Going to da Big'apple

This summer, BF and I have decided to plan a little trip to New York city.

I was pretty excited to go, because first of all, the last time I went, I was about ten years old, and the only thing we visited was the Jehovah's Witnesses head quarters in Brooklyn...and this, my friends, is a depressing thought.
I also can't wait to see all the museums (Sex Museum??! Why don't we have this here??), and to climb the Statue of Liberty, Empire State building, etc.

Madame Tussaud's wax museum, and the many possibilities of photographic immaturity it offers is making me giggle like a mad thing.
I mean, you KNOW I'm gonna pose near Johnny Depp!
Why they don't have Ewan McGregor anywhere is beyond me! Same for Bjork and Tori Amos. Scandalous!

I don't think my little brother knows about Madame's museum...so it will be pretty easy to make him believe that I met Will Smith (his favorite actor/singer ever) in NYC. I could also tell him that I met Britney or Christina Aguilera there, and have a photo of myself grabbing a few breasts for him....oooh, the possibilities.

More seriously, we still don't know what we'll do about sleeping. We could just you know...not sleep. But in case we are sissies and end up not being though enough not to sleep....is there a way to have a hotel or motel that is under 200$ a night in the city?
We still have the camping option, or the sleeping in the car option, and either would be fine, but both also bring a few complications. I don't think there are many camping in central NY....ha!
So there would be a lot of commuting between New Jersey and NYC, and also thousands of precious minutes lost...what to do...?