Growing your family is a life-changer that often comes with as many financial challenges as it does happy moments, especially here in New York City when it’s time to look for that inevitable bigger apartment.
With 68 percent of city parents more likely to rent than own, StreetEasy just released a study that looks at the neighborhoods and boroughs that provide the easiest — read: most wallet-friendly — transition for parents ready for those extra bedrooms.
According to the report, Brooklyn is the best borough for expanding your family as renters are currently seeing the smallest price jumps on homes with an additional bedroom. The median asking rent for a two-bedroom is 14 percent more than that of a studio or one-bedroom, as opposed to a 32 percent jump in Manhattan.
And though Brooklyn has a lower inventory of two-bedrooms versus studios and one-bedrooms, that drop in availability is the smallest of all the boroughs. Comparatively, Manhattan’s two-bedroom availability is 56 percent smaller than its inventory of studios and one-bedrooms.
StreetEasy’s study found that Bushwick has an abundant inventory of two-bedrooms, while East New York, Red Hook, Sunset Park and Bedford-Stuyvesant also have “relatively affordable” two bedrooms.
Queens is a close second when it comes to upgrading to a two-bedroom from a studio or one-bedroom, StreetEasy said. Ridgewood, where an estimated one out of three households has kids, has double the amount of two-bedrooms compared to the studio and one-bedroom inventory.
In fact, Ridgewood, Glendale, Middle Village and Kew Gardens Hills have more two-bedrooms available than studios or one-bedrooms. Additionally, for 6 percent more than a studio or one-bedroom, renters in Long Island City can nab a two-bedroom unit.
If a three-bedroom home is what you need, options definitely drop considerably, with just six city neighborhoods offering more three-bedrooms than two-bedrooms: East New York, Canarsie, Bayside, Ridgewood, North New York (Bronx) and West Harlem.
In Manhattan and Queens, though, the price fluctuation for a third bedroom is lower than adding a second. Manhattan may also have the largest inventory drop, 63 percent, between two- and three-bedrooms, but its Midtown South, Chelsea and Stuyvesant Town/Peter Cooper Village neighborhoods have the smallest rent increases in adding that third bedroom.
Those parents looking for three bedrooms on the Upper East Side, however, can expect an 83 percent jump in rent, while those living in Flushing, Queens, can expect to pay 11 percent more than a two-bedroom.
To determine its findings, StreetEasy analyzed the difference in rent for homes with an additional bedroom as well as the change in the number of available inventory for larger living options.
