While I do agree with the spirit of this, doesn't this mean that any fees that brokers require will be included in the rent?
replies(7):
If it's in the rent, it's better to amortize the cost of the broker fee over a year vs. pay upfront.
Between the fee + first month's rent + security deposit (+ sometimes an additional month's rent) it is common to have to front 10K - 20K just to get into an apartment here.
If you have 2 buddies and going on a $5500 3 bedroom in Boston, you'll likely be requested first rent + last rent + deposit + broker fee (=1 rent) = 4 * rent = $22k just to get the keys. That's $7300 per person. This is only to get the key, the next month you pay rent #2.
If you're going on a $4k 1 bedroom by yourself (or with your partner) you'll be hit with 4 * 4=$16k upfront cost, or $8k if you're lucky and have a partner.
Renting is extraordinarily expensive in big cities in the US right now. I'm sometimes surprised people can survive this market. I make ~$150k a year in a lucrative software engineering role, and rent is still too expensive for me. It's very difficult for e.g. teachers, researchers etc making ~$70k a year etc.
Some cities will be cheaper, some will be more expensive. E.g. I know that Philadelphia is particularly cheap when it comes to cost of living. Chicago is expensive, but seems to be slightly cheaper than NYC/Boston etc...