Hey, I already live in NY, so I don't need an apt... but I am curious about your apartment search methods. I'm trying to help a friend find a place and so far, I've been checking out craigslist and roommates.com... have you come across anything else? Aside from brokers that is.
dg:
i just moved to nyc in october. not to my surprise, it was an incredibly tormenting and drawn out process. i think the biggest factor when searching for an apartment is the amount of time you have before you need to move in. if you have plenty of time, you will be fine, if you need to find a place quickly, you may be forced to make a decision that you're not completely satisfied with.
there are a few obvious tricks. craigslist is the most popular i would say, because you can supposedly find no-fee apartments, but from my luck, a lot of this "no-fee" apartments were brokers in disguise and tried to bait-and-switch me to high-fee apartments.
there is another site that is incredibly useful that i wish i would have used called rent-direct.com you pay around $200 for all of their apartment listings across manhattan instead of the 10-15% broker fee which amounts to around $1500-$2000 depending on your rent.
if you get desperate and are rushing to find a place before a certain date, there's always the dreaded broker. i hope you don't have to resort to this. the process is really just disheartening.
don't forget about the village voice and surprisingly the nyt real estate section.
my lease ends next october. i'll be looking for a roommate then.
I am in a similar situation with your friend, and hope to hear some ideas as well... so far craigslist has been the place to go.. if for nothing else, i can somewhat get an idea of apt prices/locations.
villagevoice is also mentioned a lot
Also, i am in a situation where i need to move fairly rapidly, so i am looking for "roomates" on craigslist...i.e. apartments with an empty bedrooms... its not a permanant solution for sure, but will give me some extra time in finding the perfect place to live in the city. and since i dont know the city that well, it should give me some time.
its also pretty low cost, and seems to fit me for the first couple months... a few of my friends have had luck with this, and make sure you dont sign into a long term lease... just a sublet/type thing.
thanks david, ill be using ur info as well
also hey dgg, are u in architecture?
which leads me to the question again: who wants to live wit me in nyc?
If you are looking for a broker, my boyfriend swears by his and says this agent is really sweet, helpful, and wonderful. She helped him move from Chicago with very short notice. Email me if you want her contact info & good luck!
i never thought that the problem with brokers were regarding the merits of their personalities and whether or not they were nice, but rather the fact that you pay them a couple thousand for merely selecting listings from their online database and "showing" you the place which entails finding the key and opening the door.
my boss sweet talked his landlord into holding one of his other places long enough for me to jump in. bypassed a broker and landed in a wonderfully overpiced and woefully undersized studio.
it seems like architects with experience in the city will often have an inside track on developments and openings.
alfredo- thanks for the link. That thread ran during the final week of my semester, completely missed it. I can relate to a lot of what you said there... but I've recently had an epiphany about the whole field, feeling a little differently about it.
Well, I felt similarly frustrated by the lack of thought exhibited in the projects of the other students in my class. It seemed that I was missing out on any kind of discourse. I was seriously contemplating transfering into an Arch undergrad program. But everytime I mentioned that to teachers, they looked a bit panic stricken. They recognize my "different" approach to design and really encourage me to explore in ways other students just can't. They really try to keep me from getting bored or feeling cramped.
So, then I started to think that instead of bailing on the profession, maybe I should stick around and make it what I want it to be. If enough of us stick to our guns, and start our own discourse, eventually, that will be the norm. We might just be able to banish theme rooms after all.
One of the greatest things about the major pathway i chose was the professors: although they were not as "hard core" as architecture professors in their critiques, they were very supportive and intelligent--they really understood architecture and interior design. Another thing to be careful of is not trying to be an architect because you feel interior design is not as worthy or as intellectually stimulating. Of course, architecture has a history-lineage of this (theory/critique), interior design as a profession is beginning to become something ... led by ppl like you and me, of course..and by our professors in academia... lol
anyway, I will be starting work as an interior designer, and as of now, i am in the future entering graduate school for either design or architecture. I'll try to tell you how i feel once i am working in ny. btw are you still in school?
Yep, still in school. This is actually my second go around in college. The first time was right out of high school for two years in Fine Arts. Working on getting my BFA in Interiors.
