Photo: Luxury Real Estate Manhattan's view from downtown overlooking Brooklyn Innovative office space startup extends their business strategy to living spaces, representing a shift in lifestyle needs for New York buyers.

  You have finally found the perfect apartment, with a view of the city you’ve always dreamed of, through classic wooden panel windows. You have a washer/dryer, a beautiful courtyard, and your favorite furry companion is welcome too. But before you sign the lease for your new luxury apartment, beware of these hidden costs that can sneak up on you and add thousands to your rent:

As always, The Elliman Report released earlier this month provided a wealth of data on the state of the Manhattan real estate market. In many cases, the overall trends were not particularly surprising, with average prices maintaining their upward trajectory and vacancy rates remaining low. Still, when breaking down the numbers by specific neighborhoods, there are some interesting fluctuations from last year’s numbers worth noting.

Well, don’t say we didn’t warn you: the latest rental market report from Elliman says that rents in Manhattan and Brooklyn have been steadily rising since the beginning of 2013. Increases in rental prices have been seen across all apartment sizes in the city, with the average rents in Manhattan and Brooklyn coming up to $3,930 and $2,971, respectively, in March.

The hunt is on for the next Brooklyn destination. With trendy locales like Park Slope, Williamsburg, Boerum Hill and Carroll Gardens listing median real estate prices typically seen in upper Manhattan, investors, renters and owners alike have been trying to predict the next up and coming neighborhood. Needless to say, the competition has been fierce.

Winter is on its way out in Manhattan, and accompanying the rise in temperatures is a corresponding increase in the rental prices for apartments in the city. The latest rental market report from MNS says that rents rose by 0.92 per cent in February, which is the first indication of the market reversing the downward slump that it has been experiencing over the past few months. Vacancy rates in Manhattan continue to remain low, and these could serve as a reason for rents to shoot up further in the coming summer months.

After finding it difficult to find a Manhattan rental that fit both their budget and their specifications, it was rather commonplace in the past for New Yorkers to take their apartment hunt to Brooklyn instead. However, these days, a reversal of this trend is happening—recent rental reports suggest that with apartments in Kings County seeing a surge in rents, many apartment hunters are realizing that they may be getting better deals by renting homes in Manhattan itself.

2012 was an interesting year for the luxury rental apartment market in New York City. New Yorkers saw rents for homes in the city zooming upward over the course of the year, while the number of vacant apartments in the market stopped to extremely low levels. But as tumultuous as these occurrences may seem, members of the real estate sector were smiling, as they could see that the market was not only alive, but it was doing extremely well too! With last year putting on such a good show, one wonders: will 2013 be able to repeat the performance of its predecessor?

Recent reports on the rental market in Manhattan have said that rents in the city have seen a decline over the past few months; a decrease that is consistent with the market slow down that is traditionally seen around this time of year. After a summer that saw rental prices in the city shoot through the roof, the statistics for November show that there has been a third consecutive decline in prices being asked for rental apartments in Manhattan.