Is Citi-Habitats ok?

and...we have it on good authority that at Burger King, the help spits in 50% of all the burgers. so...what are you having today?

Does that include the Micky Dee's in the Gramercy Starck?.....Damn all this time I thought it was a high class building.

Does that include the Micky Dee's in the Gramercy Starck?.....Damn all this time I thought it was a high class building.

CC, me thinks a little Japanese... my daughter is a picky eater but will do a nabeyaki udon.

truthy, the "trick" apparently is to "know" the good cashier from the bad.... but they all look alike to me... only if there was a way of telling.... like a chain of burger joints that promises not to spit in your burger?

the mcD's at the starck is a cut above most. not so the CVS.

what do you think the servers do at chuck e cheeses?

@positivecarry

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lee-camp/the-video-that-destroyed_b_529978.html

wow....given the feedback here it soundsl like Citi Habitats is not the horrible outfit some people would make it out to be. my suggestion would be for all of the negative posters out there: attack the individual agent if they do something you consider unethical. as a firm its pretty clear their policies and procedures are above board

again, i have to say, i know and work with very successful rental agents. 75% of this town is occupied by rentals. thats an awfully big pool of potential clients. you aren't a good (successful, prosperous) rental agent if you are dishonest. your business won't grow. only lawyers make more money by lying continously

Jim, if you are a good rental broker, aren't you best off being in a position like Keith Burkhardt, being on your own, rather than under a larger umbrella?

i get a very healthy split. i don't have to pay any overhead. why would i want to do that?

Our agent split is a sliding scale for rentals, starts at $250 and caps out at $1000, this last number is for a commission of $10,000+. For the last 6 months 90% of my biz has been sales and on sales deals our agents keep 95% of what they earn. (Example- On a $3000 dollar rental commission the agent keeps $$2650.)

Our model is not for everyone, but for an experienced agent that generates his/her own business via referrals or their own advertising, it can be very rewarding financially as well as personally. It's a company run by a broker for brokers offering consumers a new way to buy,rent and sell real estate. But the important thing is we are not gimmicky or trying to reinvent the wheel,we have just eliminated the "firm" which frees us up to be a bit more creative with our transactions.

As I always say this may not be for everyone, but for many it has been quite rewarding. Having a choice in how you do business is always a good thing..for everyone.

Keith (Broker)
http://theburkhardtgroup.com/agents_details.php?agent_ID=7619

arthur1071
11 days ago
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report abuse Prudential Elliman's broker suck too.
They are lazy, and are liars.
Will never deal with them again.

This is just stupid. You deal with an individual broker. the firm they work for means absolutely nothing. there are columbia grads that work at citi habitats and elliman, there are also people who never went to college at all. the whole "is this firm or that firm ok" thread is a waste.

I work at Citi. I'm in the top 10% producers. been here about 6 years. The company is fine. The prices advertised on it's site are acurate, as the site is linked to the landlord and owner's data directly. When an apartment rents, it comes off the database and if it is advertised on our site it is automatically removed. With the exception of weekends when landlords offices are closed, our website is 99.99999% acurate. The company has taken every precaution to ensure this. There are good agents and not so good agents everywhere. But I've never been involved with ANY real estate company that puts more effort into making sure it's agents are informed and professional. We deal with the same frustrations nost renters deal with fake ads, bait and switch, you name it... We have to work 10 times as hard. This is New York City and we are all in this together. If you've had a bad experience, It wasn't with me : )

Here's a screen shot of the Citi advertising policy:

Welcome to the Citi Habitats Online Searchable Database

Rules and Regulations

Presently, each office manages a rental listings allotment and authorization to post web listings is given only by manager discretion. Sales listings are allowed being posted only by the Sales Department. Unless you or the Administrator of the website modifies or deletes a listing, your rental listings will show on the website as long as they will be either "Active" or "Application" in the internal Listings Database. Your sales listings will remain in the database for a period of six (6) months. After a listing has been deleted from the database, you will receive an e-mail notification.

The ability to post listings to the database is a privilege not a right. The listings that you post must be accurate and correspond to actual properties for rent or sale. Please, read carefully the following guidelines:
You must advertise an actual and available apartment that is for rent or sale--this is not a difficult task given our vast proprietary listings database (Click here to view/hide some examples of misleading listings).

Here is a list of types of listings that are either misleading or forbidden and can cause the suspension of your advertising privileges:
1) Listings with wrong addresses. (i.e. presence of strange characters like *, %, @; missing the West or East of a street; missing the building #);
2) Listings posted with a clearly wrong neighborhood (please, ask your manager if you are not sure about the neighborhood);
3) Listings posted as a doorman or elevator building when either the doorman or elevator is not present at all;
4) Listings posted with the wrong building type (i.e.: posting a "High Rise" building when the building has less than 15 floors);
5) Listings posted with the wrong # of baths;
6) Listings posted as "pets friendly" when pets are not accepted at all;
7) Listings with completely wrong square footage. Please, enter the square footage only if you absolutely trust the source, you personally took the measurements or it is present in the listings database.
8) Co-broke listings, unless you have permission from Corporate;
9) Courtesy listings, unless you have permission from the Landlord;
10) Exclusive listings, unless you have permission from the exclusive agent;
The following actions might also cause the restriction of your advertising privileges:
1) Stealing pictures from other agents' listings. In this case you will be asked to provide the high definition picture originally took with the camera (at least 500KB). Failing to provide the high definition picture means automatically that the picture was stolen.
2) Posting pictures with other companies copyrights, logos, views from other buildings and so on. Pictures should show only the listing's building and interior properties.

You may not list apartments with a "no fee", "low fee", "special fee" designation or similar, we charge fees.

You may not mention any landlord/owner concessions in the description.

You may upload only pictures that show listings' properties and features (no graphics like "Photos coming soon", logos and similar are allowed).

You may not upload pictures of model units or rented apartment.

