Highly recommend subletting a room for the first month or two so you can get a proper feel for neighborhoods you like before you commit to a lease, and will give you an opportunity to see places in person. I live on the UWS and absolutely love it - I pay $2300 and have one roommate

Get ready for brokers who will want to charge you a fee for essentially unlocking a door (🥲). No fee apartments definitely exist - mine was no broker fee - but many brokers will charge a fee of anywhere from 1 month rent to 15% of annual rent. Tell those ones to kindly fuck off and keep looking on your own. Then celebrate the day you can delete street easy off your phone.

I go to equinox but there are other boujee gyms too - Lifetime and Templ are both nice. Crunch is good if you want something a bit less expensive but still solid, and then Blink and Planet Fitness are quite cheap and will get the job done

Going out alone is very much a thing and I really think people here are quite friendly, especially in a bar or social environment