This time of year is known to the New York rental broker community as “the off-season” or “Chill-in-Miami-until-March-season.” But for savvy (or just plain lucky) renters, winter can be primetime for rental deals, as the apartment supply-to-demand ratio tilts — ever-so-slightly and ever-so-briefly — in their favor.
Based on an analysis of over 10,000 apartment listings from the past 30 days, Rentenna’s Manhattan Apartment Rental Price Heatmap reveals the pockets of near-sane rental prices to be found for renters fortunate enough to be moving in the first quarter of the year (and brave enough to endure New York’s sudden descent into the polar vortex).
Reading the Rental Prices Heatmap:
- Red indicates areas with nosebleed median rents (even compared to Manhattan overall)
- Green indicates areas where New Yorkers can hope to find rental deals (#HiddenGems)
- Blue indicates areas where rents fall in line with median rents for Manhttan overall (i.e., insane
(For more numbers-oriented readers, we’ve supplemented the pretty colors with median rent data for 1-bedroom and 2-bedroom vacancies by major neighborhood.)
To post the NYC rent map on your own blog or site, just copy and paste the html below:
Where NOT to Look for an Apartment in Manhattan if You’re Price Sensitive
- Union Square
- Tribeca
- West Village
Where to Find the Best Rental Deals in Manhattan
- Lower East Side
- Chinatown
- Upper East Side (East of 3rd Avenue and North of 80th Street)
Unexpected Neighborhoods with Cheap Rents in Manhattan
In addition to the relatively inexpensive rents to be found in the LES, Chinatown, and UES, tiny pockets of green on the Pricing Heatmap indicate that unexpected opportunities for rental deals await in Soho, The Garment District, and Kips Bay. But be prepared to work to find the deals: these are all neighborhoods that typically fall on the higher end of the price spectrum.
The Best and Worst Values for Manhattan 2-Bedrooms
If you’re looking for a 2 bedroom rental, there are some wrinkles to consider. Per the map, the median rent for a 2-bedroom unit in Manhattan comes in at about 1.4x the median rent of a 1-bedroom apartment in the same neighborhood.
In the East Village, Murray Hill (break out the beer pong!), and Morningside Heights, however, median 2BR rents come in at just 1.2x the median rent of 1BRs.
Meanwhile, in Union Square renters get comparatively less bang for their buck when living with a roomie than in other neighborhoods, as median rents for 2BRs run at 1.7x that of 1BRs. Tribeca isn’t far behind, with median 2BR rents costing 1.6x that of 1BRs in the neighborhood.