Real New York Tours

Very informative and well worth the $.

Booked this solely on Unilocal reviews and a desire to see a lot of the city of which we knew very little. We took the 3 hour tour of Greenwich, SoHo, ⁹⁄₁₁ memorial, Washington Square, Chinatown and Little Italy.
We would NEVER have stomped all this ground on our own, even though we have our share of adventurous spirit. Incredible amount of information (too much at times) but built the foundation for future travels here. Fabrice is gifted in knowledge retention and a prince of a guy.
Can’t recommend this company highly enough!

Had our tour just 5 days ago, Nov. 28^th.
Gregory was our tour guide. We decided to do the tour on our first full day in NYC (highly recommended), this helps you get situated and familiar with the city.
The points within the tour are great but Gregory and staff are really what you pay for. He did a great job with the history, how New Yorker’s live today, how the city has changed, truly make you feel comfortable about navigating throughout the city/​subway.
This tour is way better then being on a bus, you walk the city /​ride the subway and you feel like a local. Long day but every much worth it.

Best tour ever! Want to see NYC the real way-​this is it. Learned so much, ate amazing food. Would tell everyone to take this tour!

I got David for the «Downtown Dozen Tour», and I would say it was conducted extremely well for the most part. I meant to book one of their tours immediately after moving to Manhattan. But as most people who’ve moved here for work knows, is costs a lot of money up front to get an apartment, and reimbursement for various refundable fees take a long time to come in! Therefore, I delayed this for 6 months. Even though I’ve been around a lot of places, I’ve missed a lot of things and it was great having someone like David point out so many of the details and present the history from Bob Dylan to outside shots of the apartment the characters in Friends supposed to have lived in. I would have given a full 5 stars, but he made 2 factual errors. He said that the apartment in Friends was in the Upper West Side in the show; it’s actually in West Village. He also told everyone that undergrad tuition at NYU is about 60 $ and together with dorms, food, and fees it could go up to $ 90k a year! I went to a similar private university in NY and that didn’t sound right, so I looked it up. Tuition this year is $ 47,750. Together with food, housing and other fees, the total amounts to about $ 65,860. So many people make this mistake and quote the whole package as tuition, so this is forgivable!

Loved the tour! I recommend it for couples, family and friends ages 14 and up. Only because of the amount of walking and the info might go over a youngsters head. Really informative and I especially love getting the tour from a NYers prospective. Not gimmicky and you won’t miss seeing the tourist traps everyone else is doing. Great time!

Heidi was just what we needed to make this trip fantastic. She was full of great ideas. We loved all of the restaurant and dessert ideas that she had and she was patient. We really couldn’t have such a stress-​free, wonderful time without her help.

This was my 2^nd time booking a tour with this company and it was lovely! The first tour was a full day and the 2^nd time around we were in NYC for a short period of time so we opted for the half day. An awesome way to see NYC!

I did this tour back in 2013 with my Dad. Here’s how good it was. I signed me and Shari V up for the exact same tour when we visited in 2014. The tour was so entertaining and full of information, I felt like doing it twice was worth it. Think about that… it’s quite a recommendation.
Anyway, my tour guide for both tours was Jimmy Napoli. In his words, same bad jokes with new made-​up history. Jimmy is a funny guy. He is also very New York City.
The tour starts out in the West Village and ends at 5 points in Chinatown. There is a lot to see in a short period of time, but it’s a great way to see NYC. New York can be overwhelming to see if you only have a few days. It’s a great way to get your bearings for the city. You can then use the tour to give yourself ideas of where you’d like to concentrate the rest of your time.
Highly recommended.

We were very pleased with our tour of New York City. Our guide, Aaron, was very knowledgeable and helpful. He had an excellent way of attending to individual needs within the group of 12. If you are not familiar with the New York City subway system this is an excellent tour to take as it will provide a comfortable orientation that will allow you to ride the subway independently after the tour. Once again, overall this was a great tour. I would highly recommend it to friends, relatives, and anyone reading this review who is from out of town.

Lived in New York for a couple of years and recently came back for a visit with my boyfriend who was visiting for the first time. I wanted to take the hassle and the time out of planning so picked this tour after reading reviews. Our tour guide was great, only thing I would changed is the order of the tour, just felt like a lot of back and fourth and the spot for lunch wasn’t all too great.

Based on Unilocal and TripAdvisors reviews, we decided to book a private 6 hour Manhattan tour on Monday, our first day in NYC. Many recommended that you take the tour on the first day, to get a lay of the land and get a better idea of places you might want to revisit later in your trip. It was a great idea.
Our tour guide, Max, met us at our hotel at 10AM and our tour started with a walk to the closest subway station, where he showed us how to use the kiosk to purchase our week long Metro Card and and we readied for our first subway ride.
Max was great. He was knowledgeable, informative, patient and nice. He took us all over Manhattan, starting at the Upper East Side, including the lower 3^rd of Central Park, the Upper West Side to Tribeca, Greenwich Village, SoHo, Little Italy, China Town, and ending up at Wall Street. All the while, Max imparted bits of NYC history, city lore, and other tidbits of information. He left us with a good knowledge of the subway system, some NYC history and a better lay of the land. He also emailed us «Max’s List,» his picks for all things NYC; food, bars, music venues, bookstores, jazz clubs, comedy clubs, museums, off-​Broadway shows, many suggestions with web links and additional info.
Thanks Max, and thanks Real New York Tours!

