am planning a trip to NYC in late september and thinking of using vrbo to rent an apartment for 7-10 days. did so in paris and had a good experience.
i am at a loss as to the geography. what areas are convenient to the sights, subway, and are safe? looking at gramercy park, chelsea, lower east side, turtle park?. any sugestions very much appreciated. (we decided on NYC after looking for a fare to europe for under $1000!!!!without success.

Gramercy Park or anywhere in the Village or even Chelsea would be fine, and you will have transportation very close, bus/subway.

I'd suggest getting a map of the city so you have some idea of the address of the apartments you are looking at and how close they are to everything.

In the areas you are looking in lots of things will be walkable, restaurants, shopping, sites.

September is just about the perfect time of year to be here, the HEAT of August will be over and the colours of fall will just be starting.

You can get a general idea of various neighborhoods by reading descriptions at nymetro.com/realestate There's a list on the right hand column.

Most areas will be safe and have subway access. There are areas a bit far east like Turtle BAY, the lower east side and the east village that are not as close to subway access as other areas. Subway map
http://www.mta.info/nyct/maps/submap.htm

Most first time tourists stay in midtown (34-59 st.) and there are some areas that are within midtown that are more residential than others (Turtle Bay being one). But I'll also mention it's easy to get a lousy apt. There are lots of hotels with apt. style rooms so you get the best of both-space and hotel amenities. You can also read reviews of these places here and on tripadvisor. The Affinia group (www.affinia.com) are very good.

cindyjo, what kind of price do you have in mind? I rent apartments in Paris and in New York. I usually expect to pay between two and three times as much for one in New York as I do in Paris.

I do know two great one bedroom apartments in midtown in the $225 to $300 per night range, but both are fully booked for September.

You can also look at the upper west side - mid/upscale residential with good transit and upper east side - ditto - but transit OK - but not great.

Major sights in Manhattan are spread over an area more than 8 miles long - so no matter where you stay you'll have to take the subway to many places.

thanks for all your helpful replies. am looking at a studio apartment on morton street in west village. 200 a night. small (440 sq feet) but looks nicely kept. any feedback on this location? does anyone know of a website to view the street? when we went to paris we used a site for paris that had cam pictures of all the streets. like an idiot i didn't bookmark the site. thank you.

You may also want to check out craigslist - I have had really good luck with that in NYC. Have also used and been pleased with http://www.metro-home.com/
The Paris site you describe sounds like <<pages jaunes>> (yellow pages) at http://www.pagesjaunes.fr/pj.cgi?lang=en . Don't know of a similar site with NYC photos but to assess location you might take a look at http://www.manhattanaddress.com/cross.html

Morton St. is a good location in Greenwich Village but not so sure the Morton St. apartments are that nice. If it's at 55 Morton St., there are actually some pretty terrible reviews on tripadvisor
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Rev...k_City_New_Yor

There is no comparable website for NYC like pagejaunes.

If you want to stay in Greenwich Village, you might check greenwichvillagehome.com which is a studio apartment that has rented for about $185/night.