You may not put your name, phone numbers, email addresses or internet addresses in the description box--all of your contact information is already supplied and readily apparent for any potential customer. While enthusiastic descriptions of apartments are appreciated, lies will not be tolerated.

You can only advertise apartments that you have already previewed ~ This practice will ensure your professionalism and lead to more satisfied customers.

You are responsible for the reliability of the content, pictures, floor plans and any other material you advertise on the web site. Moreover, if you post content that infringes any copyright laws, advertises other personal/company's exclusive, etc., you will be personally responsible for all or any damages caused by these prohibited listings.

You are not allowed to advertise either co-broke or courtesy/exclusive listings without the written authorization of Corporate or the exclusive agent.

You are not allowed to advertise listings not contained within our internal database, unless you receive prior written approval from your manager. In this case, you must forward such authorization to the Director of Web Development.
If it is determined that your listings are false and/or misleading, the Company reserves the right to suspend or terminate your privileges to utilize this database and delete your listings. Subsequent violations of our advertising guidelines may lead to further administrative action, up to and including termination of your association with Citi Habitats.

Accept | Cancel

I think this speaks dor itself.

Realguy,

Hi. Welcome, and thank you for your firm's commitment to professionalism. Can you answer a question for me about your firm's vacancy rate numbers?

How do you account for the discrepancies in your firm's rental reports? Another poster, inonada, brought this basic error up the other day, and no one from c-h has dropped by to answer. Your numbers appear to have errors by a factor of 10X from month to month. Perhaps you might be able to explain.

Thanks.

-----
inonada
4 days ago
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report abuse
The US Census Bureau puts the NYC free-market rental stock at 187.5K as of 2008. Call it 190K to put that number in 2010. Streeteasy shows 8500 apartments available for rent with "must have address" to filter out the likely fishing-expedition listings. That alone puts the vacancy rate at 4.5%. Throw in the fact that much of the rental stock from rental buildings doesn't make it's way onto SE, and you're looking at something in the 5-10% range. Yet Citi-Habitats reports 1.xx%.

By Citi-Habitat's own April numbers:

http://www.citi-habitats.com/market.php

There were 9974 rentals available in April 2010 with a vacancy rate of 1.23%. This translates to 811K rental units in Manhattan. Two questions for you, then:

1) Should the vacancy rate only reflect free-market apartments or the entire rental stock, including rent-controlled, rent-stabilized, Mitchell-Lama, and public housing units? I'm pretty sure the average prices being reported only include free-market rents.

2) Assuming we go with the vacancy rate overall, the Census Bureau puts the total number of rental units in Manhattan at 587.5K as of 2008. Where do the other 811K - 587.5K = 223.5K units come from???
...
More on the idiocy of the vacancy rate numbers. In the March report, there were 10,002 vacant apartments. In the April report, there were 9974 vacant apartments. The difference is 28 apartments.

What was the difference in the vacancy rate reported? It was 1.38% in March vs. 1.23% in April. If a 28 apartment difference amounts to a 0.15% difference in vacancy rates, then that would imply a rental stock of 18.6K apartments. Yet the 9974 vacant apartments vs. a 1.23% vacancy rates implies a rental stock of 811K apartments.

Uhh, that's some good statistics -- the 2 pieces of data they provide don't even line up within a factor of 10.

i'm not from citi habitats, but i'll take a stab at this. Vacancy rate would be the % of units that are unoccupied. But few landlords wait until a unit is unoccupied to put it in inventory - it can simultaneously be occupied and still available for rent if the current tenant is not planning to renew his/her lease.

again, i don't know how they calculate their numbers, but it is a possible explanation.

realguy
about 3 hours ago
ignore this person
report abuse I work at Citi. I'm in the top 10% producers. been here about 6 years. The company is fine. The prices advertised on it's site are acurate, as the site is linked to the landlord and owner's data directly. When an apartment rents, it comes off the database and if it is advertised on our site it is automatically removed. With the exception of weekends when landlords offices are closed, our website is 99.99999% acurate. The company has taken every precaution to ensure this. There are good agents and not so good agents everywhere. But I've never been involved with ANY real estate company that puts more effort into making sure it's agents are informed and professional. We deal with the same frustrations nost renters deal with fake ads, bait and switch, you name it... We have to work 10 times as hard. This is New York City and we are all in this together. If you've had a bad experience, It wasn't with me : )

the caveat here is this: whether or not the listing agents are diligent in updating the listings as they receive applications or rent. i have someone do this for me. she's 24 years old. she's been wearing skirts and sundress' to the office lately. i ask her to do it, but i don't really follow up....

What's your point?

What's your point?

Brown county is playing the repeater game? Awesome

Hot dog?

Whatsup hot-dog boy. How's the air quality up in brown county treatin you?

The reinforcements are back!

what can I say. I enjoy a good dialogue.
And it seems like one is ready to break out here.

Hasn't already?

not quite yet...there's a spark, but the kindling hasn't caught fire yet.

Wow, invalidating all of columbiacounty's scores in one fell swoop.

paging alanhart

bro, you're putting the fire out! damn
friggin hot dog

Hot dog

I think you have me confused with someone else.

I'm just looking for an explanation to an obvious discrepancy.

Hi Skinny,
You ask some good questions. Citi has long spent energy and resources on compiling rental data. Some other agencies have also started to release similar reports. Curbed recently did it's own comparison betweet Citi, Elliman, and one other (?). They all showed different #'s but were much closer than the #'s you quote. I'm not the right person to ask about this. I know that we go by neigborhood and mainly focus on Manhattan. I also know that we do have access to more data than other companies regarding the rental market. If I were looking for an alternative to citi's "black book" I check out what curbed posted. You could also simply call our corporate headquarters and simply ask them to explain. I'd love to here what kind of a response you get. At the end of the day, the market got really tight again, landlords are cutting back on incentives and prices are climbing. None of this makes things easier for renters or agents. We're not all blood suckers, most of us are just trying to help people find places to live and pay our own (too high) rents. If I get any info I'll most certainly post it here.