You're right about ID people putting the field down because they are trying to over-compensate for their own insecurity and the perceived shortcomings of the profession when it is compared to Architecture. Both have their strengths and weaknesses. As for the intellectual stimulation that is often lacking in interiors, well, it's what you make of it.
I think this is an exciting time to be studying Int. D. People with the goals that you and I share for the profession are the future. The line between designer and decorator becomes clearer everyday. And the standardized testing that leads to licensing legitimizes us as professionals.
also at the same time, our profession is less of an intellectual/overarching one as architecture/cityplanning, but it deals more with the client--i.e. the interactions (physical/mental/virtual) of a person within a space--things such as tactile qualities, adaptive spaces, etc--as a result we are more of a service oriented. Which is not to say we dont have anything to say!
I see that is another dilemma/issue that arises with architecture vs. interior design--its hard to be intellectual when we are considering such things as carpet tiles... usually.
But yea, we are definately moving away from decorator title. Maybe, we are moving more towards a service-profession (as opposed to purely aesthetic). strangely, we have a great opportunity: this allows people to really aknowledge design, and be aware of its value to people.
It's not as intellectual as architecture... yet. As the division between design and decoration is made clearer, I think that design will inevitably become a much more thoughtful/theoretical discipline. There is no reason for us to not approach the design of an interior in the same way that an architect might approach the design of an entire structure. True, selecting carpet tiles may not be rocket science, but there should definitely be a clear thought process behind it, because all of those decisions are supposed to support the concept of the space. We'll be just fine, we just have to separate the HGTV groupies from the real designers, lol.
I remember the first day of studio this semester, my teacher gave us the usual speech about design not being for pansies, and prepare not to sleep and yadda, yadda... and then he capped it off with: "You've had a semester to get faux finishes and balloon shades out of your system. I don't want to hear about them anymore. And, if they should come up in a few weeks, you'd better hope I'm in a good mood, because if not, I'll want to smack you." Love that guy.
I'm going to be moving to New York and just wanted to get some info on the neighborhoods. I'll be working way downtown in the Financial District, but obviously haven't been able to find anything reasonably priced nearby. I've been seeing a lot of listings uptown-Morningside Hts, Hamilton Hts, Harlem. I'd prefer not to go up past Morningside Hts b/c then it'd just be a really long commute, I imagine. Can anyone give me info on these neighborhoods? Anyone also looking to sublet their place? I'd appreciate the feedback.
sanofiSYN..if i were you i'd live in brooklyn...
i live in park slope..it's a 10-15 min cab ride into the city
and about a 1/2 hour train ride...and if you take the 2-3
it takes you in no time into the financial district...there
are a bunch of neighborhoods that are cool..smith st.
is a nice area...carrol gardens, brooklyn heights is ok...
i don't know all the names..but if you lived between 5th ave
and 7th close to flatbush you should have an easy commute..
Or try Staten Island (formerly known as Shaolin by ODB). You can get a good size two bed for the price of a one bed in one of the aforementioned Brooklyn areas. Your only draw back would be the fact you live on Staten Island and you need to take a boat to work.
Yeah, I was considering Brooklyn too, but I'd really like to stay on Manhattan. Do you know how long the commute is from Morningisde Hts to Wall Street? Is it longer than coming in from Brooklyn. Someone advised me that the Brooklyn Hts and Cobble Hill areas were pretty nice. I guess I'll find out myself soon enough.
living in park slope, bklyn you could get to manhattan (fin. dist) in about 20 minutes tops.
alfredocheese,
i recommend you ask a friend to put up a sign in his or her offices that you're looking for a roomate. 8 out of 10 chance someone will see it as they're looking for a place. that way you'll have a clue who this person could possibly be as opposed to a strange new yorker. (also they may turn out to be an arch or eng.) it works more times than not..... g'luck
i moved to nyc over the summer with my boyfriend. i was starting a new job and even though we were able to stay with friends until i could find a new place, i felt rushed to find an apartment. we also wanted to stay in manhattan, but i looked in brooklyn as well (b/c my job is in soho).
i looked at about 3 apartments a day. after a week i rented a small 1 bedroom in the lower east side (manhattan). i got a great deal thru craigslist ($1275, no elev, no doorman, but it's clean). i think i was the third person to see the apt and i put my deposit down immediately.
