For the very wealthy, life in Manhattan can be incredible, but high cost of living and skyrocketing housing costs have forced many to live in cramped, unsavory conditions, and Chinatown's Sun Bright Hotel is just one of such residences, though it can hardly be called livable.
Full of filth and roaches, guests and residents live for $10 a day in cramped conditions resembling human kennels, and one man claimed a dead body was left to rot for weeks, the New York Post reports.
"It was horrible - like an animal shelter," a first responder, recently summoned to the hotel, told The Post. "I picked up a suit on the wall and roaches fell out, hundreds of them."
The single-room occupancy hotel has been operating since the late 19th century, though today, it certainly doesn't look like a hotel, with men living side by side in 7-by-5 foot "rooms" in the male-only third and fourth floors, smaller than the average 8-by-10 solitary confinement cells in prisons.
Roaches, bedbugs, fleas and other vermin, coupled with rotting trash, urine and sweat in the hallways make conditions nearly unbearable.
"They keep all the garbage all on this floor," John Arkue, a disabled construction worker who has lived on the third floor for 15 years, told the Post. "Sometimes the garbage sits here. Like on a Saturday, we don't put the garbage out."
Reviewers on Yelp routinely give the hotel (or hostel, as many refer to it as) low ratings, complaining of "cockroaches, mold and mildew," smells of "cat piss," lack of elevators and overall unsanitary conditions.
"Be prepared to be shocked, bring nose plugs and ear plugs because like I said, there IS NO CEILING so you hear and smell EVERYTHING," one reviewer warned. "If you are here, you plan to ONLY sleep if you are able to."
More than 100 men share a bathroom on one floor, consisting of two shower stalls, four toilets and one urinal. Moldy paint peels from the wall, black mold covering everything. Guests and residents have tried to complain, but to no avail.
"I called the inspector a couple of times to come and check it," Arkue said. "They don't do nothing."
Since 1988, the Sun Bright Hotel has been given 46 summonses from the city's Department of Buildings, and currently the hotel has 22 open violations, nearly all of them issued in 2011.
"I pay $310 [a month] - just for a little home, just for a little bed," David Rodriguez, a 74-year old retired cabdriver explained to The Post. He has lived in his chicken wire cell for 16 years, his foam mattress disentegrating.
"Somebody died on the other side, and he was there about 15 days," said. He explained that management never bothered to clean the room after removing the body. "They left it dirty. It smelled very bad - a dead man!" he said.
A diabetic who suffered from a heart attack three years ago, Rodriguez may pay little for his tiny home, but he still doesn't feel safe, keeping an aluminum baseball bat by his side for protection.
"There's a whole bunch of nuts around here," he said. "I don't feel comfortable, but what am I going to do? I can't do nothing. I can't pay $1,000 for an apartment."
Indeed, in a city where rent is as sky-high as its buildings, Manhattan rent is a whopping $3,418 a month, according to data collected last year by Citi Habitats.
Another man living in the building told the Post that for many, this was what life in the Big Apple had become, as most people cannot afford to rent a home. "We're not millionaires," he said.
The Daily Mail attempted to contact the hotel owners, but no one was available immediately for comment.
Click here to see photos of the terrible conditions in the Sun Bright Hotel in Chinatown.