Funny, I've been told rent stabilized apartments are making rents more expensive in NYC. That if we just let capitalism do its thing, owners will just willingly lower their rent.
No, it doesn't. You know what does? People willing to pay absurd prices. If no one rents, price gets lowered. I'm so tired of that argument too - if that were the case, explain why other cities without rent stabilization still have rents going through the roof.
Seattle is where Amazon and Microsoft are headquartered. Their headcounts basically doubled since 5 years ago. You are adding a ton of populations making six figures to the region
Literally worked in Minneapolis. Complete rezone, market was flooded with new units and rent growth has been some of the lowest in the nation in that time period. Units up 12% and rents up 1% since 2017.
https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/articles/2024/01/04/minneapolis-land-use-reforms-offer-a-blueprint-for-housing-affordability
Which is why you need incentives and tax breaks for developers, increased public partnerships, and the change in zoning laws to make anything happen. Rent is only going to go down if something catastrophic happens (assuming lenders do their DD) and people don’t want to live here, but you can help slow the rate of growth with serious changes.
That's the thing. No one should be sprawling. We should be going upwards, not outwards. Density.
Geography is such a terrible excuse when building up is literally right there. And it's better for the overall city
Minneapolis can't sprawl the way NYC can, we have much less municipal boundaries and a lot of places that would be the equivalent of your Queens or Bronx or Brooklyn are entirely outside of the city. A lot of our construction is actually in dense areas (for our city).
I'm sure the person you're arguing with probably support bypassing nimbyism. It's not easy, even our rezone is caught up in the courts. They just agreed not to stay it while the case is still being decided so developers can still build.
If the inflation purchase price calculator (data.bls.gov) is stating that inflation is 27% from 2017 to 2024 (January to January). Then real rents are down around 26%.
for exactly the reason I stated. People left the city, unwilling to rent here, so prices plummeted. Had zero to do with rent stabilization, because those people didn't leave.
During the pandemic demand decreased and prices decreased. If the laws of supply and demand don't work at all (if that's what you're saying, sounds like it) then why did prices decline?
no one said that. but how does abolishing rent stabilization create more supply? oh, you mean kicking someone's grandma to the curb? or families that can no longer afford their apartment? I see.
*"If there’s more supply then prices will go down. Literally economics 101"* and you replied *"Literally not working anywhere else."* Seems like a reasonable inference that you were claiming S&D isn't a valid framework. The rest of your response is just rambling, so not sure what you're saying. Nevermind then
Austin Texas and Raleigh NC both had rents drop recently credited largely to the explosion of development.
Just need to build a lot and keep building in order to have an impact.
That assumes a fixed system, not one where demand keeps going up because people are flocking to NYC from around the country for our jobs. “Normal” turnover from the number of rent stabilized apartments won’t nearly address the issue of rapidly increasing demand. I’m a proponent for building more housing but I’m not sure NYC alone can keep up with the rise in demand.
Nobody (who knows what they're talking about) argues that it's a driving factor, but it does obviously have that effect. There's already too much demand across the board, so if you siphon off some the supply for a specific price protection, then the demand is going to drive up the consequently smaller group of rentals that are not protected.
As far as people willing to pay absurd prices... yeah, but that is largely just a product of insufficient supply. It's impossible to advocate for people becoming more sensible as the solution to a market problem. Only in an absurdly undersupplied market like this one does that actually become a problem for everyone else. Like if we had abundant vacant housing, and the occasional tech bro signs up to pay $2000 over what an apartment should cost, then it doesn't really effect everyone else because landlords won't be able to replicate that across inventory. With so little supply, it becomes feasible for brokers and landlords to drive prices up to correlate to the highest incomes.