craigslist is great, but you have to be quick...i mean really quick. great deals will be gone within the hour. i found the same with the village voice. both will have scamming brokers. stay away from rentdirect.com, i've heard from friends that they'll show you bogus or old listings and you won't get your money back. also stay away from gotham city brokers, they offer to show you apartments at a low upfront fee...but they are scammers and their ads are everywhere.
parts of brooklyn are a lot closer than morningside heights (which is the area around columbia). wall st to morningside heights is about 40 min on the train. i'm not too familiar with brooklyn neighboorhoods, but i've heard cobble hill is nice and park slope (but park slope can get expensive as well).
i just to NYC in August...i found plenty of opportunity on craigslist to sublet for a month so i had time to concentrate on actually finding a place that fit my particular needs and found a great loft in Bushwick(Brooklyn). it only takes about 35-40 min. to get to work (SoHo) and not long to the city in general. but that's beside the point. my point is to look into a sublet for a bit. mine was in east harlem...cheap but dangerous, not that dangerous, all that happened was some neighborhood kids let all the air out of my truck. but that's OK. we made up. i had a roommate lined up already so i didn't have to worry about that so much. i'm having a great time in NYC thus far except for the fact i got friggin' laid-off. anyone got any leads on employment?
Jan 19, 05 10:11 pm ·
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new york new york
anybody want to move to nyc and find an apt with me?
no
Paris, maybe
Hey, I already live in NY, so I don't need an apt... but I am curious about your apartment search methods. I'm trying to help a friend find a place and so far, I've been checking out craigslist and roommates.com... have you come across anything else? Aside from brokers that is.
dg:
i just moved to nyc in october. not to my surprise, it was an incredibly tormenting and drawn out process. i think the biggest factor when searching for an apartment is the amount of time you have before you need to move in. if you have plenty of time, you will be fine, if you need to find a place quickly, you may be forced to make a decision that you're not completely satisfied with.
there are a few obvious tricks. craigslist is the most popular i would say, because you can supposedly find no-fee apartments, but from my luck, a lot of this "no-fee" apartments were brokers in disguise and tried to bait-and-switch me to high-fee apartments.
there is another site that is incredibly useful that i wish i would have used called rent-direct.com you pay around $200 for all of their apartment listings across manhattan instead of the 10-15% broker fee which amounts to around $1500-$2000 depending on your rent.
if you get desperate and are rushing to find a place before a certain date, there's always the dreaded broker. i hope you don't have to resort to this. the process is really just disheartening.
don't forget about the village voice and surprisingly the nyt real estate section.
my lease ends next october. i'll be looking for a roommate then.
Hi David-
thank you so much for all of the info. I'll be passing it all on to my friend. Hopefully this will light a fire under him.
hey design geek gurl,
I am in a similar situation with your friend, and hope to hear some ideas as well... so far craigslist has been the place to go.. if for nothing else, i can somewhat get an idea of apt prices/locations.
villagevoice is also mentioned a lot
Also, i am in a situation where i need to move fairly rapidly, so i am looking for "roomates" on craigslist...i.e. apartments with an empty bedrooms... its not a permanant solution for sure, but will give me some extra time in finding the perfect place to live in the city. and since i dont know the city that well, it should give me some time.
its also pretty low cost, and seems to fit me for the first couple months... a few of my friends have had luck with this, and make sure you dont sign into a long term lease... just a sublet/type thing.
thanks david, ill be using ur info as well
also hey dgg, are u in architecture?
which leads me to the question again: who wants to live wit me in nyc?
If you are looking for a broker, my boyfriend swears by his and says this agent is really sweet, helpful, and wonderful. She helped him move from Chicago with very short notice. Email me if you want her contact info & good luck!
i never thought that the problem with brokers were regarding the merits of their personalities and whether or not they were nice, but rather the fact that you pay them a couple thousand for merely selecting listings from their online database and "showing" you the place which entails finding the key and opening the door.
hey alfredo-
Thanks for the info. Sorry to momentarily hijack your thread.
