The Apartment Search

Okay, I’m back. My first week of work got me away from my posting. Let’s get down to the real talk of my transition; it began with the apartment search. From the time I accepted the position to the time I started the position was only 3 ½ weeks. Now in Ohio, that’s plenty of time to find an apartment. Basically, in Ohio, you go to the area you are interested in, go to the leasing office, look at an apartment and move in almost immediately. New York City is a bit of a different story. There are many factors that have to be considered. The number one and most important, how much can you afford to spend (which in NYC doesn’t get you a lot)? How close do you want to be to a train? How many flights of stairs are you willing to walk? How far do you want to be from work? Do you want to be uptown, downtown, midtown, Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, Long Island, or even Jersey?
When I started looking for apartments I was shocked. My $1500/month (plus electric, internet and cable) in downtown Cleveland got me: 1400 square feet, two beds, two full baths, large open kitchen with plenty of cabinets and new appliances, large living room, dining room, hardwood floors, high ceilings, an amazing view of Lake Erie, the biggest residential gym in downtown Cleveland, a grocery store in the building, and underground heated parking. Not to mention I was on one of the busiest and most populated residential streets (by many young professionals’ standards) in downtown Cleveland. The most important thing is once I decided I wanted to live in downtown Cleveland, it took me one day to view the buildings I was interested in and determine the rent I could afford. Once I decided on a place there was a simple application fee and one month’s rent security deposit. For the two years I lived in the Bingham I had great maintenance service and the convenience of all the downtown amenities and the ability to walk to work.
Okay. $1500 doesn’t get you much in Manhattan. I decided that I wanted to be close to a train and near work. I decided I wanted some space and didn’t want to spend more than $1500 a month. I had no idea what I was in for. The short version is it took me 3 weeks to find an apartment after I was seeing some of the worst places I could imagine that met none of my requirements. For two apartments that I was initially looking into I had to give the brokers $150 applications fees and in one case after you submitted the $150 app fee and were accepted, then you got to look at an apartment that you would actually be able to live in (after the fee). $1500 in NYC doesn’t get you much space. Most apartments that I found in that range are about 450-800 square feet. The most shocking thing is that when you go through a broker, you have to give them 15% of the annual rent in addition to the first months rent and a security deposit. And apparently no one takes a personal check in NYC. WHAT?!?!?!
Luckily for me, I have a friend who is interested in rooming. After 3 weeks of searching I got desperate and literally started walking up and down the streets of Harlem and calling numbers. I finally found a place in Harlem four blocks from work and four blocks from the 2 and 3 express trains (which means I can get to midtown quickly, what we know as Ohioans as NYC). My place is in a brownstone and has 2 beds, 2 full baths, a connecting patio off both bedrooms, an open kitchen, and nice size living room. The biggest sale point for me was the energy efficient washer dryer in the unit! The price tag $2000/month plus utilities. The funny thing is I really lucked up. My apartment could easily go for $5000 plus a month in other areas of the city.
So let’s quickly review the similarities (I think the differences are apparent). I have about the same amount of square footage give or take. I have a patio in NYC which is great, I didn’t have one in Cleveland. I’m on the second floor in contrast to the 9th floor in Cleveland. I like being closer to the street. There’s no elevator in the apartment which isn’t a problem. The obvious difference is the difference in price. Every street in NYC seems to be very populated. It only takes me 5-7 minutes to walk to work as opposed to 15-20 in Cleveland. You can get anywhere by train which is certainly not the case in Cleveland. There are tons of places to eat and entertain within a 5 minute walk of my front door which is not so much the case in Cleveland either. We’ll see how the relationship goes with the building superintendent (which is a new concept in itself). The saga continues.
Cleveland or NYC? You decide…