The system in Manhattan is like no other anywhere in the country. Anywhere else, a rental agent is hired to save you the time and leg work, and you pay them a fee for their hard-work and service. In the City, however, a rental agent gets a fee for having a listing, in most cases 15% of the annual rent. You can spend hours every day for weeks looking for a place, you find a broker with access to a good apartment, and voila, you owe him thousands of dollars. I don’t know how the system came to be in the first place; it’s really screwed up. Now, in some cases, you can find a “no fee” apartment, where landlords and managers boast that there are no broker fees involved. But - the rent is typically listed at several hundred dollars a month more than the unit itself is worth. It’s like the landlord is doing us a favor by not charging a fee! I have even seen cases where one apartment is rented with at least 3 different real estate brokers, all for different rental amounts and different broker fees - listed for whichever sucker is willing to pay the most.

There is good logic behind the system: landlords in Manhattan typically own hundreds or thousands of units, and with the high-turnover in the City, they simply do not have the capability to run credit checks, collect paperwork, and qualify applicants all day long. So, they list the unit with the broker, and the agents do the rest. Simple as that. But over the past decade or so the rental vacancy rate in Manhattan has become so low (under 1%) that the brokerage system has become corrupt. I know Bloomberg is busy dealing with Wall Street and all, but maybe we’d all be better off and less bitter if the rental system is Manhattan was more efficient. Sure, agents need to make a living too, but let them work for it like everyone else and not just get paid for hanging their license. And I’m not blaming the agents – I’m blaming the system.

I am helping my sister find an apartment on the Upper West Side. Her budget for a 2-bedroom share is $2,800, no fee. This might sound like a lot of money for a two bedroom, but believe me this is nothing. For $2,800 she will probably not even get a dishwasher and laundry.  And for this price, no fee, we are looking at apartments the size of closets that are worth maybe $2,200 per month. Maybe. There is a building on the Upper West Side in a great location, with 10 rental units available. Ten! They are listing the 2-bedrooms at $3,500 no fee.  The units have a few appliances against the wall as the kitchen (no dishwasher!), and maybe 600 square feet of living space to share between 2 people. The nerve.

This past week I saw another 2-bedroom for $2,750, listed by the current tenants who need to break their lease. The ad mentioned a small possible third bedroom. The apartment was small but cute, maybe 650 square feet, and the “third bedroom” was nothing more than a walk-in closet or storage area. The current tenant informed me that there was an error in the listing, and the rent is actually $3,100 per month and not $2,750. And, it was just submitted to a broker. So, a 650 square foot apartment, that 3 people are supposed to live in, and each pay over $1,000 a month in rent, and pay a broker fee.

Now, a lot of rental agents are advertising apartments on Craigslist that they themselves have not even seen! This is something else that infuriates me; yesterday when I contacted an agent about a listing, he told me about this $3,100 small 3-bedroom that I mentioned above, and when I told him I had seen it and it was a closet, his answer was “Yeah, I figured”. So, we are living in a city where the brokers themselves don’t even believe in their product. And it doesn’t matter! Someone out there who doesn’t know better will end up paying.

One more scenario I will quickly mention. I saw a 2-bedroom listing for $2,800 in the West 80’s advertised in the “no fee” section of Craigslist. Sure enough, when I contacted the agent, she a) said she had not seen the apartment but heard it was big; b) said their was in fact a one-month fee and c) said the unit requires a first and last month’s security deposit. So, to get this straight, I need to be prepared with $8,400 up front, to deal with someone who has not even seen the apartment? Incredible.

My advice is that if you plan on staying in your new apartment for a few years, it is worthwhile to pay the broker fee, because you save money in the long run. But - who plans anything in New York City? At this point, how do you even know if you are still going to have a job next year? If you end up paying a fee and move out in a year, well, you just got screwed out of several thousand dollars.

So what’s the solution? There really is no solution. You need to be patient and keep your options open as far as neighborhoods and building types. If you have a budget of $2600-$3000 for a 2-bedroom, you are better off in a converted-two in a doorman building, because the layouts of those units lend themselves to convert well. I have lived in a doorman building and a walk-up building, and it’s all the same to me.

And be very cognizant of “no-fee” listings; most likely the rents are a lot more than the unit is worth ($3,700 a month for shitty 2-bedrooms with one bathroom in a walk-up), or the agent pulls the old bait-n-switch.

Some sites to take a look at are NY Bits and Urban Sherpa which are good New York City guides to landlords and no-fee listings.

