Angela's place was excellent, super cheap, very clean and despite initial impressions, in a top location. It's about 2 minutes to the subway station, which was easy to navigate from. To be perfectly honest, coming from Australia, the area seemed a little dodgy late at night but i can assure you was quite safe. In fact it was a great authentic NYC experience that can't be duplicated staying in tourist ridden Manhattan. I would certainly stay again in a heartbeat and would recommend the place to my friends.
The room was quite large by NYC standards, clean and had plenty of storage. Cas, Angela's maintenance man (we didn't actually meet her, but I spoke to her on the phone and she was lovely) was very friendly and helpful and unobtrusive. The guy that lives there is a charismatic med student and couldn't have been friendlier. All in all, my girlfriend and I couldn't fault the place, other than a few odd random noises from upstairs every now ant then. But you get that in a three storey place... It happens to be a beautiful brown stone building. The only minor faults really was the room often got too warm (despite being a cold fall) and the toilet didn't flush (but Cas fixed it ASAP!). Very minor things in the bigger scheme.
Oh, and there's a great, hip, boutique espresso bar called the Daily Press on the way to the subway station....
Highly recommended! Amazing value for money!!!!