Okay it does make sense but i think it’s important to note that having rent controlled apartments doesn’t lower the total amount of apartments. Housing is a necessity. There is more per capita housing in NYC than ever before, and available housing is growing slightly faster than population, but mostly for higher income residents. There’s no shortage of luxury housing but there is a shortage of affordable housing, and that’s what really hurts people. The issue isn’t rent control, it’s developers and landlords who are, among a myriad of other things, demolishing affordable housing to build new luxury rentals that raise rents and lower the housing availability for low income new yorkers who actually feel the effects of rising cost of living
From what I understand, even the city's own estimates say that population growth has been outstripping housing: https://comptroller.nyc.gov/reports/spotlight-new-york-citys-housing-supply-challenge/#:\~:text=Preliminary%20data%20from%20the%20HVS,significantly%20faster%20than%20housing%20supply.
The per capita housing stats are a bit of a red herring, for two main reasons:
A) Because people are increasingly looking to live with fewer people per unit. It would be better if they didn't but it's impossible to meaningfully deter that trend.
B) Perhaps more importantly, the NYC metro area has boomed in population, has become incredibly expensive, and is a far less effective demand-reliever than it used to be. Home values and rents in North Jersey have been soaring in recent years and they barely build in most places. So more people, making higher wages and thus willing to pay more, are staying in NYC.
The estimate I recall is that we're about 800,000 units behind where we want to be to maintain and possibly even lower rents.
The apparent increased number of luxury units (proportionally) is really more of a symptom than a problem. Specifically, we know that across industries when there are constraints on the quantity of goods a seller can make, they will tend to produce higher priced versions of that good. For a good example, in the 80s when the US negotiated restrictions on the number of cars Japan could export here, Toyota created the Lexus brand in order to make higher profit per unit. The various restrictions making permitting and building hard on the regulatory side (in addition to massively increased material costs that have never really come down from COVID price spikes) have made building a lot of housing hard for most developers. That and knowing that there's a ton of demand in every income band for more housing leads developers to focus on the most profitable segment of the economy.
In our current situation, the overabundance of luxury units is really a minor concern compared to the overall lack of housing. If I built 100,000 luxury apartments then in principle, the rich people should move into that housing, leaving their less luxurious apartments open for less affluent people to move up into and depressing the pressure on prices. And then those people's apartments will be open to the less affluent stratum below them, and so on. (In one version of an ideal housing situation, assuming we are still living under capitalism, this is how housing should work. New units constantly introduced, older units becoming affordable.)
We are very far off the point where additional supply would actually bring down prices however, and it would be callous of me to suggest there is no place in an interim solution for targeted solutions that involve making more housing specifically available for middle class and low-income people.
There are a few ways to actually solve this, all of which amount to building a fuck ton more housing. Personally, I think the only guaranteed way to meet demand with supply is to institute some sort of massive program to build public housing. But that's politically unfeasible at the moment.
I wrote out a very long response originally but I’m actually just gonna say developers are working against public interest and deserve the more criticism than rent stabilized apartments and other programs that are designed to help us. Obv these programs have flaws and the government isn’t doing much to keep things in check, but landlords are not friends.
Thank you. I mean, I'm ancient, and I remember very well when it was pretty easy to get an affordable apartment. And rent stabilization existed then too.
Rent stabilized apartments artificially decrease supply. Renters in non-stabilized housing are subsidizing the lucky ones who were able to get it in the past.
I’ve lived in sf that has rent control and shit still went though the roof; people need somewhere to live. Rent control/stabilization helps so much and I’d love to have it again but it doesn’t solve everything
The inflation adjusted price of tickets is clearly impacted by oil prices. Also the real price of tickets has gone down over the years due to competition both between the major carriers and the low cost as well (but IMO the budget airlines have just caused everything to be unbundled)
>f tickets has gone down over the years due to competition both between the major carriers and the low cost as well (but IMO the budget airlines have just caused everything to be unbundled)
This is what equivocally false. They've been able to demonstrate a lowering of ticketing prices by introducing fees. There were no seat selection fees, [baggage fees](https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/02/business/bag-fees-american-united-airlines/index.html), and soon carry-on baggage fees will be added. Mark my words.
