The Truth About Moving To New York City
No one will tell you this, but it’s something every young city-seeker should know.
I moved a total of three times in Manhattan over the last 5 years. Each place and season worked to teach me a new lesson after a breakdown and the many phone calls to my mom. After moving out of my most recent apartment, a 5-floor walk-up in the East Village, I remembered first moving in. Securing the bag, as they say, or in this case, locking down overpriced and overly…old housing was an arduous process. Renovated pre-war apartments are more common than not. Especially downtown. It took a toll on me, both mentally and physically. But I would not change it for the world.
To be clear, I am a transplant to the city. I, in no way, claim myself to be a real New Yorker, even after five years. It takes a ton to claim that title if you were not born there, in my opinion. But I do claim the unique challenges and experiences that I could not have come by anywhere else. The winters that somehow last until May. Embracing your community after realizing you have to work to find or make one. Long work nights extending into more long work nights so I could get my foot in the door all molded me into the person I am today.
College brought me to New York because I knew Virginia, my home state, could not do much for me after graduating high school. I also decided to stay after college graduation. Revisiting home and catching up with old friends crystalized that the people I thought I would always stay in touch with no longer fit into my life.
At 18 in New York, I sponged in a fast-paced but rich lifestyle and culture. It happened to embrace the young woman I was already becoming, someone who had outgrown her hometown community. Those friendships melted away gradually. Almost as slow as it takes for mounds of snow to disappear on sidewalks in the city. You see that the mounds exist until one day, you are walking, and they are not there anymore.
It can be lonely when you no longer have those friends with you. It is hard. Forging new friendships and keeping them is even harder in the city. My first office job was at a famous design firm. It was like running a race with 50-pound weights fastened to my ankles. The hours were grueling. I had four bosses to respond to while trying to find silk towels 30 minutes before photoshoots. You think Devil Wear’s Prada is a barrel of laughs until your ass is living it. It was nearly impossible to find an apartment that accepted my credentials because what 22-year-old makes 40 times the rent, an actual requirement to secure an apartment in New York.
To make your way as a migrant to the city you will most likely face one of the above. Or a derivative at some point. No matter how painful, I believe those were all good things that happened because they denote growth. But growth will only happen if you let it. I knew a handful of people who left New York after living there for one year. There is nothing wrong with that. It is powerful to recognize that a place or friend or job is not for you. It will save you the heartache, time, and effort. But I am glad I committed to waiting it out. Each bump in the road meant I held the knowledge and grit to help me make it over the next one.
I ended up finding my community eventually. But I also began to embrace my innate introverted-ness. The time I spent alone, I used to create projects which opened up an even larger community to me once I shared them. The worst job I had was the best job I ever had. Answering to multiple people at once under pressure taught me that I, one day, only want to work for myself under pressure. And I somehow found a broker that let me move into an apartment straight away. I know moving forward the amount of time and resources it takes to find an apartment, which will save me a ton of energy.
The truth about moving to New York is simple. You get what you make out of it. That’s it. Some people move to the city and expect the extraordinary to land in their lap without doing the footwork. Pop culture is in part to blame for this, only sensationalizing and romanticizing the societal and cultural landscape. Never panning to the actualities that city dwellers face.
While opportunities may be in more of an abundance than someone’s hometown, you still have to push, most likely harder because of the sheer competition others are bringing to the table. You have to attack the things you want to make happen for yourself. Those things usually do not appear out of plain sight. On a grand scale, this is true for life at large. But New York teaches you this in a petri dish.
For some reason though, people think they need New York to make all of their dreams come true. But after living in the city for five years, I can say you do not need New York to “make it.” While “making it” looks different for everyone, I believe tenacity, luck, and knowledge will help anyone in their twenties make it anywhere in someway.
If you do choose to move to New York, my advice is to move as early as you can. If you come to attend grad school or for an internship, you experience what many will not until much later in their lives. The advantage of an earlier move is knowing if New York is right for you. New York is not for everyone. Depending on your decision, you can stay the course and collect the tools you need to create your empire or help someone else build theirs. Or you bounce and move the hell on with your life. Both are incredibly self-warranted moves and integral to the growing process of us 20-somethings.
Here are a few nuggets to know if you are considering moving or already on your way to The Big Apple (Ironically, no one actually says that when you live here, so that’s a bonus nugget to save you from a few judgemental looks).
- To secure an apartment, a universal requirement is to show landlords and brokers that you make 40x the rent. However, there are ways around this seemingly impossible feat, like using a guarantor company.
- While this is subjective, the Lower East Side is where you will find the best food in Manhattan. I’ll leave you to discover specific places on your own. Hunting, or stumbling upon them is the best part.
- Once you’ve settled in, you will avoid Times Square at all costs.
- New York has and is still undergoing rapid gentrification. Williamsburg is by far the most gentrified neighborhood in Brooklyn. Be mindful of the history and the people and cultures that once thrived there before the city drove the original dwellers out.
- Brooklyn isn’t always cheaper than Manhattan. It can be more expensive due to increased popularity.
Yes, I have a constant low level of anxiety every time I mistake a squeak from my upstairs neighbor as a mouse. Yes, it is expensive. Yes, it is cold. It is even worse in the winter when it is dark at 4 PM, and you have to carry two bags of groceries home. Yes, it is overwhelming to the senses at times. You just have to decide for yourself if it is worth it.
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