How much time is needed to not end up homeless in the Bronx?

February 5, 2007 8:29 AM

How early is too early to start looking for a job/apartment in NYC?

So, I graduate in May and have decided on moving to NYC (Brooklyn). My question is this: I've been randomly perusing job/roommate/apartment ads on Craigslist and am starting to get my resume and such together. When should I start actively emailing people and lining things up? I plan on making the move in mid-May, so I've got a bit over three months to go.

Also: are there sources other than CL that I should be looking for this sort of thing?

posted by youcancallmeal to work & money (18 comments total)

You're generally not going to find a rental more than a month in advance. That sounds scary, but that's how it works. Generally, apartments open up on the first of the month, so moving mid-month might be difficult if you don't know someone you can crash with for 2 weeks.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 8:33 AM on February 5, 2007 [1 favorite]

It's really hard to find an apartment in NYC if you're not already here. Find a share or a sublet for three or six months from which to stage your search.
posted by nicwolff at 8:46 AM on February 5, 2007

Pretty much as above, except moving mid-month isn't necessarily any tougher than the start of the month, in my experience. Lots of people find places on CL, but be prepared to wade through a lot of crap to find the good stuff. If you have the time and know what neighborhood(s) you're interested in, take a day or two and see if the real estate offices in those areas have anything to show you as a walk-in. I found a great (and cheap!) apartment in Park Slope by wandering into various rental offices one weekend.

You might also check out rent-direct.com. They're a no-fee listing service (one-time subscription of a couple hundred bucks, I think, which is a lot better than a broker's fee) that I used once. They had some decent listings, and not having to deal with brokers is a treat.

Final word of advice: when you do start going out to look at places, take along all the paperwork that you might need to put in an application. This includes things like copy of driver's license, letter of employment, bank or tax statements, credit report, etc. It's icky and invasive, but someone is going to ask you for this stuff, and you get a lot of points for having your shit together. Plus you can get your application in on the spot and get the drop on someone who's not as prepared.

Good luck!
posted by sonofslim at 8:48 AM on February 5, 2007

Also, so far as job hunting goes, you should absolutely start looking now, but you're going to find employers are much much much more likely to return your calls if you have a local telephone number and a local address.

You can at least start scoping out potential employers, and maybe set up some informational interviews, although I really have no idea how the theater world works.

One trick with finding an apartment, is if you want to find a place more than a month out, try looking at apartments in brand new buildings that are still under construction. We signed a lease 4 months before our move date doing this.
posted by bshort at 8:49 AM on February 5, 2007

I'm actually doing the EXACT same thing right now, and am officially piggy-backing your question. I'm moving from DC, so I've got it pretty easy. My plan is to go up two months before, litter Manhattan with my resume, then start following up. Right now i'm just trying to learn the difference between the actual apartments on CL and the scams. Also, learning the neighborhoods, the subway system, reading the times and all the local brooklyn blogs will make your transition far easier. Good luck to you! Maybe we should look for an apartment together!
posted by metasav at 9:07 AM on February 5, 2007

This is not a tactic for the weak stomached but if you're only moving from Bmore (I was moving from Philly when I moved to NYC way back when) you can always flop for a couple weeks at some place relatively gnarly but super cheap like the Jane Street Hotel. I lived up in that shithole for like six months when I moved to NYC. You can sit on the bed and put your feet up on the opposite wall, so it's not exactly what one would call spacious. There's also a co-ed communal bathroom on every floor that's like something out of Dante, so getting a gym membership up and running ASAP also helps for showering.

What this does for you is provide a place to live while you go to work and then allows you the luxury of doing a full scale apartment search from a homebase in the city. Housing laws in NYC require you to move out and then back in at the end of every three weeks (anything longer than that is long term housing and falls under different regulations). So every three weeks I hightailed back to Philly and crashed with the rents, then went back and moved into a different room in the Jane Street. Let's say it wasn't exactly the best six months of my life but the apartment I found after having the luxury to search worked out perfectly.

Just something to keep in mind if you find D-day approaching and you still don't have a place.
posted by The Straightener at 9:12 AM on February 5, 2007

As for which websites to use other than craigslist, it greatly depends on what industry in which you're hoping to find a job. I find that industry-specific job sites are usually best, though I have gotten bites through monster and hotjobs, believe it or not. Craigslist, to me, seems best for service and/or tech jobs.

