what are the pros and cons of buying a second floor apartment in new york city
we'll demystify this topic in the following video i'm Nick at Hauseit visit
hauseit.com to save money when buying selling or renting real estate in new
york city long island the hudson valley or south florida so let's get started
so let's start with the pros what are the advantages of buying a second floor
apartment in new york city well the primary advantage of going with a second
floor apartment is the fact that you will most likely secure a much better
deal than you otherwise would have by going with a higher floor unit another
advantage to buying a second floor apartment is the matter of convenience
it is quite convenient to be able to just go outside your front door go down
one flight of stairs and go in and out of your building you don't have to
engage in waiting for the elevator you don't have to engage in small talk with
people and of course the elevator is still there if you're in an elevator
building so you still will have that same convenience for yourself and for
guests as you would with a higher floor it just allows a lot more spontaneity in
terms of your lifestyle to not have to think about calling the elevator waiting
probably checking your phone you just don't have to do any of that
open your door go downstairs go outside go to the bodega do what you need to do
come right back and if you forget something you can go out again and it's
quite convenient another advantage to buying a second floor apartment is that
it does feel often times like you're much more connected to the city
now most second floor apartments do have some degree of elevation so you're never
going to be right at eye level you know with people on the street and so forth
but you'll still be able to hopefully look out the window you can see people
talking you can see facial expressions if it's raining you'll see people's
umbrellas you can see the cars in the streets so a lot of our buyers and
clients that we work with oftentimes do really like this element of it and they
feel that if you get up too high in a building while you might have more light
and views and so forth you'll actually lose that connection with the city and
you might feel a bit more detached than you would like
so we've gone over a few pros now let's get into the cons or negative aspects of
buying a second floor apartment in new york city
now in our opinion one of the most detrimental aspects of living on the
second floor is the fact that you may have a commercial unit below you
now commercial units bring a great deal of uncertainty to your ownership because
you never really know what's going to be below you while today it could be an ice
cream shop a year or five years from now it could
be a pizza parlor so you never really know and as a result it's kind of hard
to gauge the risk at the time you're actually buying
and furthermore if the commercial tenant changes you know you could potentially
have differing levels of noise and odors and other sorts of problems which
basically emanate into your apartment another downside to buying a second
floor apartment is that you're just going to be closer to the source of
rodents and vermin they all come from the basement from the ground floor and
they typically go upwards so you're the first point of entry for these critters
into the building so obviously this risk
cannot be fully eradicated just by going to the third floor fourth floor fifth
floor or twelfth floor rodents and vermin are everywhere in new york city
you can never completely avoid it but nevertheless on the second floor you
will have a higher likelihood of problems
another risk with buying a second floor apartment in new york city is you have
to deal with additional street noise and other sorts of distractions particularly
late at night you don't want to be hearing sirens crazy people getting in
fights cars honking people getting out of the
bar and having existential arguments with their partners things like that
but again that being said you're not going to fully eradicate this simply by
buying on a fourth floor or fifth floor instead that is just part of the fabric
of new york city you're going to have noises you're always going to have
sirens and
therefore the main downside with being on the second floor is that it will be
incrementally louder
and more of a distraction than being on a slightly higher floor
another negative aspect of buying a second floor apartment in
new york city is potential safety issues now obviously you can never fully
eradicate the risk of bad actors and harmful things occurring in your life
but of course if you're on the second floor you simply are a much more likely
target for a bad actor who enters the building looking to commit a crime cause
mayhem or steel and so forth they will enter the building either from the roof
or from the ground floor and they will go to the first available apartment that
meets their eyes this typically in the case of an entry
on the ground floor results in it being some apartment on the second floor which
could potentially be your floor but that being said just because you're on the
third floor or the fifth floor will never fully eradicate this risk because
oftentimes a bad actor will enter the building and they will just try to open
every single door until they find one that is unlocked but nevertheless we do
like to bring this up if you are very focused on safety there's no doubt about
it that you will be safer on a higher floor
with the exception of the roof because of the fact that people can potentially
cross over buildings by way of the roof and actually enter through the stairwell
to the roof so just keep that in mind if you're thinking of either a second floor
apartment or a penthouse top floor type of unit one other con of buying a second
floor apartment in new york city is that you will typically have less exposure
views light and so forth than you otherwise would
being on a higher floor however that's not to say that second
floor apartments don't have a lot of these types of features depending on the
apartment you may very well have southern exposure and also in pre-war
buildings and the likes you could potentially have taller ceilings by way
of being on the second floor and that may actually lend itself to your
apartment being brighter or feeling larger than a unit that's maybe a floor
two or three floors above you so we hope you found this video to be helpful we
went over the pros and cons of buying a second floor apartment in new york city
if you are looking to buy we can save you up to two percent and in some cases
more here at Hauseit through our Hauseit Buyer Closing Credit Service. You can
learn more and sign up by visiting houseit.com or send an email to team@hauseit.com.
I'm Nick at Hauseit. we really appreciate you watching this video and
we hope to have you as a subscriber to our channel we'll see you on the next
one