Joyce Cohen

<h1>When his athletic career ended with an injured Achilles’ tendon, a friend urged Leigh to get a job related to his love for coffee. </h1>

A decade later, after Leigh had become an expert in coffee roasting, his employer sent him to New York on a two-year assignment.

Leigh, 38, wasn’t a complete stranger to the city. One of his six older sisters lives with her family in Kingsbridge, in the Bronx, and he had visited her several times when he was living in Amsterdam. Still, he knew the transition would be unsettling, particularly as a single father moving with his 4-year-old daughter, Ya-Amie. And he had no idea how to rent an apartment in New York.

His impression of the United States was that everything was big — cars, appliances, homes. In the Bronx, his sister’s family occupied a four-bedroom unit on the ground floor of a two-family detached house. So he assumed large places were fairly typical.

After he arrived last summer, his employer set him up in temporary furnished quarters in the financial district, while Ya-Amie stayed with her aunt’s family in the Bronx. Leigh was connected with a relocation company to help him find a two-bedroom.

He wanted a sunny space, ideally with a dishwasher and a washing machine and dryer, and he was interested in the Upper West Side, which was equidistant from his workplace in Chelsea and his sister’s home. His budget started at $2,700 a month.

After seeing a few places, he quickly discarded his ideas about size. Every apartment he saw was small and cramped, with similar bare-bones fixtures. “To me, they all looked the same,” he said.

But neighborhoods — even adjacent blocks — varied widely, he noticed: “One street looks great, and you cross to the other street and it was a different world.”

His co-workers gave him another reality check. “When I said I wanted an apartment with a washer-dryer, they all laughed,” he said. “It gave me a lot of stress when I was looking for this apartment. It was really difficult.”

Leigh soon connected with Leisa Aras, a licensed agent who was then at Keller Williams Tribeca and is now at Compass. Staying within his budget was tough, she said: “He really wanted that second bedroom for his daughter, so we were restricted to true two-bedrooms. We couldn’t have a dining room to convert to a bedroom.”

At that point, the Upper West Side was crowded with college students ready to begin the school year. “We were competing with Columbia students,” Aras said. “The apartments were typical Columbia student housing.”

A $2,700 apartment on West 107th Street in Manhattan Valley was advertised as a two-bedroom. “Basically, they converted the living room into a bedroom,” Aras said, leaving “a tiny area with a sofa in front of the kitchen.” And the kitchen was a row of appliances against a wall.

On West 109th Street, for $2,300, another converted one-bedroom had an odd layout, with the front door opening into the kitchen. “It is different from what they show on the internet,” Leigh said. “Leisa said, ‘I am not putting you here.'”

“The biggest challenge,” Aras said, “was trying to keep his expectations in check.”

Coming from Amsterdam, Leigh thought it would be interesting to live on Amsterdam Avenue, but the very small apartment he saw there, near 104th Street, overlooked an air shaft. “You see a wall from the other side of the house,” he said. “I didn’t want to see this wall every day.”

Another option arose in the West 90s. Leigh emerged from the 96th Street subway to find an appealing neighborhood not far from Riverside Park. This apartment was bigger and better than the others, with two sizable bedrooms and an extension off the living room that nearly qualified as a separate kitchen. There was even a dishwasher.

“He liked the fact that his daughter had a door to her own room,” said Zachary Scott, a colleague of Aras’ who accompanied Leigh to the apartment. The rent was $3,100.

By this time, Leigh had figured out that many buildings in the city — including this one — don’t have a laundry room. “It is hard for me to understand that a city like New York doesn’t have laundry in the apartment,” he said. “On my day off, I don’t want to spend three hours on my laundry. Leisa explained how that works. You can drop off your laundry, and the next day you can pick it up.”

When he returned to show his sister and Ya-Amie, he said, “My daughter went into the bedroom and said, ‘Wow! Papa, this is my room. I like it.'”

Aras then worked diligently to get Leigh approved as a renter.

“Here, they have what you call credit history, which in my case is zero,” Leigh said. “I never lived here. I couldn’t imagine without a professional how to find an apartment here.”

His company paid the broker’s fee of 15 percent of a year’s rent, or nearly $5,600, plus the cost of furniture rental. Leigh arrived in the fall, happy to finally be settled.

Between the apartment hunting and his job, he has been able to learn about New York. “When I came, I would do a lot to see the coffee culture in New York, and that took me hours because I had to find places,” he said. “I had to look at the map all the time.”

Now he gets around easily. But he is still figuring out the quirks of city living — including how apartments are often overheated in the winter.

“I open the windows,” Leigh said. “If I tell people, they say, ‘This is New York.'”

Learning to Play the New York Rental Game

NEW YORK — As a young man, Momodou Leigh left his native Gambia to play semiprofessional soccer in the Netherlands.

Learning to play the New York rental game

<h1>On an otherwise ordinary day last winter, Rizzo received a phone call from the Brooklyn Nets. The team was interested in hiring her as a physiotherapist.</h1>

“Basketball is a pretty tough sport for injuries,” said Rizzo, who has worked with many sports teams, including Canada’s Olympic Alpine ski squad, and whose age is a well-kept secret from her players. “There are a lot of quick movements, jumpings and landings. Ankle sprains and soft-tissue injuries are common.”