Best of luck

SkinnyNsweet
about 12 hours ago
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report abuse I think you have me confused with someone else.

I'm just looking for an explanation to an obvious discrepancy.

don't think so. you are fairly obviously a cunt.

Citihabitats will not be shut down anytime soon. Remember when one of their upper west side offices cleaned out their office and hauled out bags of old documents to be disposed of? They left the bags on the street overnight, the wind blew it open and the contents littered the streets...social security numbers, tax information, addresses and other personal information exposed! If that doesn't shut them down, nothing will. the thing with Shittyhabitats is, that they PROUDLY skate the edge of what is considered barely ethical in the business, and what is illegal. They are slippery, even rotten, but they aren't breaking REBNY rules yet. Bending the rules, oh yes. I used to work in real estate and dealt with them a few times. Some were wastes of time, some disastrous, some resulted in done deals...all of them were highly unpleasant. They are trained that way: they didn't return phone calls about a rental if the resulting deal would have split an already small commission. Renters: One time, a CH broker called me for one of my rentals. Before the appointment, he called telling me to please not mention the price during the showing. Turns out, he had shown his customers photos of the apartment, but quoted them a price higher than we were renting it for. He said "this'll be good for all of us, right?" I refused because a) that's just sleazy, b) the real price is listed online, and c) that's just really sleazy. He insisted to tell them that they would have to pay more to beat out the rabid competition bidding on the apt. Truth is there was no competition, they were the first ones to see the apt. I asked him to please just let me do the showing, with the info as is, just to keep it straightforward. He agreed, we did the showing. No harm, plenty of foul.

Want to see a CH rental listing, pinged the broker three times today. Had my client call and he made an appointment with her. When she said, "I'll be bringing my agent" he literally cancelled the appointment, saying, "I prefer to handle direct customers and not to deal with agents."

So I wrote a little email to him reminding him about the REBNY co-broking rules. We'll see what happens.

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

Sounds rude, unethical, and generally wrong.

w67thstreet and apt23, would these circumstances be ok for a mother to kill her 4 children? Or did it need to be a sale listing for more than 1?

Ali that's awful. And it seems to be an epidemic.
I have a buyer's broker and I was quite surprised at the lack of communication and correspondence initiated by any of the other brokers after some of my visits to some open houses.
I tested some by not signing in my buyer's broker at the initial open and it's like I went from diseased to rock star.
None as bad as your story, but all this behavior is quite bizarre to me given current market conditions.

Please do not generalize... there are 1000 agents in the company... and they are owned by NRT which owns Corcoran, Sotheby's, Century 21, Etc. you should judge the individual agent versus entire company.... there are some really bad agents in the company as well as excellent ones.... I know many who had good experience.... there must be a reason why they have been around for over 10 years and many top agents from other companies started at Citi-habitats or still work there...

WOW! Sharp elbows? From a professional who brings so much to the table? I'm surprised that you guys don't charge a cover to get into an open house... what do cookies cook themselves?

Update: my elbows must still have a little Wall Street sharpness left because I got into the apartment.

and NYCrenter, I do believe there are good agents at every company but I think some companies also have better cultures than others.

As far as the NRT factor, that may be part of the problem. The company is certainly a powerhouse -- I think a couple of years ago they boasted of selling roughly 1 out of every 4 homes in the U.S. -- but the corporate parent's extremely high leverage can't feel good during this downturn.

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

Why do owners, landlords even hire Citi-Habitats to handle their rentals?

Wow...this thread is disheartening.

Having worked at Citi Habitats, I can confidently say that I have NEVER met an unprofessional broker. I honestly think most people don't appreciate the real estate professionals who work hard, day in and day out, to help their clients find good apartments.

Just as a basic premise, I don't understand why some people think brokers are their enemy. It honestly isn't logical. A broker does not make a dime if you do not find an apartment that you like. A broker does not get paid AT ALL, until you find an apartment that you like. To be honest, I think this is part of the problem.

People abuse the fact that they can enlist a broker's help for free. If people had to pay even a nominal retainer to work with a broker (say $100), the level of respect clients have for broker would increase ten fold. As it is now, clients treat good, hardworking, human beings like animals.

Just like the internet, people are mean and nasty when there are no consequences for their actions.

Anyway, to make my point, when you contact your broker their number one priority is helping you find an apartment you like, so that you will rent it, and then they can pay their bills. They also want you to enjoy the experience, so that you will refer your friends and family to them, and come back to them in the future for all your real estate needs.

Some common problems broker's run into...

1. Clients with unrealistic budgets. You'd be surprised how many times brokers get phone calls from clients looking for apartments that DO NOT EXIST! People will call asking to see $2000 lofts in Tribeca, $1200 one bedrooms in the East Village, $2,500 elevator/doorman two bedrooms in the West Village, and other insanities. As a broker, you try your best to explain to the client that they are going to have to adjust their neighborhood, or raise their budget, to find what they are looking for and they act like you are lying to them and keeping the $1200 one bedrooms in your back pocket for whatever reason.

2. Clients that use multiple brokers. As your broker, it costs money, time, energy, and effort to find apartments to show you, get access to them, and to take you to see them. I am doing all of this in the hope that at the end of the process, you will rent your apartment with me. When you tell me that you are using 20 other brokers, after I explained that we EACH have the ability to show you EVERY APARTMENT on the market, it makes me feel like disposable trash, and you come off as extremely obnoxious and disloyal. Especially when you tell me this after we have seen 10-15 apartments together.

3. Clients that are jerks. Let's face it, when people don't have to pay for a service, they treat their service providers like slaves. Ask any freelance professional, who works pro bono to build a portfolio, which client is worse, the client that is paying top dollar to use your services or the client paying nothing, and you will hear every single time that the pro bono clients are the worst.