I'm actually not in architecture. I'm an interior design student. Toying with the idea of getting an MArchI. But that's a whole 'nother thread.
haha im in the same boat but graduated and about to work now
happy home and job hunting... I'll have to pick your brain some time about how you feel about the field...
never underestimate your future/current employer.
my boss sweet talked his landlord into holding one of his other places long enough for me to jump in. bypassed a broker and landed in a wonderfully overpiced and woefully undersized studio.
it seems like architects with experience in the city will often have an inside track on developments and openings.
yo i might of just got a job in nyc i might have to look for an apt. --- put me down for one of those!
hey dgg, ill tell you how i feel once i start work in two weeks...
alfredo- thanks for the link. That thread ran during the final week of my semester, completely missed it. I can relate to a lot of what you said there... but I've recently had an epiphany about the whole field, feeling a little differently about it.
how so?
http://www.120seconds.com
Well, I felt similarly frustrated by the lack of thought exhibited in the projects of the other students in my class. It seemed that I was missing out on any kind of discourse. I was seriously contemplating transfering into an Arch undergrad program. But everytime I mentioned that to teachers, they looked a bit panic stricken. They recognize my "different" approach to design and really encourage me to explore in ways other students just can't. They really try to keep me from getting bored or feeling cramped.
So, then I started to think that instead of bailing on the profession, maybe I should stick around and make it what I want it to be. If enough of us stick to our guns, and start our own discourse, eventually, that will be the norm. We might just be able to banish theme rooms after all.
One of the greatest things about the major pathway i chose was the professors: although they were not as "hard core" as architecture professors in their critiques, they were very supportive and intelligent--they really understood architecture and interior design. Another thing to be careful of is not trying to be an architect because you feel interior design is not as worthy or as intellectually stimulating. Of course, architecture has a history-lineage of this (theory/critique), interior design as a profession is beginning to become something ... led by ppl like you and me, of course..and by our professors in academia... lol
anyway, I will be starting work as an interior designer, and as of now, i am in the future entering graduate school for either design or architecture. I'll try to tell you how i feel once i am working in ny. btw are you still in school?
Yep, still in school. This is actually my second go around in college. The first time was right out of high school for two years in Fine Arts. Working on getting my BFA in Interiors.
You're right about ID people putting the field down because they are trying to over-compensate for their own insecurity and the perceived shortcomings of the profession when it is compared to Architecture. Both have their strengths and weaknesses. As for the intellectual stimulation that is often lacking in interiors, well, it's what you make of it.
I think this is an exciting time to be studying Int. D. People with the goals that you and I share for the profession are the future. The line between designer and decorator becomes clearer everyday. And the standardized testing that leads to licensing legitimizes us as professionals.
Well, that's my two cents, at least. ;)
also at the same time, our profession is less of an intellectual/overarching one as architecture/cityplanning, but it deals more with the client--i.e. the interactions (physical/mental/virtual) of a person within a space--things such as tactile qualities, adaptive spaces, etc--as a result we are more of a service oriented. Which is not to say we dont have anything to say!
I see that is another dilemma/issue that arises with architecture vs. interior design--its hard to be intellectual when we are considering such things as carpet tiles... usually.
But yea, we are definately moving away from decorator title. Maybe, we are moving more towards a service-profession (as opposed to purely aesthetic). strangely, we have a great opportunity: this allows people to really aknowledge design, and be aware of its value to people.
It's not as intellectual as architecture... yet. As the division between design and decoration is made clearer, I think that design will inevitably become a much more thoughtful/theoretical discipline. There is no reason for us to not approach the design of an interior in the same way that an architect might approach the design of an entire structure. True, selecting carpet tiles may not be rocket science, but there should definitely be a clear thought process behind it, because all of those decisions are supposed to support the concept of the space. We'll be just fine, we just have to separate the HGTV groupies from the real designers, lol.