The idea seemed far-fetched. Relocation was a big deal, and Rizzo was settled 3,000 miles away in her native Vancouver with her husband, Dan Pavich, a hockey referee and retired firefighter. They owned a house and a dog, Bodhi.

But they were willing to listen, so the Nets flew the couple to New York. On their third and final day, they met Josh Lieberman, an associate broker at Douglas Elliman who works with the team on relocation. He took them to view some options. Rizzo had been to Brooklyn only once before, when she ran the New York City Marathon two years ago.

She thought a one-bedroom — with a nice kitchen, a washer-dryer and plenty of natural light — could work. The budget started at $3,000 to $4,000 a month.

“I had no idea how expensive renting was in New York,” she said. “We had an idea of what it would cost, and everything was a little bit more than that.”

Location was key. The neighborhood needed to be walkable, with places to eat and shop, and convenient to Rizzo’s two workplaces. Barclays Center, the Nets’ home arena, is at the junction of three neighborhoods — Prospect Heights, Fort Greene and Park Slope — and their practice facility is in Industry City, in Sunset Park.

If she took the job, she and her husband decided, they would not uproot their lives. Instead, they would rent an apartment for Rizzo, and Pavich would visit as often as possible.

“All our friends and family are in Vancouver, and it is a pretty hot market,” Rizzo said. “If you sell and try to come back, you can never re-enter the market.”

Lieberman was prepared with a lineup of buildings. A few were in Dumbo, including 220 Water St., a converted shoe factory. A lofty, sunny one-bedroom there with almost 700 square feet had plenty of character. The rent was $3,825. But the location wasn’t sufficiently Nets-friendly, with a long, drab walk to the arena that would lead her under a highway overpass.

For $4,000, a charming two-bedroom in a Brooklyn Heights brownstone occupied an entire floor, with around 1,200 square feet. Such a building, run by a small-property owner, can work well for international clients, Lieberman said: “The owner is more willing to have flexibility if the tenant doesn’t have U.S. credit.”

Inside, however, it seemed more quirky than charming, with an uninviting kitchen, and it couldn’t compete with the area’s gleaming, amenity-filled new buildings.

The 2-year-old rental tower at 300 Ashland Place, with almost 400 units, was ideal: steps from both Barclays Center and Atlantic Terminal. From there, it was one express stop or an easy bicycle ride to Industry City.

“There’s a subway hub, tons of restaurants, people everywhere, a Whole Foods, an Apple store,” Lieberman said. “Most people moving to New York from other markets like to be in the action.”

Pavich was impressed right away. “I wanted Stef to be on top of her workplace,” he said. “I wanted this to be really easy for her.”

After Rizzo accepted the job, the couple continued checking listings online but couldn’t glean much information. “You see the inside but have no idea what the neighborhood is like,” she said.

So 300 Ashland Place was the obvious choice — except, by then, no one-bedrooms were available.

“We had set our sights on this building, but the vacancies were two or three months before we actually needed them,” Rizzo said. “I thought I would go crazy in a studio.”

So they splurged on a two-bedroom, sight unseen, with almost 1,000 square feet, floor-to-ceiling windows and a balcony, for a monthly rent of $6,225. (One month free on a 13-month lease made it closer to $5,750.) The amenity fee was waived.

“It was always on my mind that we wanted two bedrooms,” Pavich said, so “our friends don’t have to stay in hotels.”

Rizzo, who has a renewable two-year contract with the Nets, arrived in late summer. “As far as the convenience of everything I need, it’s all here,” she said. “It’s not a quaint neighborhood feeling, but I am a short walk away from neighborhoods I like to hang out in.”

Living on Flatbush Avenue means plenty of traffic outside. (“People in New York really like to honk,” she observed.) So she sleeps with a white-noise machine, a strategy recommended by her Nets colleagues, many of whom are also new to the city.

Overall, the apartment is much nicer than she anticipated having in New York. “I thought I would have something with more of a raw, rough edge,” she said. “It is brand-spanking new.”

Not that she is home all that often. The Nets are in the playoff hunt, and she travels with the team to most road games.

“I view this whole thing as this crazy, unexpected adventure and want to share that with my friends and family,” Rizzo said. “New York is on everyone’s bucket list. The reality is, I haven’t had the opportunity to do much in New York. It’s not a lot of New York in my life; it’s a lot of basketball.”

NEW YORK — When Stefania Rizzo started hunting for a place in Brooklyn, she wasn’t even sure she was moving to New York.

A Canadian scores from long distance

NEW YORK — Zoe and Spencer Pepper met in preschool while growing up in neighboring Long Island towns. Years later, they reconnected as undergraduates at Cornell University.

After graduation in 2008, Zoe Pepper (then Zoe Cohen) moved to Manhattan and roomed with a friend in Murray Hill. Spencer Pepper headed to law school in Philadelphia at the University of Pennsylvania. As a summer associate at Milbank, Tweed, Hadley &amp; McCloy, in the Financial District, he watched from his office window as the undulating New York by Gehry building (then known as Beekman Tower) rose on Spruce Street.