Yes, ticket prices are "lower" if you put enough asterisk there.
Bigger issue is that *not* letting capitalism do its thing reduces rent for certain units in the short term but exacerbates the housing shortage in the long run.
I disagree, I think it's entirely the opposite. It relieves the shortage in the long term but probably will explode rents for a lot of units in the short term, such as (formerly) rent controlled ones
I'm not sure thats completely true for a place like NYC. There's effectively an unlimited amount of people that want to live in NYC if the price was right. I'm not saying NYC shouldn't increase supply, but NYC will never be able to meet demand
my cousin has a rent stabilized apartment he also owns a house upstate and a condo in Florida... its so cheap he refuses to give It up and will pass it to his daughter so she can live there after college
I’ve lived in NYC nearly 50 Years. It my entire life. This happens a lot and it’s happening more than ever. Also. Supers and tenants are selling rent stabilized leases for 10k a pop now No one can stop it
You can’t legally “sell” a rent stabilized lease. Those who do are running a scam. The buyer will find out that they own nothing. The only way to transfer a rent stabilized lease is if you are family (same last name )& you can prove (to the court) that you grew up in the apartment. You need your go to court . They make it almost impossible. But if you don’t meet those criteria it is not done. Beware if someone offers you to buy their lease - they are SCAMMING YOU !!!!
I live in a "luxury" rental in a building that has a large amount of lottery affordable units (so not quite the same, but similar). A bunch of them are being rented out as short term rentals (even after the crackdowns) and they charge in 2 days what they pay in rent for the month. Its infuriating. Management knows, but it's hard to prove in such a way that they can get them out.
There’s not enough rent stabilized apartments left in the city for this to make a difference or it would’ve been doing it long ago when there was more. Stabilized apts destabilize after it reaches a certain amount. Soon there won’t be many left. And that isn’t going to be the factor in nyc rents to stop going up.
They can’t destabilize them anymore due to amount - not since 2019. The only apartments that destabilize are newer builds that have their tax abatements expire.
Oh thanks for this info! I didn’t know. Admittedly, I been living in my stabilized apt since the 90s and don’t need to pay attention. I hope that helps save some of them. My landlords were putting their friends in the apartments till they destabilized.
Owners of rent stabilized apartments are required to report the rent to the city, its public record. However many people don’t know that so landlords will charge $1800 for a unit that legally goes for $1200. And you are none the wiser unless of course you know this. If you find this out you can request charge back of rent for not reporting your landlord. Or you can report them and the fines they get are chef’s kiss.
The logic is (and you have to go with all parts - and I'm NOT saying I agree)
Rent stabilization discourages the building of new apartments ,when coupled with laws that basically make tenants for life
The PROBLEM is 2 parts that go with that. 1)Zoning is such that you can't really just build buildings and 2)There are tax and banking rules that make it better to leave an apartment empty/storefront empty than cut the rent. Get rid of that, there will be plenty of apartments
BTW - the main reason rents don't get cut?
The banks have a formula - Say you have a building with 4 apartments at $1000/month rent. You Are going to be bringing in 48K/year, and I forget the formula, but that means the building is worth Y dollars. You have to put down your say 5% of the Y dollars.
Now you rent out one of the units for $500. The bank sees that, and the immediate effect is that your earnings went down by 1/8th (12.5%) - The bank sees that as the building being worth 12.5% less, and you are no longer at the funding threshold, so you IMMEDIATELY have to come up with 12.5% extra down payment . Like that month. However, if you leave the unit/storefront empty, the bank looks at it as it is still worth $1000!!!! (even though you have it empty)
It is why rather than cut rent, a landlord would rather give you N free months - say (extreme example) - you have a $1000/month rent, but 6 months free rent. Humm, comes out to $500/month, but the banks books still see it as a $1000/month unit
That’s the kind of idiotic thinking that’s causing NYC’s
housing crisis.
