New York City rents hit record highs in January as Brooklyn and Manhattan spending soar: report

The rent is damn high.

A recently released report indicates that average city rents and rents per square foot rose sharply in the past month, with Manhattan and Brooklyn posting all-time January median highs of over $4,000 per month.

The median rent in Manhattan rose to $4,097 last month, the third-highest increase on record and up more than 15% from January 2022, real estate firms Douglas Elliman and Miller Samuel said in a report.

In Brooklyn, median rent has set a new average January high of $4,165 — a jump of more than 30% from last year.

“It’s ridiculous, it’s a lot,” said Katherine Rodriguez, 30, a lifelong resident of Williamsburg. “The whole area is changing from what it used to be. Buildings, culture. Everything is more expensive. It’s not the same anymore.”

And in Northwest Queens, which spans Astoria, rents are up 14.2% since last January, with an average rent of $4,369 per month. The study found that the area has seen higher rents for four consecutive months as the city continues to recover from COVID-19.

Social worker Cladidia Cordoba said prices are already too high, citing her $2,200 monthly rent for a studio apartment in Queens.

“New York is only for rich people,” she complained. “It’s crazy. And the landlords want the first month (rent), the last month, and the deposit. My out-of-town friends are like, ‘Are you crazy? How can you live there?’

The report also said Manhattan’s vacancy rate fell for the first time in nine months, with the area’s median rent covering the top 10% of rents above $8,300 soaring to $11,000. The report said the figure was the third highest on record and 22% higher than before the pandemic.

“It sounds something like this,” said 25-year-old Bedford-Stuyvesant office manager Nick Brandeis. “It’s not a surprise.”

In response, the Legal Aid Society called on state legislators to sign legislation protecting tenants from unjustified evictions and higher rates.

“Despite the decline in inflation, rents remain at unprecedented levels, forcing residents to leave their homes, take to the streets or to local shelters,” Judith Goldiner, a lawyer for the society, said. “Until Albany is able to promote ‘The Good Deed’ to provide tenants with basic protections … this worrying trend will continue.”

Just last month, Mayor Adams and senior city planners provided new details about their efforts to convert underused office space into apartments in New York City’s business districts. The proposed plan would repurpose millions of square feet of the city’s office buildings for residential use.

The reuse plan specifically mentioned downtown Flushing and the Bronx Hub as candidates for refurbishment. Currently, office-to-residential conversions are only permitted in Financial District buildings built in 1977 or earlier, and other city business districts with buildings built before 1962.

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