Hahaha kinda wish we could! Yes, I am going to U o M. I'm either going to live Northeast or Uptown. I'm actually originally from Wisconsin so I'm somewhat familiar with the area.
For apartments in NYC... all the leasing happens super last minute. It's difficult to sign an apartment more than a month ahead of time. If you do Columbia, I really like the Upperwest side neighborhood. Popular neighborhood for ppl in 20's are lower east side, east village, murray hill, gramercy--these are all on the east side though and would make the commute to Columbia campus difficult. So I would just stick to upper west side. It is such a nice neighborhood (you'll feel like you're living sex in the city)!!
For SUNY Downstate...I'm not sure. This place is deep in Brooklyn and I think the surrounding area is pretty rough. I think you would want to commute to school a little ways if you go here but not sure. Maybe theres like a cluster of student apts around the school? If you want to live in Manhattan, Fidi is like a 30 min commute and one of the more affordable neighborhoods to live in in Manhattan, so it has a lot of young professionals.
Hope that helped!