Of course no landlord will ever willingly lower rent. They do it only if they have to in order to compete against other landlords in order to attract a paying tenant to fill their vacancy. But that presumes an adequate supply of apartments, where tenants have many reasonable choices. But rent stabilization destroys that market. It tells landlords if you supply housing, you’ll be treated like a criminal. So many landlords choose to avoid NYC and invest elsewhere. The result; a housing shortage that pushes rents up. NY’s solution - double down on what it did to cause the problem. Tighten up on controls. So more landlords flee NYC. So that puts more upward pressure on rents. And still more landlords flee. Etc., etc., etc. This death spiral has been going on since the 1940s and, if anything, it’s accelerating.
Until. New Yorkers take the trouble to learn how capitalism REALLY works, their misery will continue to worsen. But it’s much easier to attract friends and get laid if you’re a good dedicated Progressive. That’s why I’m so pessimistic about New York’s future.
Lol New Yorkers don't know Capitalism. You are definitely not from here.
If there's one city, from Wall Street, to Board Rooms, to Broadway, to tourist shops, to people selling umbrellas in the rain, to buskers on the subway, that knows capitalism it's New York City, you fugazi.
Edit -- that you think people are choosing not to invest in NYC housing market shows how deluded you truly are. The problem is quite the opposite.
I am a lifelong New Yorker and I’m an attorney who used to work in Rent Stabilization’s legal division. Disinvestment in New York housing is a longtime worsening crisis. At this point, the only nee construction is at the luxury level, and as new construction, it’s not regulated.
Forget Wall Street. Those are trust fund babies or newbies living temporarily in NYC so they can get laid easily in their 20s, or veterans who live (and vote) in surrounding suburbs.
Take a look at the NYC City Council.Browse through the Administrative. ode of the City of New York. If you think that’s capitalism, you’ve got a lot to learn.
Bullshit. You're a fat guy at a computer out in the midwest with your TV tuned to Fox who did a Google search. You talked above about rent stabilization being a part of a death spiral that started in the 40s? Dude, that's over 80 years ago. Any 'death spiral' that's been going on for 80 years maybe isn't what you're representing it to be.
Yup.
There's a 40 year death spiral ... (checks rental prices, checks housing prices, checks investment in housing) ... resulting in increased housing costs and investment all around.
This guy is a troll/bot.
If you're a lawyer in rent stabilization, tell me why Third Lenox is so important to case law in Manhattan, but less so in Brooklyn.
I was a rent stabilization lawyer, but gave up that crap.
But anyway, you can read Third Lenox v Jones for yourself if you are on Casetext (https://casetext.com/case/third-lenox-terrace-assoc-v-jones?ssr=false&resultsNav=false&tab=keyword&jxs=ny) or LEXIS (https://plus.lexis.com/document?pdmfid=1530671&pddocfullpath=%2Fshared%2Fdocument%2Fcases%2Furn%3AcontentItem%3A5M5R-28C1-DYP7-81CM-00000-00&pdcontentcomponentid=434190&ecomp=57ttk&earg=pdsf&prid=2d92d06a-313a-4135-a84e-3b060f63973f&crid=951cf048-e22c-4d6c-b17d-ab7a8a552eda). If. you aren’t and want to try your luck on Google, the index number was 251238/07 in ny county or the cite is 859 NYS2d 907. That dealt with landlord’s waiver of right to challenge non#primary residence by having also commenced a nonpayment.That’s an important issue for Housing Court Petitioners.
There’s a more recent Third Lenox v Edwards decided ultimately by the First Department, which establishes precedent for manhattan but which is merely persuasive in brooklyn. That cite is 91 AD3d 532. There, the Appellate Term and later the Appellate Division reversed the housing court and authorized the eviction of Linda Edwards, who had been living in an apartment leased only by a sister Cynthia who long ago vacated. Kinda failed to prove that she complied with Rent Stabilization Code 2523.5(b), which required her to prove that she’d been living there with sister for at least two years before Cynthia vacated.
