{"items": [{"author": "Sun", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118758399052", "anchor": "fb-10100118758399052", "service": "fb", "text": "what's the number on the left mean? number of listings in boston? you said price, but I wouldn't think it apartment rental cost per month?", "timestamp": "1572374917"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118758399052&reply_comment_id=10100118764002822", "anchor": "fb-10100118758399052_10100118764002822", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Sun it's the number of listings, sorry. Not a good title!
(It's the number of listings in the \"Boston Apartment Price\" dataset.)", "timestamp": "1572376694"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118758399052&reply_comment_id=10100118767440932", "anchor": "fb-10100118758399052_10100118767440932", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Fixed it to say \"Boston Apartment Listings By Month\"", "timestamp": "1572378218"}, {"author": "Sun", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118758399052&reply_comment_id=10100119973179622", "anchor": "fb-10100118758399052_10100119973179622", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Jeff Kaufman thanks.", "timestamp": "1572966652"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118767056702", "anchor": "fb-10100118767056702", "service": "fb", "text": "What we really want for this is a graph of the number of listings that will start on Sept 1, right?", "timestamp": "1572378074"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118767056702&reply_comment_id=10100118767665482", "anchor": "fb-10100118767056702_10100118767665482", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Yes, that's much better (though we want to combine it with when the listing goes up) but it's not in the dataset", "timestamp": "1572378264"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118767410992", "anchor": "fb-10100118767410992", "service": "fb", "text": "The October number is more than half the June peak, and presumably most of those October listings are not for the following September.
So we know already that non-Sept1 listings are a big part of the story.
It could be that most of those June listings start in July or August.", "timestamp": "1572378194"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118767410992&reply_comment_id=10100118767914982", "anchor": "fb-10100118767410992_10100118767914982", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I think most of the October listings are landlords who wanted to rent for 9/1 but couldn't for some reason (no taker, needed to do maintenance after their tenant moved out). And that's why November is even lower.", "timestamp": "1572378326"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118767410992&reply_comment_id=10100118768044722", "anchor": "fb-10100118767410992_10100118768044722", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Jeff Kaufman maybe but the February number is even higher than October... So it really seems like there's a decent baseline of apartments not renting for Sept 1", "timestamp": "1572378407"}, {"author": "Eli\u0161ka", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118767410992&reply_comment_id=10100118770879042", "anchor": "fb-10100118767410992_10100118770879042", "service": "fb", "text": "→ David Chudzicki [Anecdata] My apartment's management company lists their properties in February for Sep 1 start dates, so I wouldn't say necessarily that all of those Feb listings are non-9/1 starts.", "timestamp": "1572379219"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118767410992&reply_comment_id=10100118771682432", "anchor": "fb-10100118767410992_10100118771682432", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Wow!", "timestamp": "1572379412"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118768883042", "anchor": "fb-10100118768883042", "service": "fb", "text": "My hypothesis is that most ads are for not more than a month or two out, and the May/June peak in adds is explained by a large number of rentals that start in June, July, August.
I know that no single date will be as common as Sept 1, but I suspect the summer might still be pretty popular compared to other months.", "timestamp": "1572378620"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118768883042&reply_comment_id=10100118771797202", "anchor": "fb-10100118768883042_10100118771797202", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Update: way less confident in this given the anecdata in the other thread.", "timestamp": "1572379464"}, {"author": "Jacob", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118768883042&reply_comment_id=10100118783334082", "anchor": "fb-10100118768883042_10100118783334082", "service": "fb", "text": "→ It's accepted wisdom in most places that the summer is the worst time to go apartment-hunting.", "timestamp": "1572384556"}, {"author": "Alex", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118773204382", "anchor": "fb-10100118773204382", "service": "fb", "text": "This is crazy. In both NYC and the Bay Area people seem to list places at most 4-6 weeks in advance. Many places are immediate availability. It's virtually impossible to get a place further in advance.", "timestamp": "1572379946"}, {"author": "Andrew", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118781472812", "anchor": "fb-10100118781472812", "service": "fb", "text": "Is it easy to produce a graph of price by month? I have the theory that when there's less rental activity, landlords offer lower rents because they expect longer vacancies if the unit isn't filled.", "timestamp": "1572383957"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118781472812&reply_comment_id=10100118791792132", "anchor": "fb-10100118781472812_10100118791792132", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Andrew this is hard, because if you saw some months were cheaper how do you know that it's not \"different parts of the city are on different schedules\" or worse \"fancier apartments are on different schedules\"", "timestamp": "1572387784"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118781472812&reply_comment_id=10100118791901912", "anchor": "fb-10100118781472812_10100118791901912", "service": "fb", "text": "→ (For example, student apartments are especially in Allston and are relatively cheap)", "timestamp": "1572387819"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118781472812&reply_comment_id=10100118936018102", "anchor": "fb-10100118781472812_10100118936018102", "service": "fb", "text": "→ One way to kind of adjust for geographic distortion would be to return the average color of https://www.jefftk.com/apartment_prices by month