You can find an apartment very quickly in this city, and there are certainly worse times than May to be looking. It sucks, but you just gotta put the time in pounding the pavement. Luckily it's over quickly, usually. Again, depending on your industry, jobs can be a catch-22. You can't really line one up more than a month in advance, and you can't really rely on having one lined up no matter how far in advance you begin. Be prepared to be jobless, and/or do temp work or restaurant work for a while, just in case.
posted by lampoil at 9:13 AM on February 5, 2007

My advice is to commit to it and move today! If nothing else you are local for doing the job searches and can be more dedicated to the job part and not the move part.
posted by thilmony at 9:22 AM on February 5, 2007

When you're looking at listings, be aware that if "no fee" is not specified, you're probably going to be looking at paying an agent a sizeable fee (probably 1 month's rent), in addition to the usual first & last month + security.
posted by textilephile at 9:39 AM on February 5, 2007

Particularly if you're moving to Brooklyn and into an apartment you may want to scope out the bed bug situation... this might be one place to start.
posted by rolypolyman at 10:21 AM on February 5, 2007

An addendum to textilephile's comment: especially on CL, even if a place is specified as no fee, look out. Sometimes that's a blatant lie, sometimes the fee has been folded into the rent.
posted by sonofslim at 10:42 AM on February 5, 2007

Good god... Please don't live in the Jane Street Hotel & its ilk unless an address below 14th St is more important to you than life, limb and the pursuit of happiness. Seriously.

Instead, check out any of the several room-rental agencies that post daily in Craigslist (you'll see headings like "Rooms for 125/wk"). I've used (and seen close friends use) four of them at this point, and each one lets you keep seeing rooms until you find an apt and a roommate you really like. They will get you a good room, same-day, for very little cash (usually 375 up front -- 125 first week, 125 refundable deposit, 125 onetime fee). You can show up from out of town at a room agency and be sleeping in a nice bed, in a big apt in Harlem, Inwood or the Heights (any area you prefer of upper Manhattan) within a few hours.

That's the approach I recommend to my friends and it's the perfect apartment-hunting solution, because you can't find an apt that's really right for you until you're living here. It just doesn't make sense to sign a lease until you've gotten an idea of the areas you like, walked around in them several times, both day & night, and seen enough different apts to get a real idea (not an idealized-Craigslist-description idea) of what's a good value according to your personal needs & standards. Welcome and good luck!
posted by allterrainbrain at 10:47 AM on February 5, 2007

In my experience, both jobs and apartments are less likely to take you if you don't have an NYC address. I would suggest borrowing a friend's or getting a sublet for a time.
posted by unknowncommand at 11:42 AM on February 5, 2007

Here are some links for you.

Also, start looking at apartments two weeks before your move-in date. Many brokers or landlords won't even talk to you earlier than that.
posted by mds35 at 11:48 AM on February 5, 2007

Good god... Please don't live in the Jane Street Hotel & its ilk unless an address below 14th St is more important to you than life, limb and the pursuit of happiness. Seriously.

People don't live in the Jane Street because they want to be downtown, they live there because all they can afford is $20 a night (at least, that was the rate then, who knows what it is now). It wasn't that bad. Well, you know, except for all the hookers and crackheads. And that one dude that took a dump in the shower, I wanted to kill that motherfucker. But besides that? Golden.

Like I said, not for the weak stomached.
posted by The Straightener at 12:34 PM on February 5, 2007

All kinds of good advice here. The truth is, there's no single best way-- far better to have your wits about you, be in serious touch with your standards and tastes, and always have a B plan.

Therefore: start looking for both apt and job now, in case you luck out on either front. Having one big component or the other solved (even for a while) will ease your life more than you know. And the fact is, post-graduation is THE peak season for apt and job seekers. The competition will be unlike anything you've ever seen (and you won't even see all of it!). If you were graduating from grad school, you're already late.

Don't be afraid to rent something that's available a little sooner than you'd like, such as May 1 (as long as you have that B plan in mind).

Tap into anyone with a connection to your campus for leads on both work and apt. Career center, alumni office, your favorite prof, your freshman roommate's parents-- if you ask around, you're gonna get help when and where you least expect it. (And, like I'm doing here, you're going to pass it on when you can.)

Spend spring break in town, setting up local cell (or buying a virtual # that forewards to your current cell from a voip like Vonage) and mail service (ups store or friend's apt).

This is going to sound silly, but: when you get to town, wear your comfiest non-sneaker shoes and stay hydrated. Unlimited-use metro cards are your friend.
posted by jouster at 12:34 PM on February 5, 2007

While it's not worth arguing about the Jane St specifically (especially since it's now almost double the price of the rooms-for-rent I mention -- without a usable bathroom, and without a kitchen), this reminds me of a broader issue that's important:

Sometimes newcomers choose the really nasty & filthy hotels/SROs because those seem like the only possible option, but sometimes these choices are informed by 70s-era fantasies that in this city you "take what you can get" and you're not really a hardcore New Yorker til you've put up with some truly nasty, dangerous shit (and you've got the stories to tell about it).

Putting up with nasty, dangerous shit is something you can do in all kinds of short-term ways if you really want to collect those stories or build up that cred. Your living situation can be different, especially in the days of Craigslist.
posted by allterrainbrain at 1:59 PM on February 5, 2007

Baltimore will miss you!
posted by nj_subgenius at 8:01 PM on February 5, 2007