30th
For Mackenzie Rosenthal, who will be a senior at New York University next year and who will be moving into a one-bedroom at 20 Exchange Place this summer, “the perks were just kind of too good to pass up.” She said she and her father had “pored over the lease, saying: ‘Where’s the catch?’ but as far as we can tell, there doesn’t seem to be one.”
When she and a roommate moved into her current two-bedroom walk-up in the East Village, they had to come up with $12,000 to cover the broker’s fee, security deposit and first and last month’s rent. “That was just ludicrous,” she said. “But when I move into my new apartment, all I need is the first month’s rent.”
Ms. Rosenthal said that after factoring in the free month’s rent, her $3,000 apartment will cost her $2,750 a month. She worries that she will not be able to afford to stay in the apartment when her one-year lease is up, but her broker, Jeffrey Carlson of Platinum Properties, said that as an original tenant, she might be able to negotiate the same rate at renewal time.