Broker listings not on rental building websites

I don't know what is going on. Two friends told us to look at their buildings because there is a lot of vacancy; when we called both buildings we were told there is 0 vacancy and things are hot right now with everyone coming back to the city - "its never been busier" said 1!. We don't believe them, but at same time we don't understand why they would say that in a 1x1 call.

Not sure about OP, but what Mouse describes seems to be just a tactic to make you desperate. Do as you do at the Grand Bazaar: tell the vendor he's full of it and you'll give him half the price he's asking.

I look at this building as I used to live there long time back and number of available listings have come down from 20 in Jan to 4 now for 300 unit building. But they are still offering 2 months free without changing the base rate from the peak. So something is off - perhaps they have more units becoming available as the leases run out or they know their base rate is too high.
https://alginny.com/properties/hilary-gardens/

Yes, many of the Hell's Kitchen high rises are still offering 3 months off of a 15-month lease or similar, despite supposedly having few units available. This article may also help explain it - https://patch.com/new-york/new-york-city/fearing-plunging-rents-nyc-landlords-keep-apartments-market

wow 50%! Thank you @hellskitchen.