4. Clients that only want no-fee apartments. Brokers have ZERO problem showing you no-fee apartments. The landlord is still paying our fee, so it doesn't effect us at all. There just aren't that many on the market, especially in Manhattan. And the no-fee apartments are usually the bottom of the barrel in terms of quality. So when we say, there aren't many, or that there are NO 'no fee' apartments that meet your criteria, we are not out to hoodwink you, it is just the simple truth.

This is already too long, but if you only remember one thing from this post, remember this...

Broker's are your ALLIES when you are apartment hunting. Pick one, treat him/her with respect, trust their opinion, and they will move mountains for you to make sure you end up in the perfect home.

Oh yeah, and Citi Habitats rocks!

Oh, and just for kicks this is a partial list of the charitable organizations Citi Habitats supports, taken from their website...

AIDS Walk
Aid for AIDS
A Little Hope
Alliance of Guardian Angels
American Heart Association - American Heart Walk
American Red Cross
Big Brothers Big Sisters
City Harvest
Dance, Love, Sing, Live
Discover the Smile Foundation
EHRC Charity Golf Tournament
Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation
The Food Bank for New York City
GLS Memorial
Help USA
Junior Achievement
Juvenile Diabetes Foundation
Kevin Powell and Friends Katrina Benefit
MS Society
National Association of Real Estate Editors
National Road Safety Foundation
NRT Foundation
NY Cares - Annual Coat Drive
NYU Master of Science in Real Estate Program
Operation Backpack
Revlon Run/Walk for Women's Cancers
Samba et Soleil
Scottsdale Healthcare Foundation
Sean Kimerling Testicular Cancer Foundation
Seeds of Peace
Starlight Children’s Foundation
Student Athletes Inc
Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation
Tender Loving Care Foundation
Toys for Tots
Volunteers of America
Wall Street Rising
And more...

If I still lived in NYC, I would be back working for them in a heartbeat!

Why don't you require your client prospects to pay you the $100 retainer if you think that would be a solution to some of the problems you mentioned?

Guy is actually pretty fun. First of all this is not the only business where you actually either consult or help without a payment. Plenty of professionals offer consultations. My real estate lawyer spent 30 minutes on the phone with me and then met me in person prior to formalizing my hiring him.

He would also need to understand that it is his own fellow agents who make it seem that we all need more than one person helping us. Why, because they all claim to have their own exclusive access to things. Of course it is all lies and bullshit, but hey not our fault.

And to the no fee, of course we don't want to pay it. It is a ridiculous number when you think about it. 15% of a years rent for helping us get an apartment. a $3000 apartment costs $5400 just to get in. Seems kind of high to me. Who would want to pay that.

And if he never met a dishonest broker, well then maybe he was never in NYC. While there are plenty of hard working brokers who honestly want to help you, there are so many more out to make a quick dollar that they are not really concerned with finding you the right apartment just with finding an apartment they can convince you is the perfect choice and hurry and sign before someone else grabs it.

I remember when i was looking to rent after college with a friend and this was 14 years ago, but even then it was just put in an application on the spot or the apartment will be gone. even if you clearly said it was not what you wanted.

Plus an investment property i have, we had a renter a few years ago, she was never told by the broker that the place she was renting was being converted to a hotel, even though it had to be something out there since 9 months in she was told no renewal lease. Meanwhile the broker walked away with a great comission smiling and she was left scrambling.

What the problem today is that you can do so much work on your own, there are to many people who call themselves brokers and agents, yet their background screams lost my job so i turned to this. So you have 1000's of people in an industry that probably needs hundreds in order to service the masses. But because of this the costs are so high because these people need to live off not so many deals each year.

Maybe they should work on fixing the model instead of telling their potential clients that we are all wrong for wanting more for less.

Mikev
about 1 hour ago
ignore this person
report abuse Guy is actually pretty fun. First of all this is not the only business where you actually either consult or help without a payment. Plenty of professionals offer consultations. My real estate lawyer spent 30 minutes on the phone with me and then met me in person prior to formalizing my hiring him.

He would also need to understand that it is his own fellow agents who make it seem that we all need more than one person helping us. Why, because they all claim to have their own exclusive access to things. Of course it is all lies and bullshit, but hey not our fault.

And to the no fee, of course we don't want to pay it. It is a ridiculous number when you think about it. 15% of a years rent for helping us get an apartment. a $3000 apartment costs $5400 just to get in. Seems kind of high to me. Who would want to pay that.

And if he never met a dishonest broker, well then maybe he was never in NYC. While there are plenty of hard working brokers who honestly want to help you, there are so many more out to make a quick dollar that they are not really concerned with finding you the right apartment just with finding an apartment they can convince you is the perfect choice and hurry and sign before someone else grabs it.

I remember when i was looking to rent after college with a friend and this was 14 years ago, but even then it was just put in an application on the spot or the apartment will be gone. even if you clearly said it was not what you wanted.

Plus an investment property i have, we had a renter a few years ago, she was never told by the broker that the place she was renting was being converted to a hotel, even though it had to be something out there since 9 months in she was told no renewal lease. Meanwhile the broker walked away with a great comission smiling and she was left scrambling.

What the problem today is that you can do so much work on your own, there are to many people who call themselves brokers and agents, yet their background screams lost my job so i turned to this. So you have 1000's of people in an industry that probably needs hundreds in order to service the masses. But because of this the costs are so high because these people need to live off not so many deals each year.

Maybe they should work on fixing the model instead of telling their potential clients that we are all wrong for wanting more for less.

Mike, "Why, because they all claim to have their own exclusive access to things. Of course it is all lies and bullshit, but hey not our fault."

Really? All lies and bullshit? That's funny, I have legally binding contracts with several landlords that are EXCLUSIVE. You might not like it, but that's the the way it works. I've got other landlords that don't give exclusives, but only work through brokers because the public at large (people like you) are so fucking stupid they need/want a shield.

And remember one more thing, when a broker tells you that you have to take an apartment now before someone else does, in most cases it's because it WILL get rented by someone else. That's supply and demand. We don't intent the demand, renters/buyers do.

