Today I’ve been back on the renting websites looking for another place to stay again. I spent weeks before I was due to come over looking for accommodation before I found the Queen of Manhattan. But when Mutley comes to join me for a 10 day holiday I need to find another place for the two of us.
It’s a mark of just how expensive accommodation is here, and maybe also of how people are struggling to make ends meet, that a lot of people don’t just rent out floor space, like the Queen of Manhattan is doing, but actually rent their apartments and stay with friends. And because they can make double what they pay by renting out, and normally ask for cash, it’s also tax free. You can’t really rent a private apartment on Manhattan, even a studio – a basic one room place with kitchen/living/sleeping all in the same area, for less than 2,500 dollars a month. So when I saw such a place for $90 a night I jumped. For the 10 days Mutley and I need, that would be around a $1000, but believe me, that’s cheap!
So last night found me heading across town to the Chelsea area, way downtown of my current Upper East Side address, but nearer to the West Village. I walked for blocks and blocks, and the surroundings got distinctly dingier. Finally I arrived on 10th Avenue – way over to the very West of the Manhattan island, almost on the shores of the river between Manhattan and Jersey. Tenth itself is a monstrous three-lane race-track, and although the block was a lovely old building – a walk-up as they call it here, because it has no lift – it was standing pretty much alone in this wasteland of garages and empty lots – not very attractive! The person who lives there, and was renting out, runs an art gallery nearby, and said she would sleep a few nights at the gallery and a few nights with friends – it all seems very upsetting in some ways – throwing someone out of their home so you can have a holiday – but of course you’re paying for the privilege. The flat was actually exactly the kind of place I had imagined staying in before I arrived in New York – old-fashioned heavy iron pipes, high ceilings, mis-matched furniture. The Queen of Manhattan’s place is lovely, but it’s in a fairly souless modern building. This place was, as the arty owner put it, all ‘vintage’! As I noticed a small cage in the corner, she finished the (quick) tour by reassuring me that the hamster wouldn’t be staying – she’d go with her to wherever she ended up staying! I’ve said I’ll get back to her tomorrow – but I’m a bit put off by the noisy road, crummy area and lack of internet connection – so we’ll see.
At the other end of the spectrum, the free paper I now read on my subway commute (I’ve abandoned the buses for a bit as the subway is so much quicker) led today on ‘They’re rich and renting..’ – the story of how the rich Manhattanites, ‘leery’ of buying in the current market, are happy to pay $20,000 a month to rent penthouse apartments. The story however, featured only one couple, and was surrounded by ads for real estate agents and so on, so I’m NOT entirely convinced.
But the paper then went on to to tell us that Jennifer Anniston, clearly NOT ‘leery’ about buying, has snapped up a penthouse in the West Village. Her place only has one bedroom, like most New York pads, but unlike most New Yorkers, she’s reportedly paying just under five million for it…I don’t think she’ll be needing to rent out to anyone!