Comment by codedokode
2 days ago
> For those of you who aren't familiar with this Act, NYC has been an outlier in the US where the tenant would pay a broker fee to rent apartments that were listed by a broker.
It might be unusual in US, but it is a standard thing in Russia: a tenant pays the fee and landlord pays nothing. I always thought it was the same everywhere. However, when selling the property then the seller pays the fee.
As for high prices, isn't it caused by the fact that everybody wants to live there but there is not enough properties for everyone? If the rent in place A is 3 times higher than in place B it means that people want to live in A and whoever lives in B is there only because they cannot afford living in A.
Interesting. Is it the case the landlord hires the broker in that situation? Like the landlord hires the broker, the broker lists it and then the tenant pays the broker? One thing that's still true in NYC is if the tenant hires the broker the tenant still pays the broker, but that's a tiny occurrence relative to the broader practice.
Totally true on high prices. I was only trying to point out that the goal of that FARE Act, or at least a major goal of it, was to keep tenants from having to pay junk broker fees, with the assumption that would lower the overall cost of housing. It might actually be doing the exact opposite, though still too early to tell (only went into effect in June).
> Is it the case the landlord hires the broker in that situation? Like the landlord hires the broker, the broker lists it and then the tenant pays the broker?
Yes. It costs nothing to the landlord in this case. However some landlords prefer to post the ad themselves and do not want to deal with the brokers, as well as some tenants avoid them too.