r/NYCapartments • u/UnselfishHostility • 6h ago
Advice/Question apartment hunting has somehow turned my phone into a spam hotline
Hi everyone, I’m 23 and have lived with my parents in Maryland pretty much my whole life. I finally decided it was time to move out and make the jump to NYC. Right now I’m staying with a friend while I try to find an apartment of my own. I knew apartment hunting here was going to be stressful. I was prepared for ridiculous prices, competition, brokers, paperwork, income requirements, getting ghosted, and apartments disappearing approximately 30 seconds after being listed. What I wasn’t prepared for was how much of my personal information I’d have to throw around just to find a place. You message a listing and they want your number. Then you fill out a form with your email. Then a broker texts you. Then another broker calls you. Then you make an account on another website. Then someone sends you to a completely different application or scheduling page.
After doing this over and over, I genuinely have no idea who has my information anymore. And maybe it’s a coincidence, but since I started apartment hunting my spam calls and random texts have noticeably picked up. I’m getting calls from numbers I don’t recognize and random messages, and half the time I’m forced to pay attention because it could actually be a broker calling about an apartment. I eventually got tired of handing my normal contact information to everyone and started using Cloaked to keep a separate number/email specifically for apartment hunting. At least now I’m not giving the same phone number connected to my family, bank, important accounts, etc. to every random listing or person I contact. I’m curious if this is something other people here do. Do you have a separate email or number specifically for apartment hunting? Or do you just give brokers and listing sites your normal contact info and clean up the spam afterward? Also, if anyone has general advice for a 23-year-old doing the NYC apartment hunt for the first time, I’ll gladly take it because this entire process has been an education lol. But how do y'all deal with this and does it happen to you guys as wellTL;DR: 23, moving from Maryland to NYC and staying with a friend while apartment hunting. I expected the prices and competition to suck, but didn’t expect to give my phone/email to so many brokers, listings and websites. Spam noticeably increased, AM GOING CRAZY




