Jack Leahy

Tell a New Yorker that you pay $450 a month, and they may get jealous. But Jack Leahy, a 25-year-old musician who moved to New York from Austin, Texas last September, who lives in a 40 square foot crawl space, might not be one of them.

“… they don’t have any idea. It’s like The Phantom of the Opera — how much did THAT guy pay?”

His windowless room measures about 9 feet long and 4.5 feet wide. You can stand up at the entry, but once inside you mostly stoop — as it’s only about 5 feet tall. A twin-size futon mattress takes up most of the space.

Leahy works at Best Pizza in Williamsburg, spends a lot of time watching soccer at a nearby bar, or in his $220-a-month music studio in East Williamsburg, which is about the same size as his crawl space. Of his home he says,

“In a way, it’s kind of awesome. You can get some good sleep in here. And I think it matches my life in ways. I tend to run into odd situations.”

Leahy must keep quiet during rehearsals in the performance space below him, which can be any time between 9AM and 10PM, seven days a week. But, the Wi-Fi is great, so he can always watch TV. He’s also required to maintain a ghostly profile in the kitchen and office in the back of the building, which is where the bathroom is.

“I think I was happy to be in New York and that I actually had a place. It was just kind of comical. It is comical. Whenever I show people where I live, they always laugh.”

He recently decided to stay for another year. Romantic rendezvous here are not a concern at the moment. He got back together with a girlfriend who told him about the crawl space in the first place. She lives in a nearby studio. Some people might think even a good-size studio cramped for two, Mr. Leahy is not one of them.

“Are you kidding me?. It feels like a great hall.”

Feeling a bit better about where you live now?

(Photos, Alex Wroblewski/ New York Times via New York Times)