Great so basically what you are telling me is the other moron broker was whining that there are no such thing as exclusives and you are saying there are. Well that is wonderful as you just proved my point that brokers lie as he just lied by saying it was wrong that we STUPID people talk to more then one Broker (aka liars and out for your money).

Seriously it gets harder every day to believe most of you. I have a few I trust and i will leave it at that.

The reason that landlords are willign to work through a broker because 99% of the time in a good market it costs them nothing as the tenant is paying you a fee, so why not give a broker an exclusive. So don't try and convince us it is because they are shielding from us, they are shielding from having to do any of the legwork of credit checks, etc, and use you.

So go and give yourself a pat on the back because it is so OBVIOUS that you are the best broker in the city because you get exclusives.

Hones, I'm all for the exclusively-brokered apartment and seeing them directly from the exclusive broker. Generally, I only look at listings that have an exact listed address, which almost always is done by the exclusive broker. Most often, but not always, these brokers work for one of the big brokerages as I generally am not interested in rental buildings.

What do you do that distinguishes your listings as exclusive? What would I look for in my search to distinguish your exclusive listings from the crap listings?

nada, you don't need to tell me what exclusive brokerage means. it's how i make my living. yes, my listings are on streeteasy, the times, etc et al with the address. i also advertise for a few other landlords where i don't have exclusive rights but who only work with my firm. you're shorting yourself if you are actually looking for an apartment but pass up on all open listings, but that's my opinion.

mike, i don't care if you believe the majority or none of us. bottom line is, we're part of the market, and that isn't changing.

There seems to be some confusion about what an exclusive listing is...allow me to explain.

When a landlord wants to rent an apartment, they have two options, to submit the apartment to brokerage community as a whole, or to list the apartment with a specific broker.

When the landlord lists the apartment with the brokerage community as a whole, it is called an 'open listing'. Any agent who wants to place in a client in an open listing, can deal with the landlord directly. For example, apt at 123 Anyaddress is on the market. A Citi Habitats agent, a Prudential agent, or a Halstead agent can rent the property. Each agent will be dealing directly with the landlord when they submit their application.

When the landlord lists the apartment with one particular agent, or one particular agency, it is called an exclusive. By contractual agreement between the agent and the landlord, the agent is the only person allowed to rent the apartment to a client. This is good for the landlord if they have a relationship with a good agent, that helps them get their apartments rented quickly. According to REBNY, the governing body of New York real estate, all exclusive agents must allow other brokers submit applications on their properties. When an agent submits an application on another agents exclusive, this is called a co-broke, and both agents split the commission.

An agent with an exclusive is protected from anyone else renting a great property that they have, so they have no problem giving out the address. There is no risk to them. An agent advertising an open listing is obviously not going to give out the address to the apartment, as you can go to the building yourself to rent it, or contact another broker and have him direct you to the property. Also, it wouldn't be smart for a company like Citi Habitats to invest millions per year in developing a huge inventory of apartments, if other brokers can just piggyback on our listings by going to their website and looking at the addresses.

As I said earlier, each and every agent can show you EVERY apartment on the market. All agents can show open listings, and all agents can show you exclusive listings.

If you guys have questions about the business, feel free to ask. There is no need to be overly hostile and dramatic.

Excuse some of the grammatical mistakes. Sucks that you can't edit a post...

"Why don't you require your client prospects to pay you the $100 retainer if you think that would be a solution to some of the problems you mentioned?"

I no longer work in the business, so it doesn't matter to me anymore, but I honestly don't know why it isn't standard.

w67thstreet
about 5 months ago
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report abuse
I went into McD, the cashier bf handing me my Big Mac, spit in it. I was horrified, walk over to the manager and said, your cashier just spit in my Big Mac bf handing it to me.
The manager said "you do know we have cut down spitting incidents from 1 out of 4 burgers to 1 in only 5. We are a huge hamburger chain, you must understand there are bad apples in any large institution. We hope by the end of the year we can get it down to 1 in 7."

When was the last time you held a job? Late 90s?
When was the last time you didn't pay your landlord for last month's rent? More recently?
When was the last time you owned a residential property and were in lawsuits with your tenants?

All these people who talk trash about Citi Habitats kill me. Do you have any idea how much shadier EVERY OTHER RENTAL BROKER is in New York next to them? They are like 10x worse! Overall, Citi is one of, if not the, most ethical firm out there. I have been a renter in Manhattan for over 14 years, and was an agent at Citi Habitats for 3 years. I only went there by default, after interviewing at literally every other ethical brokerage in the city (there are about 10 reputable ones in existence that cater to new agents; this is a very small industry) because having been a renter for years, I knew how much worse the other firms were, and how unprofessional and under-resourced they are. There are many bad apples at Citi, like any large company, but most of the other agencies out there are much worse. So you are comparing brokerages with 100 agents and 50 of them shady agents, to a company with 600 agents and 100 of them shady agents. Of course you hear more complaints, just like you hear more about them than any other company, because they are larger and have greater market share. Overall even though I am not a huge fan of the company, they are one of the most ethical brokerages in NYC by and large. Anyone who talks trash about their business practices has obviously never called Bond, Best Apartments, Hart Diamond, Kurland, Metropolitan, Domain, Location 3, Century 21, etc., who are their direct competition and the shadiest places out there. I would regularly get complaints from customers and hear from other agents who left these firms about how they literally trained agents on shady practices (most of them post fake and bait-and-switch ads regularly, whereas with Citi Habitats that happens a lot less often--all their website ads actually link to real apartments in the database, and are deleted 24 hours after they are rented...I know this because I worked there. What other broker in NYC does that??) I was never trained to do anything shady at Citi, but I think your experience varies a lot office to office (they have 12 offices, and I know some are much shadier and get away with a lot more shi* than others...there are reasons that I don't have time to go into here, but let's just say it's the offices with "lifers" in management, and that explains why...again, this is a huge corporation with many politics at play). But still, I don't know what you people are complaining about overall, really. They have far better technology and much more accurate listings than any other broker out there by and large. Their biggest problem is that they are a CORPORATION, run by a bunch of suits, who tolerate a bunch of bullsh**, because yes, profit is king, and politics run rampant. So if a shady agent is making $50k and gets busted posting a bunch of fake ads, they're usually gone. If they're making $350k, well gee, suddenly nobody seems to care. After all, they're Incorporated, and this is America. And if anything, you should be concerned about losing an apt when renting to them because of the rediculous amount of beauracracy required to do a deal there (you'll never know the real reason you didn't get the apartment, is because of some red tape or non-sense with their internal politics). But most people there are some of the friendliest and most ethical people I've ever met in real estate, if you don't mind the red tape. Don't let a few bad apples spoil the bunch. Just know you're getting a hit or miss experience, just like when you call tech support in India. It's a service industry, all commission based, with a lot of turnover, in the craziest city in the world. Get some perspective, people.