Aaron was an amazing tour guide. Funny. Knowledgeable. Inspirational. Never thought a 6 – 7 hour walking tour of NYC would be the highlight of our trip. Would highly recommend as one of your first adventures prior to heading out into The Big Apple!

Aaron is funny and super knowledgable. Really cool personality who happened to know a bunch of people just roaming around the city.
Very glad to have picked a walking tour over a bus tour. Can’t think of a better way to get a feel of the city on my first trip to NYC.

Jimmy! What a guy :-D Very funny and friendly, knowledgeable and great at story telling while injecting some historical learning into the mix. He walks and talks fast, so keep up and pay attention. I wouldn’t bring little kids on this tour since it’s pretty long with a lot of walking, but if they do good with those two elements they will have a blast seeing all of the sights that are covered by this comprehensive tour. It’s truly a bargain value experience, so make sure you tip well! Also, bring cash for the White Horse because they don’t take credit card.
Thanks for everything! This was a very memorable tour.

Today we had a six hour walking tour with Greg!!! It was a great day! He had so much information about NYC and took us to Soho, Little Italy, China Town, Central Park, and more! He taught us to manage the subway, he had so many detailed stories of the history of New York City, and made it fun too! Not just an average historical type tour!!!
We ask a million questions and we got a million and one answers. Plus he took us to a hand made candy store and an awesome cheesecake place.
I would recommend this tour to anyone but especially first timers because we have a decent understanding of where everything is now and also how to get around!
Thank you Greg for a fun, entertaining adventure full of facts and a little exercise!!!

There’s a good reason this tour is rated #1 on trip advisor. We took the three hour tour with JIMMY and were so beyond blown away by his vast NYC knowledge and the early history that sculpted this great city.
Jimmy, truly delightful to get to know you. Thank you!

Highly recommend the Dozen Apples walking tour! It’s about 6 ½ hours, but really worth it! Plan to take this tour at the beginning of your stay in NYC so that you can learn how to use the subway. Also you will see so many areas of the city which will help you decide where you want to return later in your trip! Wear comfy clothes and walking shoes! You will be mostly walking, and I think we hopped on the subway two or three times! Nathan was our guide and he was awesome. Lots of interesting info. We saw China Town, Little Italy, Greenwich Village, St Paul’s next to World Trade, SoHo, Financial District, Central Park and John Lennon’s memorial, Times Square… So many things!

It was my first time in New York and while comparing tour companies, I couldn’t ignore this company’s 5 star rating to the depressing ratings of the bus tours. So, my dad, nephew, and I booked the 3-​hour public tour. In the rain, Jimmy met us and informed us that we were getting the private tour at the public price since we were the only ones who signed up. It was fabulous! This company is all about customer service!
I easily could have done another 3 hours with Jimmy. The old federal building is his happy place, so if you’re into history, he’s definitely the tour guide for you! But, we learned a lot of fun facts about New York besides the historical ones. We also received personal recommendations of restaurants and other sites to visit while in the city. There were food/​drink/​potty breaks. Jimmy took us to a restaurant after we chose the cuisine where we met the owner and were seated personally by him. People around the city know Jimmy and it was like being a New Yorker without living there.
There is a lot of walking to this tour. Be prepared to move, but if you’re a little slower like we may have been, you just won’t see as much. But, I promise you won’t feel deprived!
Be aware that the company’s phone number is the owner’s cell phone. So, if you’re calling at odd hours because of your location, you may be rousing the owner out of bed. Regardless, he is as nice as can be! Honestly, the company’s slogan could be «When you’re with us, you’re family!» Super experience and I’d do it again in a heartbeat!

I took the Downtown Dozen tour in May 2014. It was fantastic. There was only three of us; practically a private tour! We toured all the areas listed and then some… we were having a great time and the tour just kept going into overtime… it was almost four hours long!
Our guide was David. He was wonderful; funny, friendly and knowledgeable. He was full of trivia about the different neighborhoods; it was obvious that he grew up in New York, loved his city and his job. He was very perceptive to our interests and focused on areas/​subjects we seemed interested in. He gave us restaurant recommendations, tips for using the subway and touring other parts of the city and even hailed a cab for us at the end!
This is definitely the best way to see the city… on foot, and in a small group, you see things and learn facts that you wouldn’t on a big bus catering to a wide general population. This tour is pretty much individualized to the group’s interest. Everything ran smoothly, on time, there were plenty of popping into cafes for a treat and bathroom breaks. We covered a lot of ground and David said they can even customize tours to areas you’d prefer to see. This is obviously a small, family-​run business that aims to please!
Booking the tour was easy; they provided quick email response and answered the phone right away when I had a question.
Overall, I’d give them a 4.5 star rating, taking off half a star because sometimes David walked a little fast and dodged crowds forcefully like a true New Yorker, which made it a little difficult to keep up with him.
I highly recommend Real New York Tours!