This still wouldn't handle questions like \"maybe different kinds of apartments are available at different times of year\"", "timestamp": "1572465235"}, {"author": "BDan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118797171352", "anchor": "fb-10100118797171352", "service": "fb", "text": "It\u2019s driven by landlords, in significant part. A lot of them ask for three or four months notice so they can start showing it as soon as possible.", "timestamp": "1572389759"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118797171352&reply_comment_id=10100118799112462", "anchor": "fb-10100118797171352_10100118799112462", "service": "fb", "text": "→ BDan isn't this just as consistent with \"landlords are showing early because tenants are looking early\"? I don't see how to pull these apart.", "timestamp": "1572390702"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118797171352&reply_comment_id=10100118800265152", "anchor": "fb-10100118797171352_10100118800265152", "service": "fb", "text": "→ (analogy to social dancing: is booking ahead driven by people asking, or by people being willing to take bookings?)", "timestamp": "1572391159"}, {"author": "BDan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118797171352&reply_comment_id=10100118801193292", "anchor": "fb-10100118797171352_10100118801193292", "service": "fb", "text": "→ No, landlords are showing early because they want to start finding new tenants as early as possible. Many of the people who are looking that early are only doing so because the apartments go away if they don\u2019t, because it\u2019s an arms race.", "timestamp": "1572391607"}, {"author": "Nix", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118805414832", "anchor": "fb-10100118805414832", "service": "fb", "text": "At Cornell, people often find flatmates and sign leases a full year ahead of time (in September for the following year). I think it is certainly possible to find housing only a couple months before, but not in the most coveted areas.
Here's a relevant news article about people camping out to be first in line on the day that one of the big lease companies opens up leases that will start 11 months later: https://cornellsun.com/.../cornell-students-sleep-on.../", "timestamp": "1572393651"}, {"author": "Jonathan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118850933612", "anchor": "fb-10100118850933612", "service": "fb", "text": "I was so confused when I started house-hunting in NJ because it DIDN'T follow this cycle. Housing just appeared, in consistent amounts, every two weeks from may through august.", "timestamp": "1572403298"}, {"author": "Viva", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118864052322", "anchor": "fb-10100118864052322", "service": "fb", "text": "From experience, I can say that apartment hunting in October in the Boston area is the Worst. (Maybe especially because it was 2013)", "timestamp": "1572411474"}, {"author": "Ofer", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100118741607702?comment_id=10100118868618172", "anchor": "fb-10100118868618172", "service": "fb", "text": "In my experience there are almost as many June-to-May leases as there are September-to-August leases.", "timestamp": "1572415395"}, {"author": "Kenny", "source_link": "https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Ric6wFiETXzBLBRYZ#vPrSJFitHP3zAevzk", "anchor": "lw-vPrSJFitHP3zAevzk", "service": "lw", "text": "I'm really confused. I'm used to the NYC rental market, particularly Brooklyn, and, aside from lining up apartment-mates, the rule is that you look for a new apartment right before you're reading to move. I can't even remember seeing apartments listed for rent months in advance, tho I wouldn't be entirely surprised that it happens, e.g. for students.\n
Where are you getting your listings and how can you tell when the lease is intended or expected to start from the listing?\n", "timestamp": 1574978232}, {"author": "Raemon", "source_link": "https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Ric6wFiETXzBLBRYZ#PRZQshtSvcPThjWH7", "anchor": "lw-PRZQshtSvcPThjWH7", "service": "lw", "text": "→ NYC doesn't have the \"almost all apartments operate on a Sept 1 - Sept 1 schedule\", so if that's true in Boston it makes sense for there to be a fairly different ecosystem there.", "timestamp": 1574978488}, {"author": "jkaufman", "source_link": "https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Ric6wFiETXzBLBRYZ#SdEevmxkgmQZRCtiL", "anchor": "lw-SdEevmxkgmQZRCtiL", "service": "lw", "text": "→ \n
I'm used to the NYC rental market, particularly Brooklyn, and, aside from lining up apartment-mates, the rule is that you look for a new apartment right before you're reading to move.\n\n
NYC has a very different apartment listing culture than Boston, yup!\n\n
Where are you getting your listings and how can you tell when the lease is intended or expected to start from the listing?\n\n
I'm scraping Padmapper. The availability date is usually plain text in the listing, unfortunately, and is also not something I have in my archived date (just location, price, and number of bedrooms).\n
But if you go on Padmapper, Craigslist, etc in April and look at listings, you'll mostly see 9/1 start dates.\n", "timestamp": 1574994338}]}