Jim i am glad you believe you will be part of the apartment world forever, however i know for a fact based on my job, that in bad years such as the last few, big companies such as rockrose, brodsky, related, etc, who have their own rental departments are willing to pay brokers. However the rest of the time they normally will just let their own offices do their jobs and avoid the broker fee.

I think the brokers out their especially on here seem a lot more defensive these days because the whole business model has been changing not only in the sales market, but the rental market also. There are a lot of people who want to go at it on their own because they have access to the same information.

I was looking to buy and the agent claims to have a track on better inside information because brokers talk to each other, but it would seem they lie to each other also. the apartment i did not buy which i was told was almost at ask, actually finally sold at 8% below ask. how is that close to ask?

and then you have a former broker defending unethical pratices at citi saying it is okay because only 1 out of 6 agents are bad, compared to a worse ratio at a smaller firm. Seriously with a defense like that i do not even need to bother to argue my points because you all do it for me.

There are brokers out there who realize the model is broken and that people in this day and age are really starting to realize when the information is at their fingertips there is no reason to pay a 6% sales commission or a 15% rental commission. it happens to be a crazy fee.

think of it this way, would you pay a tax preparer 5% of your income for the year to prepare your return because it has to be done? well sure it was never that high, but people paid. Now you have plenty of people who go out and buy Turbotax and prepare on their own because their returns are not overly complex.

I believe over time the same will happen to the rental and sales markets.

Go ahead shoot me and call me stupid again. But seriously if people feel comfortable preparing a tax return which if they screw up they get hit with penalities, why would they not feel they can go out and rent an apartment without some pushy broker telling them they have great apartments to show when they have none?

Mikev
about 2 hours ago
ignore this person
report abuse Jim i am glad you believe you will be part of the apartment world forever, however i know for a fact based on my job, that in bad years such as the last few, big companies such as rockrose, brodsky, related, etc, who have their own rental departments are willing to pay brokers. However the rest of the time they normally will just let their own offices do their jobs and avoid the broker fee.

I think the brokers out their especially on here seem a lot more defensive these days because the whole business model has been changing not only in the sales market, but the rental market also. There are a lot of people who want to go at it on their own because they have access to the same information.

I was looking to buy and the agent claims to have a track on better inside information because brokers talk to each other, but it would seem they lie to each other also. the apartment i did not buy which i was told was almost at ask, actually finally sold at 8% below ask. how is that close to ask?

and then you have a former broker defending unethical pratices at citi saying it is okay because only 1 out of 6 agents are bad, compared to a worse ratio at a smaller firm. Seriously with a defense like that i do not even need to bother to argue my points because you all do it for me.

There are brokers out there who realize the model is broken and that people in this day and age are really starting to realize when the information is at their fingertips there is no reason to pay a 6% sales commission or a 15% rental commission. it happens to be a crazy fee.

think of it this way, would you pay a tax preparer 5% of your income for the year to prepare your return because it has to be done? well sure it was never that high, but people paid. Now you have plenty of people who go out and buy Turbotax and prepare on their own because their returns are not overly complex.

I believe over time the same will happen to the rental and sales markets.

Go ahead shoot me and call me stupid again. But seriously if people feel comfortable preparing a tax return which if they screw up they get hit with penalities, why would they not feel they can go out and rent an apartment without some pushy broker telling them they have great apartments to show when they have none?

Mike, I have always said that the public at large can go at their housing search alone. On the rental side (3/4 of our city are renters right?), if you do that, you are very simply NOT seeing everything there is to see. If you are satisfied with only looking at a portion of the market (those landlords that list their own or have onsites) by all means, have fun. You won't get the best deal, and in lots of cases won't see the best apartments. Those "no fee" landlords factor in the cost of paying salaries, benefits, having offices into their asking rents, or do you actually think they do it for free? My clients, and those that contact my firm (thousands and thousands a year) do so because we're still the best option for them. So the absorb our fee's. Or they chose not to and try and go direct. But how it works isn't changing, because the status quo works well for those in charge; the ones who own the property.

So..you figure if you say it enough times, it will be true. Good luck with that. Wish it away.

You guys are very dramatic.

Citi Habitats rented 12,900 apartments last year, or 73% of the apartments rented last year in total.
They also recently started a sales division, and have quickly risen to become the fourth largest sales company in the city. That's behind only Corcoran, Prudential, and a third company that I forget.

The recent economic downturn affects NYC VERY differently than the rest of the country, here's why.

Manhattan is an island, that means that unlike Miami, Los Angeles, Pheonix, and other cities, speculators can't build way more real estate that there are people. The fact that Manhattan is surrounded by water ensures that this year, and next year, Manhattan is still the same size. That means the supply of available land is static. You can build up, but not out, unless you count Battery Park City, but that's obviously much more difficult to do then building a new subdivision in Miami. Also, New York city has a virtually unlimited demand for property. New York is the most famous city in the world, and the largest city in the United States. It's featured in just about every pop culture phenomenon, Seinfeld, Sex in the City, etc, and it's been in every movie and tv show from now back to when they invented the video camera. Everyone and their mother wants to move here.

