Brooklyn is one of the most popular neighborhoods in New York City. It boasts over 2 million residents spread over its land mass of 71 square meters.
It is famous for the botanical gardens, the museum, The Soldiers’ and Sailors’ arch, and the famous ‘New York accent.’ It is a melting pot of different cultures and this shows in its rich collection of restaurants.
Brooklyn is home to a number of higher institutions of learning like Brooklyn College, Saint Francis College, SUNY Downstate College of Medicine, and other private Colleges like Brooklyn Law School, and Pratt Institute.
Brooklyn is home to entrepreneurs, tech startups, designers, artists, students, and families.
If you want to join the community of people who live in Brooklyn, and you’re not looking for anything too pricey, you can read this article to help you figure out what to do. In addition, SharedEasy got you covered if you are looking for a room in Brooklyn for rent.
Before we get into the meat of the article, let’s go over the guidelines for renting a place in New York City.
Guidelines for Renting a Place in New York City
Get Your Financials in Order
Most landlords in New York want to see that you can afford to live in their houses, so they require proof of your financial ability.
This can be in the form of pay stubs, tax returns, bank statements, a letter of employment from your employers, and proof of other income like revenue from investments, securities, real estate or trust funds.
If you don’t have any of these, you will need a guarantor to stand in for you, and present their own proof of financial ability with the same documents as listed above. Most landlords require that your guarantor make at least 80 times the monthly rent yearly, which is an annual income of about $189,000.
You also need to have a credit score of at least 600 to be considered as a potential renter, and your guarantor needs to have a higher score than that.
Do Your Research
Where do you want to live? Talk to people you know that live there. Read articles about the area. Look up the statistics. Figure out what the average cost of housing and amenities would be in that neighborhood.
What are the amenities accessible to you in that neighborhood? If you love to read, figure out if they have public libraries. What is the transportation system like? Are there regular buses? Is it close to the subway system? Is it close enough to your workplace or school?
You also need to do your research on potential landlords and apartments. Find out if the landlord is notorious for overcharging or making up ridiculous excuses to extort money from renters, or if he is a slumlord.
Also find out if the apartment is on a blacklist, or if it is prone to frequent infestations of bed bugs or mice. It is important to know these things to prevent from being unpleasantly surprised when you move in.
Define Your Expectations, But Be Flexible
You need to have a list of things that you need your apartment to have- a must-have list of sorts, and that should make up your baseline. Decide that you won’t settle for anything less than that.
The next thing to do is to make a list of things that would be an added bonus to have. This would include things like a doorman, an elevator, or gym facilities. Also prepare to be flexible. Don’t compromise your must-haves, but be willing to be flexible with your choices.
When you have all these in place, you can now begin your room search.
Where to find a Month-to-Month Room to Rent
Word of Mouth
When you’re looking for a room to rent, it helps to ask around. You just might find someone who knows someone who is looking for a roommate, or someone who has a room in their house that they want to rent out.
It also helps to pay attention to ads placed in public places like gyms, the laundromat, or the community center. You just might find your perfect rental there.
An Agent
If you’re new to New York City, you might want to hire an agent to help you find the best room for your budget and specifications.
Agents help you block out the noise, and you can rely on them to find authentic offers for you.
The only snag to this arrangement is that hiring an agent will require you to pay an agency fee, but it’s worth it for the value they provide. An agent will be in your corner and help you negotiate for favorable terms whenever it’s possible to.
The Internet
There are a variety of options for finding a room to rent available on the Internet.
The first option is Facebook. There are groups on Facebook that were created for the sole purpose of catering to people that are looking for rooms to rent.
You just need to join the group and put up a post about what you need and wait for a reply. Or you can just look through the posts on the page and contact the poster when you find the perfect room for you.
Websites like Craigslist have a lot of things on offer, and one of those is rooms for rent. Some of these might look too good to be true, so you need to do thorough research before committing to anything.
Another option is rental sites. These are primarily for hosting property. They list available property along with pictures and prices for you to look through and pick one. Some of the properties have a fee attached for viewing them, so pay attention to that.
Conclusion
This article lists out the things to note when you need to rent a room on a monthly basis in Brooklyn. It also highlights the places you can find these rooms.
We hope this article helps. Good luck on your rental journey!