I remember the first day of studio this semester, my teacher gave us the usual speech about design not being for pansies, and prepare not to sleep and yadda, yadda... and then he capped it off with: "You've had a semester to get faux finishes and balloon shades out of your system. I don't want to hear about them anymore. And, if they should come up in a few weeks, you'd better hope I'm in a good mood, because if not, I'll want to smack you." Love that guy.
oh, have you settled the apt. thing yet?
not yet... but have some people i am in contact with..
ny is too expensive
Hi guys,
I'm going to be moving to New York and just wanted to get some info on the neighborhoods. I'll be working way downtown in the Financial District, but obviously haven't been able to find anything reasonably priced nearby. I've been seeing a lot of listings uptown-Morningside Hts, Hamilton Hts, Harlem. I'd prefer not to go up past Morningside Hts b/c then it'd just be a really long commute, I imagine. Can anyone give me info on these neighborhoods? Anyone also looking to sublet their place? I'd appreciate the feedback.
-Thanks
sanofiSYN..if i were you i'd live in brooklyn...
i live in park slope..it's a 10-15 min cab ride into the city
and about a 1/2 hour train ride...and if you take the 2-3
it takes you in no time into the financial district...there
are a bunch of neighborhoods that are cool..smith st.
is a nice area...carrol gardens, brooklyn heights is ok...
i don't know all the names..but if you lived between 5th ave
and 7th close to flatbush you should have an easy commute..
Or try Staten Island (formerly known as Shaolin by ODB). You can get a good size two bed for the price of a one bed in one of the aforementioned Brooklyn areas. Your only draw back would be the fact you live on Staten Island and you need to take a boat to work.
Yeah, I was considering Brooklyn too, but I'd really like to stay on Manhattan. Do you know how long the commute is from Morningisde Hts to Wall Street? Is it longer than coming in from Brooklyn. Someone advised me that the Brooklyn Hts and Cobble Hill areas were pretty nice. I guess I'll find out myself soon enough.
sano, i dont think you really know what prices you're burying yourself within with the idea of wanting to stay in manhattan. here's an example:
1 BR/Studio, Fin. Dist. HW, HHW, DRMan- $1700/mo
thats a typical thing.
don't close your mind to the idea of Brooklyn. its really not far at all. look at a train map if necessary http://www.mta.nyc.ny.us/nyct/maps/subwaymap.pdf
living in park slope, bklyn you could get to manhattan (fin. dist) in about 20 minutes tops.
alfredocheese,
i recommend you ask a friend to put up a sign in his or her offices that you're looking for a roomate. 8 out of 10 chance someone will see it as they're looking for a place. that way you'll have a clue who this person could possibly be as opposed to a strange new yorker. (also they may turn out to be an arch or eng.) it works more times than not..... g'luck
i moved to nyc over the summer with my boyfriend. i was starting a new job and even though we were able to stay with friends until i could find a new place, i felt rushed to find an apartment. we also wanted to stay in manhattan, but i looked in brooklyn as well (b/c my job is in soho).
i looked at about 3 apartments a day. after a week i rented a small 1 bedroom in the lower east side (manhattan). i got a great deal thru craigslist ($1275, no elev, no doorman, but it's clean). i think i was the third person to see the apt and i put my deposit down immediately.
craigslist is great, but you have to be quick...i mean really quick. great deals will be gone within the hour. i found the same with the village voice. both will have scamming brokers. stay away from rentdirect.com, i've heard from friends that they'll show you bogus or old listings and you won't get your money back. also stay away from gotham city brokers, they offer to show you apartments at a low upfront fee...but they are scammers and their ads are everywhere.
parts of brooklyn are a lot closer than morningside heights (which is the area around columbia). wall st to morningside heights is about 40 min on the train. i'm not too familiar with brooklyn neighboorhoods, but i've heard cobble hill is nice and park slope (but park slope can get expensive as well).
good luck.
i just to NYC in August...i found plenty of opportunity on craigslist to sublet for a month so i had time to concentrate on actually finding a place that fit my particular needs and found a great loft in Bushwick(Brooklyn). it only takes about 35-40 min. to get to work (SoHo) and not long to the city in general. but that's beside the point. my point is to look into a sublet for a bit. mine was in east harlem...cheap but dangerous, not that dangerous, all that happened was some neighborhood kids let all the air out of my truck. but that's OK. we made up. i had a roommate lined up already so i didn't have to worry about that so much. i'm having a great time in NYC thus far except for the fact i got friggin' laid-off. anyone got any leads on employment?
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