So if you're renting an apartment, you need someone to advertise that it's available, you need someone to pick up the phone and answer questions about it, and y

So if you're renting an apartment, you need someone to advertise that it's available, you need someone to pick up the phone and answer questions about it, and you need someone to unlock it and show it to prospective tenants. In many cities, the landlord pays this person and passes the cost on to you in monthly rent. In NYC, the tenant that rents the apartment pays these fees up front. It's kind of like the airlines, you sort by price ascending, pick the cheapest flight, and then are outraged when they charge you a non-middle-seat fee, a carry-on fee, an I-didn't-print-my-boarding-pass-at-home fee, etc. People search for apartments in the same way, so it makes sense that the market would remove anything other than the monthly carrying cost from the listed price. In the end, I'm not sure it's that bad. I moved to NYC in early 2012. I found a rent-stabilized apartment with the help of a broker, and paid about $600 less per month than a market rate apartment. I paid $3000 to my broker, and conservatively saved about $79,200 over the lifetime of the apartment lease relative to equivalent market-rate apartments.