The Hot Rental Market Greets New Yorkers Returning To Work.

Jasmine Perillo, a 26-year-old digital strategy consultant who has lived in New York for eight years, has never had a hard time renting an apartment other than this summer. So after one of his roommates moves house and the other moves to the city center, Perilo embarks on a seven-week journey to find an apartment at the end of May as his return date to work draws near.

After checking over 60 apartments, visiting open houses attended by 30 people, and expanding his search throughout Manhattan, he found everyone back in town looking for rented apartments.

"There are lines everywhere.

I guess in the middle, but yeah, some of the crazier trails are on the Upper West Side," he said. "I have never seen a market like this. This is crazy. " When New Yorkers return to the city - or arrive for the first time - expecting to return to work or classes in person in the fall, they flood the rental market looking for whatever they can find.

According to the latest real estate broker, Douglas Elliman, more new leases were signed as renewals in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and northwest Queens last month than every other July for more than ten years.

"Everyone you talk to in the industry knows it's a crazy, crazy market right now," said Raymond Ghani, a real estate agent at Misrahi Realty Group. "I don't think there's ever been a summer when so many people were interested in every apartment added."

Rents for New Yorkers have not returned to levels at the start of the pandemic.

The median rental claim in Manhattan last month hit $3,000 for the first time since July 2020, according to StreetEasy. However, this is still below the $3,500 high observed in March 2020 before prices fell. In Brooklyn, the median rent rose to $2,600 in July, a $100 jump from June and a $100 difference from the March 2020 high of around $2,700. The median rent in Queens rose to $2,200 last month and is close to - but not entirely coincidentally - the high $2,400 seen in March and April of last year.

Typical market

Expecting this busy market, some New Yorkers tried to overtake the crowd and head back to the city early.

Sasha Minovski, a surgical assistant at care company Nomad Health, returned to the city to settle in June before being forced back into the office in September. She left town at the start of last year's pandemic and moved to Iowa with her partner, who is from there.

"I think I came at the right time," he said, referring to the rent for his apartment.

But it also means these tenants are returning to the city with the Delta option, and more and more companies are delaying their return dates. For example, in early June, Griffin Kao, Google's product manager, signed a two-bedroom deal with two friends in the Gramercy neighborhood of the East Village after living and working in his hometown of Philadelphia for a year after graduating from college in May. 2020. Although his return to work was delayed from September to October, he is relieved to have hired him at this time.