NYC Rental Market Shows No Sign of Slowing Down

Living in New York City is getting more expensive by the day. While it is true that everyday items such as groceries, transportation, and entertainment have increased over the past year or two- most New Yorkers will tell you without a shadow of a doubt, their biggest expense is rent.

And it keeps getting more expensive and eating up more of New York’s resident’s income.

New York is a renter’s town, the world’s most expensive real estate market in the world leaves purchasing out of reach for the vast majority of its residents. Higher interest rates only precipitate the problem as those who may have previously been looking to purchase a starter home are now priced out.

Net effective median rents rose from a year earlier for the 20h straight month in Manhattan. Of the eight most recent rental units Meraki Realty has represented this month, all of them have found a renter in less than 24 hours, two of them weren’t even listed on StreetEasy because of a building waiting list, and three of them had bidding wars and set building records.

Manhattan median rents rose 12.8 percent to $4,175 compared to March 2022. When you factor in the concessions given last March rent increased by 13.2 percent. The most telling stat of the increase? This increase in rent happened despite there being 40 percent more listings available in March 2023 than the same time last year.

It has only gotten worse in April and May.

A contrarian observer might remark that Manhattan is always expensive and an anomaly, but they’d be wrong. The rental cost increase has spilled over to Brooklyn and Queens.

In Brooklyn, median rent rose 17.1 percent year over year and reached the second-highest level on record. March also saw the most lease signings in the borough’s history.

In Queens, both the net effective median rent and median rent hit the second-highest levels on record. March also saw a new record for lease signings in Queens and one in five or twenty percent of new leases involved a bidding war, the highest in more than two years of tracking.

If you are looking to move in the next three months, be prepared to pay more than in previous years and expect fierce competition.