Off-Campus Housing
To start off: NYU Housing is pretty good, on the scale of things.
NYU Housing will run you about $1500 per month. You can beat this price off-campus, but it'll take some work. Our housing is a pretty good deal- you're near campus, you have a doorman, you've got dining halls. There are plenty of good dorms, and you'll have a good time no matter which dorm you're in as long as you leave your dorm open and seek out friends and opportunities proactively. If you can't quench the desire to be king of your own domain, though, let's talk about how to navigate this real estate market.
There are two categories of apartments when it comes to transportation cost: walking distance, and subway distance.
A subway ride currently costs $2.75 per ride, and a 30-day unlimited costs $116.50. This means that on your 49th subway ride in a given month, an unlimited card makes financial sense. If you're making one round-trip every day, the unlimited card makes sense. There will be days when you make more than one round trip. Once you have an unlimited card, that $116.50 is a sunk cost and it doesn't matter whether you're living 30 blocks from campus or 100 blocks from campus. You are now "subway distance."
Add in some cost for cab rides- maybe you've been at a bar for one round too many, or you wake up 15 minutes before a final and live 50 blocks off campus, or you and your romantic interest want to get back to your place in a hurry. Whatever the reason, tack on $50-75 in cab rides.
What does all of this mean? It means that with approximately $175/mo in transportation costs, you'd better be saving more than that amount in rent differences. Moving to Williamsburg because the rent is $100 cheaper than the village is actually more expensive than taking the higher rent and walking to class. You can certainly save money with cheaper off-campus apartments, but make sure you're factoring transportation cost in.
You will have much more space, but your friends might not want to visit you.
I was living up in the 130s by Riverside Drive (or as my friends called it, "Connecticut") my sophomore year. It was a beautiful, spacious apartment for 60% the price of NYU housing with a full kitchen, brand new hardwood floors, and a view of the river- and it was always empty, because that's a long haul to come visit. If you're living far from campus when your friends call you on a Friday night to go out, you'll be the one traveling downtown to meet them. "I'll be there in 45 minutes to an hour!" became a common phrase. Keep in mind, also, that in the wee hours of the morning trains run every 20 minutes. This will feel like an eternity at 3AM, and you may end up crashing downtown with your friends just to avoid this.
The next year, I lived in a tiny overpriced shoebox apartment in SoHo that barely fit a queen bed, but my friends were over all the time and I was 5 minutes from class.
Weigh the pros and cons of this: You may have your dream apartment that's a relaxing sanctuary from the activity of the city, but a 1.0-1.5 hour round-trip commute is no joke, especially when you forget that essay and have to do that commute twice in a day. Bring a good book.
The East Village has some great apartments hidden within 10,000 mislabeled scam advertisements.
Expect about a 10% return rate on hunting for apartments within the East Village: For every 10 you do a viewing of, 9 will be mislabeled or have some fatal flaw:
"Why is there a bunk bed built into the kitchen wall? That's one of our three bedrooms?" The tenth will be a place you actually could live at a price slightly higher than you wanted. Get into the habit of calculating price per square foot, accepting that half the time they will either claim not to have (or refuse to give you) a floorplan of the apartment. Start bringing a tape measure and making your own measurements when you view places.
You're going to get a lot of "bait and switch" situations, which are illegal but inevitable. You'll call about apartment #5A that you saw on Craigslist, the one that's right in your ideal price zone and has the kitchen with the beautiful exposed brick. The guy on the other end will say
"Oh, 5A was rented last week but 7A is open- it's $200 more and has one fewer bedroom, but lets set up an appointment for you to look at it!" Then, a week later, you'll see #5A listed again on a brand new listing. The apartment might not even exist. Be wary of this tactic, and don't let them use it to force you into a place you don't want.
Don't sign anything or give anyone any money until you're absolutely sure you've found the right place and are ready to move ahead with it.
If they're trying to get you to sign papers while viewing a place or to in any way get a single cent of your money,
say no. You always have the right to say no, and walk out the door. Ten other scumbags will line up to take their place. And read absolutely everything you ever sign, without exception. Don't sign anything you don't understand.
If you're being pressured to sign something without reading it, something is wrong. I've had brokers try and force us to sign exclusivity agreements that said that if we used any other broker, we would owe them thousands of dollars. I'm the guy in my group of friends that actually reads contracts and terms of service, which my friends started to appreciate after that. You're in college now, you're legal adults, and if you put your name on paper it's legally binding.
Regarding safe neighborhoods
I'll be blunt here: If you see buildings that look like
this, do not live in that area. These are city housing projects. There is a disproportionate amount of crime that occurs inside these areas and in the blocks surrounding. I have worked with law enforcement in the past, just take my word for it. While
StuyTown looks like these projects, it's a privately owned development on the Lower East Side that I'll talk about more later.
Other neighborhood advice. If you're living anywhere in Harlem, live as far West as possible. I was on Riverside Drive off of the 1 train and it was great. The closer you get to Amsterdam Ave, the sketchier the neighborhood is. Amsterdam and 125th is the worst area.
The East Village is safe, although it wasn't 20-30 years ago. Things can get a little sketchy when you start passing Avenue C late at night, but that's about it.
Never live in BedStuy, ever, without exceptions. The apartments are that cheap for a reason. This is not a trendy, edgy area that you can live in to show your friends that you're hip and don't like gentrification. It's the hood.
If your significant other came to visit you at 11PM, would she/he be safe on the walk over? If a place puts you on edge, lean towards no.