At the depth of the recession, Manhattan's vacany rate dropped to an unheard of 2%. That means 2% of the apartments in Manhattan were vacant. ARMEGEDDON? No, not really. This year, the vacany rate tightened back up to below 1%. In July the vacany rate in Manhattan was .88%. Yes, this July 99.2% of Manhattan was occupied. That leaves a very small amount of real estate, for a very large group of interested renters. This is why New York apartments are infamous for being on the market for VERY short periods of time, and brokers say "If you like this apartment you have to submit an app, because IT WILL be gone."

In 2009 Citi Habitats had a record year in terms of rentals. Why? Simple, people that could no longer afford to buy properties, or keep their homes, had to live somewhere, so they rented an apartment. Also, last year thousands of people who were priced out of certain neighborhoods, suddenly saw prices become affordable and jumped all over the best deals this decade. To repeat, Citi Habitats had a record year. 12,900 apartments rented out of the approximately 17,000 rented in total last year.

The market is only going to get tighter in the coming years, and here's why. During the recession, developers stopped construction of new buildings. Usually, new buildings are built constantly in the city, keeping some upward pressure on vacancy rates, and downward pressure on prices. With virtually no new construction for two years, it means that there is even LESS supply now, and going into the future, than there would be in a normal market. And as the economy speeds up, even MORE demand.

Mikev, you are not stupid. You just don't know everything about this business. Which is fine. It's also why people pay brokers.

I think everyone should just calm down. It's a sunny day in October.

I doubt citi rented 70 percent of all apartments in manhattan last year.

For Jim...

http://www.nydailynews.com/real_estate/2010/03/19/2010-03-19_rent_city_rentals_are_the_backbone_of_the_nyc_real_estate_market.html

I read that article when it came out. I don't doubt the number of apartments they claim to have rented, only that it represents 70 percent of all apartments rented in the city. The article doesn't state that. How can you?

I don't feel like searching for more articles, but the total number of rental transactions in the city is tracked by firms like Miller Samuel.

Just found one: http://www.millersamuel.com/reports/pdf-reports/MRMO2Q10.pdf.
That's for the second quarter of 2010 though.

You can probably find more at: http://www.millersamuel.com

I'm familiar with those reports as well, and don't buy in. They do a ton of rentals no doubt, but that percentage of market share isn't supportable.
I might agree with most of your sentiment, but stop quoting statistics.

Fortunately, facts don't require anyone to 'buy in' for them to be true.

Men lie, women lie, numbers don't.

Friendly, because it's written (with stats provided by brokerage firms no less) doesn't make it so. You're too low level to get it, all good, enjoy the evening.

Friendly, because it's written (with stats provided by brokerage firms no less) doesn't make it so. You're too low level to get it, all good, enjoy the evening.

now of course you're doing precisely what you accuse everyone else of doing. on the other hand, little that you say can make you look even worse.

I supported all of my claims with logic and sources.

Apparently, ranting and raving is the only form of communication that's accepted on the internet.
Good luck...

As I said, I am no longer in this business, and am now no longer in this conversation.

Allow me to add to the list of grayed out posters on this thread.

Oh wait, I'm NOT YET grayed out.

hey cc, all i'm saying is no re firm in new york has 70% market share.

aren't you having enough fun with your other handles?

You don't get to ask the questions boy.

isn't that racist?

Which race doesn't have boys?

truth

makes sense, you are an enemy of truth.

and truth is your friend. she thinks you're delicious. maybe she'll write a song about you.

No one has written a song about you?

she's all yours.

You and julialg seem to agree on that.

boring

Wow.

Former Citi, are you saying that if you do have an ethical, hard working broker from Citi, that you still might get screwed if the office the broker belongs to is bad?

Anyone see the fraud claim against the recent former Citi broker who is accused of cheating the village house owner with two long term leases.

Splaken, did you read about the elliman broker who stole the tenants dog?

indeed. Would love an update there.

Very amused -- just saw a great listing for a building that was much better than another broker had stated. Sure enough, asked about it and it was "just rented" but they had other options at a less desirable building/location.

Sounds familiar from what I have already read here. If was rented, why is it still up on your website?

If I could have a dollar for the number of times I've heard, it was just rented, I'd be living in Trump Towers!

LOL... It was "just rented" because it was literally JUST RENTED!!!! @renterrenternyc , Citi Habitats automatically deletes listings from the site 24 hrs after the apartment rents officially. If you are viewing a listing at any time in this window and happen to be too late than I'm sorry that sucks. but it's not our fault.
Believe me, we WANT to rent you a place and we WANT to put your best interests first because if you are rented in an apartment that you love and you are happy with my service than not only does that mean that I successfully continued to make my living but it also means that I may potentially have the opportunity to do further business with you again or with friends of yours..... That's how anyone makes their business grow, if customers are happy and word of mouth travels that's all you need..

Now I can't speak for brokers who may act differently or in a way you don't like, that's on them; just like I can't generalize with clients saying that they all operate the same way because that's not true either. But seriously the way some people have treated me for the free service of showing them apartments all over NYC is appalling I never knew people had the ability to be so disrespectful until I got into this business. If you don't want to pay the fee, that's totally fine nobody is holding a gun to your head. Have fun scouring the market looking for your dream apartment with no fee I'm not saying it's impossible or that you won't find it but I'd be lying by saying that it's as easy said as is done; seriously good luck. Remember also that if an apartment has no fee maybe check with the average price point of comp apartments on the market because most likely you're paying at least $200 more than the average monthly rent for the same thing. So if you had found a no fee 1200 apartment but I had the same exact quality apartment for 1000 then if you had gone with the no fee apartment you would be paying over $500 more in total by the end of the year than if you had just went with me and paid 15%.

