East Village, LES Rent Has Gone Up $800 In The Last Year: Study

EAST VILLAGE, NY — It is not a great time to be looking for a new apartment in New York City, but the East Village and Lower East Side do have a higher rate of apartments sitting empty than other Manhattan neighborhoods.

Specifically looking at Manhattan, rents are up in every part of the borough from where they were last year, according to a recent study by Corcoran — an American real estate firm.

The study breaks down Manhattan neighborhoods by rent prices, leases signed, and vacancy rates.

In terms of how much an apartment costs, the average rent in the East Village and Lower East Side last month was $4,121.

Here's how that compares to January 2021.

Average Rent

• January 2022: $4,121
• January 2021: $3,292
• YoY change: +25 percent

The rise in rent almost exactly matches the jump seen in Manhattan during the period, where rents went up across the borough by 24 percent.

While the East Village and Lower East Side's rent has gone up over the past year, it is still the third most affordable of the 13 Manhattan neighborhoods tracked in the study, and the most affordable of the downtown nabes.

East Village/LES Vacancy Rate:

• Jan. 2022: 1.96 percent
• Jan. 2021: 8.91 percent
• YoY Change: -6.95 percent

The vacancy rate from last month is still the second-highest in Manhattan, but it is by a marginal amount.

Midtown-East has the highest vacancy rate in the borough at 2.07 percent, while Midtown-West and the Upper West Side trail slightly behind the East Village and Lower East Side at 1.87 percent and 1.80 percent, respectively.

Along with the vacancy rate, the number of leases signed in the East Village and Lower East Side also decreased in January 2022 vs. January 2021.

Leases Signed In East Village/LES

• January 2022: 221
• January 2021: 330
• YoY Change: -33 percent

"Median rent held steady at its post-Covid high, driven by upward pricing pressure in the Doorman market," reads the report from Corcoran. "The luxury rental segment continues to outperform the market as a whole. 'Amenities' and 'space' remain the buzzwords for many of today's renters. A full 57% of new Manhattan leases signed in January were in doorman buildings, while the average rent for apartments in this property type climbed a remarkable 41% year-over-year, versus 19% for units in non-doorman buildings."

You can check out the full report for yourself on Corcoran's website.