So when he finished law school and went to work full time at the firm, he and Zoe Pepper moved into a one-bedroom rental there. They liked its distinctive architectural qualities and its many amenities. And the location couldn’t be beat.

“I had been told the long hours that a big law firm would entail, particularly as a junior associate, so I thought it made sense to live close to the office,” Spencer Pepper said.

His walk to work took five minutes. Zoe Pepper rode the subway to midtown Manhattan, where she now is the director of rooms operations at the Westin New York at Times Square.

In 2018, Spencer Pepper’s firm announced its plan to move to Hudson Yards. It was good news for the couple: They could move to a location where both could walk to work.

“We both work crazy hours, but Spencer’s hours are super unpredictable,” Zoe Pepper said. “He could be on a deal where he doesn’t come home for two straight days. So having that flexibility to come home and take a quick shower or quick nap, that is super critical for him.”

Although her work hours are more stable, “I get called in a lot,” she said. “I will run there in a heartbeat for anything.”

The Peppers, both 32, were also up for exploring a developing neighborhood, as they had done when they moved to the Financial District in 2011. At the time, Zoe Pepper said, “there weren’t any good restaurants. We had to go to Tribeca to get a salad.”

The couple went on the hunt for a rental in late spring, intending to line up a one-bedroom before their July wedding so they could move in post-honeymoon. They wanted a new, amenity-filled building for themselves and Andiamo, their Italian greyhound.

“We kind of get this high on new buildings,” Zoe Pepper said. “They are so exciting. It’s so fun being the first person to live in your apartment. No one has sat on your toilet seat.”

Their budget was $5,000 to $7,000 a month. With some research on StreetEasy, Spencer Pepper narrowed down the options to a handful of possibilities in and north of Hudson Yards.

“I have a lot less patience for that stuff, and Spencer is super organized and detailed,” Zoe Pepper said. “I am extremely decisive, whereas he will crunch numbers and weigh all the pros and cons.”

MiMA, an 8-year-old rental building on 42nd Street east of 10th Avenue, fit their criteria. But, Spencer Pepper said, “It didn’t have that brand-spanking-new feeling that we really wanted.”

The Eugene, on West 31st Street, was closer to his office but farther from hers. They weren’t keen on the interior finishes or the location next to Dyer Avenue, the Lincoln Tunnel entrance and exit ramp, where impatient traffic seemed hazardous.

Then there was Oskar, on 11th Avenue near 43d Street, with just 164 apartments. The Peppers found the small size more appealing than a massive building with hundreds of units. It felt to them like a boutique hotel.

When they visited, it wasn’t quite finished. “It seems like the apartment is being built for you,” Spencer Pepper said.

They saw several iterations of one-bedrooms, some with balconies and many with interesting hallways and curves. The building also offers access to most of the amenities at Sky, across the street, the largest rental building in New York, with nearly 1,200 units. (Both were developed by the Moinian Group.)

The Peppers were able to sign the lease nearly two months in advance. They chose a one-bedroom with no balcony but with an extra half bathroom for $6,200 a month, and received three free months on a 27-month lease, with the monthly rent netting out to $5,511. They also received six free months at Life Time Athletic at Sky, a gym and spa that normally costs $199 per person per month. The one-time pet fee for Andiamo was $750.

The Peppers, who arrived in late summer, faced some construction-related issues, like a sporadic lack of hot water and workers coming and going from their apartment.

“It was certificate-of-occupancy ready, but not our-crazy-attention-to-detail ready,” Zoe Pepper said.

Now, she strives to take a fitness class every day, usually on her walk home from work. Spencer Pepper goes in the morning.

In their sunny one-bedroom, which looks straight down 11th Avenue, “I feel like I am floating in the middle of New York City,” Zoe Pepper said. Being on an avenue in midtown, however, is proving louder than being on a small street downtown. Late on weekday nights, “there is a honking contest outside,” she said.

They enjoy the small details, like a hidden refrigerator and dishwasher, closet lights that turn on when the door opens, and a walk-in shower rather than a tub. Their entry door uses a key fob.

Plans call for the building to go even more high tech. “Eventually, people will be able to open their doors with their smartphones,” said Toby Gingold, Oskar’s leasing manager.

The Peppers especially appreciate having that second half bath across the hall, so when Zoe Pepper rises extra early for work, she won’t wake her husband. She also loves walking to work. “Getting that extra hour of sleep is truly life-changing,” she said.

As for Spencer Pepper, his office move won’t happen until February, so he has temporarily assumed a subway commute. “I cannot wait to be able to walk to work again,” he said.

This article originally appeared in <a id="a7ea3712-6520-43b7-9f2f-a0a748f475cd" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/03/realestate/heading-west-for-new-development.html">The New York Times</a>.

After the honeymoon, snuggling into a brand-new building

So when he finished law school and went to work full time at the firm, he and Zoe Pepper moved into a one-bedroom rental there.

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Joyce Cohen

Articles written by the author

Learning to play the New York rental game

A Canadian scores from long distance

After the honeymoon, snuggling into a brand-new building