I've been in the city for 5.5 years and have moved 5 times, so I think I have a fair idea of how the system works. While, yes, it stinks to pay a fee to rent an apartment in NYC, I will say that my experience with this company, particularly our broker, Tosh, was as good as it gets.
1. There was no bait and switch. When I initially saw the ad, there were no pictures because Tosh refused to post pictures of similar apartments as other firms often do. Pictures were posted an hour or so later once he was able to get real photos.
2. Our place is awesome and from what I understand, this company has an exclusive listing on it. You can go with the bigger names who "have keys to all the doors" but I've been down that route, and most of the inventory is crap or overpriced or "so good it's going to rent to the next person who sees it if you don't act". The apartment I signed for is one of the best I've seen in the city for our budget and I received no pressure to act immediately (granted I did because I was sold from the minute I walked in, but I appreciated not having it thrown in my face)
3. Tosh was very upfront about the process and gave us realistic time frames and worked with us and the landlord directly to ensure we got the apartment. He stuck to his word and wasn't queuing up other applications behind ours "just in case", which I also greatly appreciated.
4. After the lease was signed with all money present and accounted for, he still kept in regular contact giving us whatever updates there were to give from move-in dates, opportunities to buy anything off the current tenant, who to contact for what, etc.
Basically I am now an advocate for this firm as they had exclusive access to one of the coolest apartments I've seen in NYC (so I'm assuming they may have others); there was no BS; there was no pressure, and maybe, more importantly, I found Tosh to be very personable. He was different from other brokers I had worked with who were just looking to get their commission and would say whatever they had to in order to get you to bite. It matters hugely when you feel as if your broker is actually working as an advocate for you, and you can say with confidence that the fee went towards a service rather than simply opening a door to an apartment you feel you could have found on your own. read more