Rentals

Most apartment leases will be for 1-2 years in length. The New York City rental market is dominated by stabilized and non-stabilized "free market" apartments, which make up 90% of the market, while a smaller portion of the market consists of rent-controlled apartments with highly restrictive terms. Landlords of modern buildings often receive tax breaks in exchange for maintaining a portion of their units as rent-stabilized, providing tenants in these apartments with the right to renew their leases annually with modest, commission-approved rent increases, in contrast to the free-market rents that can be set by landlords and tenants in non-stabilized units.

In New York, a common benchmark for determining your budget is that your annual salary must be 40x the monthly rent. For someone looking at $6,000/month apartments, they must earn a minimum of $240,000/year. There are ways of getting around this rule through guarantors. Typically, landlords will want a guarantor to make 80x the monthly rent and reside in the tri-state area. If your guarantor is out of state or country, you can still get approved with a 3rd party guarantor.

You can expect to pay $20 for a credit/background report (it is valid for 30 days) and at the time of lease signing, you will be required to pay 1st month rent, 1 month security deposit and brokerage fee of around 15% of the annual rent (who pays this fee is market sensitive and in a strong rental market the prospective tenant is expected to cover it). There might be incentivized listings posted as NO FEE listings where the landlord paid their broker's fees. If you decide to rent unrepresented by a real estate broker these could be potential savings however with significant risks, such as signing unfavorable lease terms, overlooking hidden costs, or falling victim to rental scams.