Too early to look for late Dec move in?

you should "look" for as long as you can tolerate so you have an idea of the market. i looked for 7 mos.

I don't think you need to work with a broker. streeteasy has a lot of listings, then check sunday's printed real estate section in NYTimes. there are no fee bldgs (i'm sure someone will post the links) but ANY apartment has the potential to be no-fee if negotiated well. Good Luck!

fwiw - i mostly went to open houses for the first 4-5 mos, then 2-3 mos before we were ready to move i also contacted listing brokers on apartments that peaked my interest. they don't need to know when you're planning to move. they'll ask, of course, and you can say "this winter" or "soon" or "before the end of the year" or "within the next month or so". it doesn't matter and you don't have to be honest. we just signed a new lease in july and i first saw the place in january, sooo...

Don't work with a broker. With all the info available these days, if you have half a brain, you'll never need a broker. And I mean for both buying and renting.

We've been looking for an apartment (using a buyer's broker) for about 6 months and I also thought that working with a broker was a waste of time. But lately, I've been proven wrong. Our broker has been really helpful in assessing the price that an apartment is really worth which is often alot lower than the listing price and also lower than my husband and I thought the apartment was worth. My advice is to go to open houses and meet some brokers, call up the brokers for apartments that you want to see and meet the brokers as well as getting referrals to brokers from friends and co-workers.
I'm assuming that you're renting and in that case, it may not pay for you to use a broker because you have to pay the fee yourself and it runs into some money. We used a broker for our current rental (had never used one previously) and paying the commission wasn't fun. But if you're buying an apartment and you have time to find a good broker, then I would do it.

Certainly you can look, but your negotiating power does not really come into play until mid-November. Most spaces are looking for a tenant now, so it's not like you can lock things up on currently-empty apartments. So you might find a place that is listing something now for your move-in, but they won't be giving a good price because they think they can wait-and-see. So your best bet is to get serious 1.5 months before your move date: enough time for things not to be hectic for you, but also a constrained time to put pressure on the landlord that if they don't rent to you, they'll lose a month.

In terms of using brokers outside of thelisring broker on one-off apartments, it'll cost you in the end. At the end of the day, the landlord will be more negotiable on even a no fee apartment if they don't have to pay a broker a month of rent. Use nybits.com or renthop.com to find rental buildings. For condos, use this site and search with "must have address". Avoid listings where the broker seems to have too many listings. Do not only look at no-fee rentals: fees are quite negotiable these days, and the best places price-wise are usually listed with a fee, even after accounting for the fee.