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

A few things I did not like about downtown San Jose and the convention:

1. The boxed lunches at the convention center. Just because I am a vegetarian does not mean I will enjoy eating a few pieces of vegetables on bread. But I suppose the meat-eaters did not enjoy their boxed lunches much better. By Day 2 everyone was already heading out for lunch.

2. The lack of food options near the convention center. Being from New York - and not having been on the West Coast in a while - I am spoiled by the 5 pizza places and delis and sushi restaurants on every block. We wandered around quite a bit to find some breakfast. Only last night did I realize that walking about 4 blocks would yield me a variety of food options (Good Karma was delicious).

3. The lack of electrical outlets in the meeting rooms. Oh, the perpetual search for laptop power. But Topix saved the day - they gave away splitters at their booth - and I was happy to share my outlet with my peers.

Some things I did love about San Jose:

1. The cleanliness of the town - again, being from New York - I am not used to this at all. And the lack of smokers.

2. The IM Charity Party at Agenda Lounge. The open bar enabled me to meet a lot of new people - and give me a slight hangover the next day.

3. The Google Dance. Read all it about it in the next post.

4. The weather. Of course.

Can’t wait til next year!

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

The highlight of the show, as is every year, is the Google Dance, which actually took place last night at the Google Campus in Mountain View, California. The theme of the dance was “glow in the dark”.  The Google Headquarters were unbelievable. Like a college campus, video arcade, dance club, and bar mitzvah all in one. There was a sand volleyball court on site, a lawn strewn with bean bag chairs and a stage, - complete with spotlights and a fog machine - where groups were lining up to play Rock Band. Buffets of food set up in at least three different places, a decorate-your-own-cupcake-bar, smoothi bar, photo booth, a large glow in the dark dancefloor, and a few bars with kegs. And that was just the outside. On the inside was a nother dance floor with a large overhead screen (think, NYC night club), and video games everywhere. What really impressed me was the charicature booth - not old-fashion artists with charcoal or pencils, but digital artists drawing Avatar charicatures on their computer. Very cool. Thousands of people were there and everyone appeared to be having a great time - how could you not! Can’t wait for next year’s Google Dance already! Will post the pictures as soon as I get my hands on a USB cable, but you can check out Google’s photos of the dance.

Will keep you posted on the remainder of the conference.

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

I was reading some responses to the Starbucks closings online at ireprot.com, and it seemed more often than not people were happy about this. One person commented “It’s about time. Their coffee tastes like charcoal.” Another person said “I already spend $4 a gallon on gas. Why would I spend another $4 for a 12oz coffee?” Point taken.

However, along with these Starbucks closings come thousands of store managers and baristas out of jobs. Empty buildings with landlords losing rent. Coffee machine manufacturers and paper-goods manufacturers losing income. Clearly there is not going to be a good economical after-effect of all the closings. So, all the people out there that think corporate Starbucks is evil, well, they were actually stimulating the economy. Wow look at me now defending them!

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

Neighburrito stays open until 2am from Tuesday to Saturday nights, which should be popular with the Lower East Side late night bar crowd. It’s a welcome new addition to the hood.

127 Rivington Street (between Essex and Norfolk)
New York, NY 10002
212-260-2277

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

Check out some coverage at the Daily News and The Street.

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

NYC Apartments for Sale
www.XYZCompany.com
Condos, Coops, First Time Buyers
www.XYZCompany.com

Now, some of you out there are familiar with the advertising program and know that Google limits the amount of characters per line to 25, 35, 35, 35 - with the display URL in the last line. Each character is very valuable - and you need to carefully choose your words! To waste line 2 with the URL is just a stupid thing to do! I actually don’t think I have seen anyone make this error until today. Now the ad might be relevant, but there is no call to action and so they are probably not attracting qualified traffic.

In the same set of sponsored listings for the query “Manhattan Apartment”, the second sponsored ad was a listing posted by an individual agent, with the agent’s name in the ad, and a landing page that takes you to the agent’s profile page. Now, I also happen to manage the account for this agent’s firm…and guess what…the agents do not have access to the Google Analytics! Which brings me to mistake #2. Do not advertise in Google (or on any other search engine for that matter) if you are not tracking the performance data! How can the advertiser modify their ads, see which ads are achieving high click-through rates, high ROIs, are performing poorly or performing well, etc., without having access to the data? Yet another way of throwing money down Google’s drain. This agent is probably wasting a lot of money on the campaign.