For the most part, you'll be pretty safe anywhere in Manhattan (or just across the water in Brooklyn) as long as you follow your gut and keep away from the housing projects.
Broker's Fees
It's become common in NYC to have a "broker's fee" of 15% of your yearly rent that gets paid to the broker as a reward for finding you the place. Sometimes you can negotiate down this fee to 12.5% or 10%, which is better. This is a lot of money- a few thousand dollars typically. Take this cost and amortize it over your year's rent to see what it will cost you. If your absolute max budget is $1400 and you find a place for $1375 with a 15% fee, you can't afford it.
There's no shortage of places without fees, and you should start looking for no-fee places first. Sometimes, if you see a building you're interested in living in, you can look it up online and call them directly to ask about vacancies. Dealing directly with a building is a lot more pleasant than brokers.
Stuyvesant Town
StuyTown is a common place to live for students moving out of the dorms. If you can get a couple roommates together (3 or more of you) it will be a great deal financially. Utilities are included and there are a lot of amenities. They have laundry in the building and public safety. The free NYU bus runs to StuyTown.
They're really strict about late rent and you'll get hit hard with late fees, so get your rent in a couple days early if you live here. If you have fewer than 3 people, it doesn't make financial sense to live here compared to the dorms if you're trying to save money. Their online listings are never up to date, but if you go in to their offices and talk to them they're helpful. Overall, I like StuyTown because there's no broker's fee and it was a lot easier than my previous apartment searches.
How to deal with agents/brokers
Do your research before going in. They're going to try and pressure you under the assumption that you're just a dumb kid that will sign anything. Always remember that you can walk away at any point.
Understand that you need to give them slightly lower cost numbers than you actually have. If you say that your ideal price is $1500, they will have "the perfect place" for $1700. Know your true numbers, and keep them close to vest. They will tell you that "you really can't find any apartments in your ideal price range" which is nonsense. They say that to everyone regardless of your price range.
You don't actually have to give them all of the private information that they ask for. They may ask for your family's tax returns, which could include your siblings' SSNs. They don't need that to determine whether you can afford a place. Take a black sharpie and redact information that's irrelevant and none of their business. They'll whine and get over it.
I said this in my last post, but avoid CitiHabitats like the plague. They'll scam you. They're known as "ShittiHabitats" for a reason.
Again, remember that you can always walk. They will tell you that they already have two applications in for this apartment, and that it will go quickly. They are often lying. Being efficient with your paperwork is good, but it's better to lose an apartment than be pressured into a bad one.
They may try and imply that it's poor etiquette to use multiple brokers at once to look for a place. They are wrong. They will ask if you're looking around with anyone else, and your response should be "I've seen a few places recently with other brokers, but I'm still looking and haven't found the right place yet." Don't give any more detail. Competition lights a fire under them. It's the free market in action. Play hardball.
Roommates
Your best friend might not be the best person to live with. Some people are compatible in an apartment and some people are not. Pick roommates that, to the best of your knowledge, have similar attitudes and values about how the space will be used. You may love going out to the bars with your friend, but might not like the wild parties he throws at your apartments while you're trying to study. Do your best to get on the same page.
Do not live with your significant other out of convenience or to save money- do it because you love each other and are ready for that stage in your relationship. I have known couples who moved in together out of financial interest, broke up, and had to continue living together in the same tiny apartment because they couldn't afford to break the lease and move out. That is some romantic-comedy level misery there.
So, you've found the perfect place.
Have your paperwork assembled early so that you're ready to move, but do so on your own terms- don't be pressured. Don't let your roommates get pressured and freaked out either, because then they will act irrationally.
When it comes to the security deposit, divide it by the number of roommates and have everyone pay equally. Yes, I understand that you're living with your best friend since childhood and you've personally seen him put out a fire in a puppy orphanage using only his pectorals. It doesn't matter- you should all be on equal financial footing, so that everyone has an equal incentive not to damage the property.
The same goes for
guarantors, which are effectively a means of having your parents vouch for your ability to pay rent because you're a college student. You can have multiple guarantors. The real estate agent might say that "they usually don't do things that way" or "it creates a lot of paperwork", but make it happen anyways- you want to have as even of a distribution as possible of responsibility. Ideally, everyone's parents are guarantors, and everyone pays into the security deposit equally. Everyone has equal skin in the game, so no one has an incentive to break the lease or damage the property. This isn't because you don't trust them, but because everyone should be on equal footing.
Payment
You may have to pay using a method you're unfamiliar with. Get your mind out of the gutter, we're talking about certified checks and money orders. Certified checks come from your bank/credit union of choice, and are a means for a bank to say "Yes, they actually have the money in the account, we promise." Money orders are effectively like cash, and are a single nameless check with a dollar amount- you hand the bank cash, and they hand you a money order. Don't lose them, and treat them like cash.
Notarization
You might need to get something notarized at some point. This is a government-sanctioned way of saying "Yeah, shit's official." This is done through a notary public, who may charge you a nominal fee (something like $2) to notarize a document. They legally cannot charge you more than this nominal fee, so if someone says that it'll cost $20 to get something notarized they're trying to scam you.
Final Thoughts
Take a deep breath. You will be ok, and will find a good place to live. You will not end up in a cardboard box. Just spend a lot of time looking around, don't be afraid to say "no" or to play hardball, remember that you always have the dorms as a backup, keep away from the housing projects, and factor in the various costs listed above when figuring out what you can afford.
Bonus resources that are a decent place to start
This guide is courtesy of reddit user /u/nyusenior