I live in a nice new high rise in a 1 bedroom apt of 550-600 sq ft in midtown Manhattan. Rent is $3,300 which is killing me right now because bear markets suck with my income down significantly in the last two years (there are many morons I can thank for that). Perhaps I rented this apartment a little overconfidently based on a great first year of income in 2006 out of grad school. I am ashamed to admit the disgrace that I was laid off from my job with about 5 months of salary, but it is the case - and the rent is high. The building had a holiday note with the list of all the employees. Often the tipping that people do is based more on who has the power to be a pain in the ass than who has done the most labor.

There are roughly 250 apartments in the building.

Googling around, some other people gave a list of what they tipped for a similar building and it came out to roughly $600-$800!!!!!!!!!!

I was thinking $100 total until Google gave me a reality check...andI saw the list of 16 employees, most of whom I never met.

Our building's staff:

Resident Manager - Some person who I never met and never heard of. $20 (Google showed people give $200 quite often)

3 Handymen - One I never heard of ($10), One has been helpful on the three occassions we asked ($40)and one was helpful on the one time we requested help ($20). Googling showed that $40 was avg.

6 Concierges/DoorPeople - All friendly and very smily. I like them, but don't really know their names. All pleasant people though. They are not really doorpeople since they mostly sit behind the desk and do not actually open the doors and quite frankly, I can open the door myself - which have motion detectors to open the door. They get my larger pieces of mail and things that are signed for etc and are a first line of security. $20 each. Google had a $50 bare minimum for each.

6 Porters - Apparently a porter maintains a lot of the common space etc for the building. Don't know any of them. $10 each. Google said most people avg about $20 per porter.

So, the bill comes to $270...and it looks like, according to Google, that I am a super cheap son of a bitch that will get dirty scroogy looks for the rest of the year and shitty service for the year (though I demand almost no service).

So, am I cheap son of a bitch? Or are the people paying $600-$800 out of their minds? Or is it a bear market and I am not the only one who will seem like scrooge?

Confused