New York City Mayor Mamdani made a high-profile announcement on Wednesday (May 27) of a massive housing plan, vowing to use municipal resources to “eliminate negligent landlords” and transfer ownership of “long-term neglected buildings” to tenants or responsible trustees such as non-profit organizations. However, real estate non-profit organizations and industry insiders have told the New York Post that this initiative, called “Fix the City,” is essentially just a rehash of failed old policies in New York since the 1970s, which could potentially permanently shift a huge financial mess onto taxpayers.
The primary mechanism of Mayor Mamdani’s plan is to initiate an obscure “7A program” through housing courts, where judges appoint non-profit organizations to take over poorly managed properties from landlords. Additionally, the plan strongly promotes the “Housing Development Fund Corporation (HDFC)” project, aiming to convert more buildings into “Affordable Co-ops” owned and operated collectively by residents, thereby increasing homeownership rates in New York City.
However, a former Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) insider poured cold water on this, noting that the city has long sought to help tenants become owners, but tenants lack the professional skills needed to manage an entire building. They need to understand accounting, and must also collect rent from neighbors, which is very challenging.
Data shows that there are currently about 1,100 such cooperative apartments in New York City, but an investigation by State Attorney General Letitia James last year revealed that the vast majority are considered “high-risk.” These buildings commonly face issues such as delayed rent collection, tax arrears, high debt levels, and serious building code violations, prompting the State Attorney General’s office and former Mayor Adams to urgently allocate $750,000 in “blood transfusion” relief last September.
Mamdani also called for the controversial Community Opportunity to Purchase Act (COPA), which would grant non-profit organizations the priority to purchase distressed buildings. This COPA bill was vetoed by former Mayor Adams last year.
In reality, non-profit housing organizations in New York are already mired in difficulties. A report by the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development (ANHD) in February warned that out of the 290,000 units of subsidized housing operated by non-profits in the city, their financial situation is unsustainable, with costs rising and incomes stagnating, making it nearly impossible to sustain without major government funding.
Kenny Burgos, CEO of the New York Apartment Association (NYAA), vehemently criticized this, accusing the mayor of resorting to “failed solutions that cannot solve current problems” to indirectly seek more government subsidies. Burgos bluntly stated that the rent received cannot cover costs, and simply changing ownership would permanently shift the financial burden to taxpayers.
Humberto Lopes, representing the newly formed Gotham Housing Alliance, stated that the mayor should first address the nearly collapsing New York City public housing system (NYCHA), likening the government’s actions to a dictator seizing private property from the people and transferring it to others.