1bed with stainless steel appliances, hardwood floors, and a dishwasher when i know for a fact that isn’t true, since i currently occupy the unit, the floors are peeling, and i still wash my dishes by hand. it’s also, to be frank, way too small to be a comfortable 1br. the reality is they probably listed it when they tried to entice my friends out of their lease last year (with intent to renovate enough to destabilise), and marked the unit as rented when those friends opted to continue their lease. but now there is a record online of this rent-stabilised unit having been rented for more than double what i’m currently paying for it. hmmm!!