So my advice to all you novice Google advertisers out there: read through the Google Adwords Help Center, join the forum, buy Google Adwords for Dummies, arm yourself with enough knowledge to run a successful campaign. Pumping more money into the system will not guarantee you top placements; you can achieve great results without going broke. If you write compelling ads and monitor your results, you can do very well. If you don’t know how to do this or need a little guidance, you can contact me. I am achieving very healthy ROIs, and my ads are very well written, if I do say so myself (gettin’ great click-throughs).

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

Now, I am all for big companies coming together to create a new user experience for the consumer (see my post about tech firms joining forces to invest in a new WiMax network. And I have nothing against Microsoft - I am a Windows user and proud of it! But Microsoft clearly wants a piece of the search and social media action. And why not, there is nothing wrong with that. But I think Microsoft is resigned to the fact that Live Search is never going to make any kind of dent in the search search demographic, so rather than coming up with something unique, something big (which of course is not easy to do), Microsoft would rather just take their money and buy something shiny. I see zero benefit to a Microsoft-Facebook merger - except of course the Microsoft execs. And don’t forget, Microsoft already has a $240 million stake in Facebook which they purchased in October 2007.

Here is an interesting article on the subject:

http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article3893228.ece

You can also read about the latest in MicroHoo here:

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/PCWorld/story?id=4808236

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

The night began with speeches from various political figures, including Israeli ambassadors and consuls, Governor David Paterson and Mayor Michael Bloomberg. We even heard video messages from Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and President George Bush, which was actually pretty cool. Natalie Portman then came on stage, as she was introduced as the host of the evening…what a cutie! Never heard her speak Hebrew before.

Rami Kleinstein and his orchestra opened the musical portion of the show, followed by a beat-boxing Matisyahu, who sang his hits “I Will Be Light” and “Jerusalem”. Matisyahu was surprisingly mellow, he usually jumps around like a Chasid and I expected him to be more crazy in celebration of Yom Ha’atzmaut. He became a bit more lively upon joining Idan Raichel for a duet. Idan Raichel gave a great performance, as usual. When David Broza came on (I love him - amazing guitarist) he made the right choice performing his two most well-known songs, “Banu Lechan Mitachat LaShamayim” and “Yihieh Tov”.

David Broza was followed by Paul Shaffer of David Letterman fame, who came on together with Richard Belzer, aka “Munch” from Law and Order SVU. They did some sort of odd Yiddish musical shtick, not quite sure what that was…it was strange humor which maybe we could have done without, but hey, more Jewish celebs showing their support of Israel we’ll take.

The highlight of the evening for me was Yael Naim. You probably know her song “New Soul” from the MacBook Air commercial. She has a stunning voice and can really perform! Yael sat down at the piano, and gave a rendition of Britney Spears’ Toxic. It was awesome, a slow, sensual version of the song. I guess she was making fun of Britney (?) but her version was pretty excellent. Very unexpected from a poor-English speaking Israeli Frenchwoman. Hopefully someone was able to record that performance. I did however catch the second half of “New Soul”, check it out.

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com

So what is this “WiMax”, anyway? WiMax is an acronym that stands for the Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access. It is a technology aimed at providing wireless data over long distances in a variety of ways. It can support fixed and mobile broadband usage and is a powerful alternative to DSL and Cable.

WiMax is a wonderful technology because it essentially eliminates the need for running wires through walls. It works similar to WiFi, but at higher speeds, over greater distances and for a greater number of users. WiMax provides two forms of wireless service. In one way, a small antenna on your computer transmits to a tower station using a low frequency range similar to WiFi. Lower wavelength transmissions are not easily disrupted by physical obstructions and can diffract or bend around obstacles. In the other form of WiMax service, a fixed dish antenna, say on the roof of your building, points to the WiMax tower. This is a stronger, more stable connection using higher frequencies to send great amounts of data via high bandwidth.

Since WiMax equipment is minimal, installing and maintaining the service is more cost efficient than more traditional methods of obtaining internet access. A solution that makes sense in more rural areas due to its greater coverage areas, WiMax is starting to be seen more in cities, especially in older commercial buildings which are not pre-wired for high-speed internet access.

I first learned about WiMax a few months ago doing research for a client. I thought the product was great and the wireless solution logical. In fact I was surprised that more companies were not offering this option. And as it turns out, my office now utilizes WiMax to access the internet (we are in an older building)! I imagined it would only be a matter of time before the bigwigs started to catch on.

Post from: Sheara Wilensky . com