Our broker fee is fair. Let's say we eliminate all the other great things that we offer for you such has helping you move, looking out for your best interests in your search, only showing you apartments that fall in line with your criteria, providing knowledge of the market, relating to and understanding the predicaments that arise as you transition from place to place and working with the landlords on your behalf to answer any questions you may have before committing; with all of that stuff and much more aside, our ACCESS ALONE is worth the 15% fee. We have access to every apartment on the market. Go ahead and look for no fee but then also limit yourself greatly to where you can potentially see/live.

I consider myself very good with only my client's best interests in mind because I knew from the beginning and still know now after proof that if I'm ethical and treat my clients like gold my business will grow exponentially. Maybe if those of you apartment seekers that choose to treat us like expendable crap had been a little nicer than you would find yourself a great place at an amazing deal and have a perfect go-to agent for when you need to move again or if your friends need to move.

Oh yea and if an agent is advising you to put in an app immediately on an apartment you like then for god sakes DO IT! Pull the trigger! Because if you don't than somebody else will and you'll be out an apartment and a non-refundable application fee! Did any of the naysayers think that the broker was advising you to put in the app not because of a quick broker fee but because of the fact that they don't want you to take a $200 hit on an apartment you won't get because you were too late? Think about these things please.

so, after reading this string of warnings, I like a jack ass, still went to see a listing with CitiHabitats. Guess what? The apt was rented. So, we're off to see another rental that is a "little more" than what I can afford. really?? Oh, and I asked for pet friendly too. They guy shows me an apt that's over my budget and not pet friendly. really? okay, so off to the next listing. A larger apartment than what i'm looking for and WAY above my budget, but it's pet friendly. He tells me that he may be able to negotiate the price down for me by $100. Okay, let's see where this goes. I get to my computer to continue my search and, "whoa! that's the apt i just saw!! and it's $275 LESS THAN WHAT THE CITI HABITAT GUY TOLD ME!". come to find out, he was pushing $275 on the listing and the listing actually went DOWN $575. wth? I, like a eager renter, actually signed a form with Citi saying they showed me the listing and that they would get commission. this was me being the loyal client/customer. now, i'm feeling seriously douped and really pissed. now i can't get that apt through someone else if it's within the 120 days or they can take me to court if they find out i get the apt some other way. really??? even if the citi habitat agent LIED to me about the price of the listing???? can't that get me out of the form I signed and supposedly agreed upon? to be honest, he rushed me to sign it and didn't give me a chance to read it and he didn't say what it was for either. i should have been smarter and read it but i didn't, however, he still lied. can i get out of it based on the fact he lied about the listing price?

I hired Citi Habitats as a client to lease my apartment for me. Fast forward 15 months, and they are threatening to sue me because a clause in their contract gives them right to a percentage of futures sales on my apartment. This is a true story. I am starting a web page about this here: https://citihabitatsisrotten.wordpress.com No one should eve use a broker to rent an apartment, but definitely do not use Citi Habitats. The team of Dicky Tsuarte, Johnny Lal, and Seth Hirschhorn are rotten, but probably representative of the agency as a whole. Folks, please, please post your experiences on their Yelp pages!!

What is it you are actually complaining about?

If you hire someone as your broker, they should not turn around and stab you in the back. I was going to use that money for my school for poor children on the Thai Burma border.

Cheated1, have you actually read your contract before you signed with CH?!

Burma Man, I hear that is fun every year.

They are scam artists at their best. I gave them a clear, measured, and detailed Yelp review and they successfully had it removed! Or I assume it was them. They must use reputation management service to keep from getting a black eye. So great to see real reviews here on Street Easy!!

Cheated1,

Are you saying the whole company are scam artists? Or jus the broker you used? You are assuming that they were able to have them remove your review. Yelp does not work that way. Yelp has a software program that will filter reviews based on several criteria. If it feels like your review was "fake" it will filter it. For example, I wrote a very good review for my dentist and they filtered that and removed it, I questioned them and what I described is what happened. It happens more so if its your first couple of reviews

Good morning,

This email serves as a complaint regarding on of your agents Shmolo Azizyahi regarding a house located on Ryder st

My mother and sister in law looked at the house Monday and decided to go with it. I contacted Shlomo who at first said he and his father own the property. We agreed on the rent for $3550 instead of $3800 if I pay for the whole year upfront. He asked me to send all the paperwork which, I did and where I mentioned that I will go as a cosigner and first check my documents before we proceed. I filled out an application. He ran the credit. He said all is good but please have my mother and brother to do the same, which the did.

Then he called me and told me we are good to go for with one year rent. I said perfect, please call me when the lease is ready.
30 minutes after someone else calls and saying well..you spoke to Shlomo and now you speak to me..and this is what we do:
We want 6 month security deposit and the whole year rent upfront! I said, this is not something that we agreed on and why would some pay 6 month security on top of one year rent?
Then Shlomo texted me saying do not worry. We will go as agreed. I said please let me know as soon as possible since I do not want to loose on another house. He said all is good don't you worry

On hour later, he texted me accusing me that I input wrong social. I send him photographs to confirm. Then he asked me to get references from SHUL and RABAI as well as previous landlord

I told him I don't go to shul but here is the # of the landlord

An hour or so later he says, Ok let's do one year rent, one month deposit and one broker fee. I said what broker fee if you said you own the property? He is like...oh..this is for partner..what partner? I only dealt with you and why do you constantly changing the story? He said oK. I will speak to my PARTNER now and if he confirms no broker fee then we are good to go

Towards the evening I get a text from my landlord saying she gets a lot of weird calls asking whats her name and on top of that Shlomo passes by my the house where we live and checking us out. This is unacceptable!!

Now that I gave him my personal information, I am worried what could be done with it

I never dealt with someone that is so unprofessional, who constantly lies and changes the story.

He waisted my time and my money. You as a big organization should be weare of who uses your name and represents you. At this point, I'm not sure whether this guy an agent or a landlord or whether this property is available in the first place or that he tried to defraud me by extracting a lum some check without having a property. Needless to say, I'd like to get my $400 back. I have his texts as a proof of his misconduct

I intend to file a complaint with real estate association and NY state licensing bureau