It’s important for you to be in the know of what certain real estate terms refer to, especially in New York City where the real estate market is renown to be hard to navigate!

By having this knowledge, you’ll not only save a lot of time in your apartment search, you’ll also know exactly what to ask for if you have an idea of what kind of apartment and what budget you have. We’ve setup some easy to read definitions for you to quickly browse through the most important terms!

No-Fee versus Fee Apartments: A Fee Apartment usually means you have to pay for a broker fee. This fee depends on the broker but usually equals a month's rent. A No-fee apartment means you won't have to pay the broker fee. The broker's fee will usually be covered by the building you end up moving into!

We can now move onto terms you’ll often encounter on listings. We’ll also discuss further in this article what the benefits of choosing apartments no fee in nyc are, over choosing fee apartments.

Gross Rent versus Net Rent: The gross rent is the overall monthly rent shown without any concessions taken into account. The advertised "Gross Rent" will always be higher than the Net Rent if there are concessions on the current unit (usually 1 month free). The NET Rent (Net Effective Rent) is the monthly rent minus all concessions placed on the unit.

Now that we’ve covered four of the most popular terms in terms of finding apartments in NYC, we’ll give you a walkthrough of finding apartments in manhattan for rent (and nyc no fee rentals).

We’ll start with what it’s like to work with a broker and if it’s for you or not.

SHOULD YOU WORK WITH A BROKER?

To work with a broker or not to work with a broker, that is the question…

The New York City real estate market and the world of apartment rentals in new york can be seriously tricky to navigate if you aren’t sure where to look or don’t have much time to spend on research and listing searching. You have to consider whether or not you’ll want to go at it solo or work with a fee broker, or a no fee broker. You haven’t even started apartment searching and all these added steps are already piling up!

In our experience, working with a no fee broker is usually the easiest and fastest way to find a great apartment for rent in nyc without the hassle of apartment searching. Why spend time searching through hundreds of listings and spend time figuring out the lease signing process and approval process when you can have someone assist you the entire time! This isn’t to say that fee brokers shouldn’t be used either.

Fee brokers have many of the same benefits of working with a no fee broker, with the exception that you’ll have to pay a broker fee and add that on top of all your moving fees, hence why we tend to recommend working with a no fee broker instead.

If you do decide to work with a broker that charges a fee, make sure you know to budget for it as you’ll often be asked to pay the broker’s fee which is usually equal to a month’s rent or a month in a half.