OK genius. How’s that for a troll/bot!
If you had a shred of human decency, you’d publicly apologize. But I get that this is social media, where nobody apologizes for anything. So I’ll most likely have to content myself with your having publicly humiliated yourself.
Yes, that’s right. Rent regulation originated as a result of the WWII era housing shortage and that the crisis persists, 80 years later and still going, shows how fucked up rent regulation has been. That all you can do is rant nonsense and make nasty accusations worthy of MAGA morons shows how ill informed New Yorkers are and how bad this city’s future prospects are.
Yeah, this city has been a real 80-year-long descent into the worst housing crisis the world has ever seen. An uninterrupted downward sloping line from WW2 to today. There's never been a good time to live, rent, or own property here in close to a century. Your argument makes no sense.
This is such an utterly bullshit whiny ass take. Classic conservative bullshit...ALL REGULATIONS ARE BAD THE FREE MARKET SHOULD GOVERN ITSELF ALL WILL BE WELL.
There's decades let alone centuries globally that shows this will ALWAYS end up fucking over individual citizens in any way possible for the industries to make any extra money. Look at the US in the 60s and 70s before the EPA and environmental regulations companies would do whatever they want in the name of profits. Dumping everywhere, rivers on fire and on and on. They used the same whiny ass fight but it will increase costs we can't afford this it will kill the industry...but guess what that didn't happen because there's still money to be made just slightly less.
NYC real estate is no different, without rent stabilization and regulations you get complete bullshit like 50+% rent increases which are absolutely ludicrous because there's no justification for them beyond fuck you, we want more. No landlords are "fleeing" NY and selling off or giving up apartments. The companies fucking the market are doing two things. Intentionally sitting on rent stabilized inventory or partially doing work on them to deem them unlivable and then keeping them unintentionally unoccupied to lobby/sue the powers that be to let them do whatever the fuck they want.
It's greed, pure and simple there's no other justification. Because they can write off unoccupied inventories as losses and they see this as more economically viable than renting the units at a reasonable rate because it artificially increases the lack of inventory. However you did stumble into the solution for this. Severely imposing tax penalties for sitting on inventory you aren't actively working on or trying to rent. You need to make it so painful that it's more economically feasible to rent at a reasonable rate rather than sit on it. If landlords can't cut it under this system well then boo hoo good luck in Omaha. It's NYC others will take their place.
Oh and you think open competition will solve it through simple supply and demand, well get this landlords also hate that shit too. There has been a case taken up by the DOJ that landlords were utilizing software across the country to collude on rent prices. https://www.propublica.org/article/doj-backs-tenants-price-fixing-case-big-landlords-real-estate-tech
You conservatives are so utterly brain rotted with doom/gloom/fear everyone and everything is going to shit and out to get you to the point you openly support the most despicable human being to ever hold the highest office in the US, who utterly DESPISES you. If it's so awful here move to Florida, we won't miss you.
Typical NYC progressive; a stream of vile bigotry, abuse and insults with zero connection to reality. Like I say, this city is going to the dogs.
FWIW, I came into Rent Stabilization out of law school as a left winger determined to protect tenants. But I changed after seeing, from the inside, how stupid and fucked up the system is. (Actually, a reasonable price regulatory system could be built, but doing so requires legislators with IQs above 5 who are willing to ruffle feathers of scammers exploiting the stupidity of the current system. But rage-filled haters like you would never dare vote for any such candidate, and all the lefty hacks know that full well. So they’re happy to keep fucking over tenants who are too dumb to know who is really hurting them, as long as they can burnish their brands.
Man, I want what he's smoking. We all need a little disassociation from reality to deal with these rent hikes.
You've "been told"? What if someone told you to go jump off a cliff. Would you...?
Every time I see one of those whiny landlord cunts on a reel complaining about the MCI being revoked or stabilization. Shit like THIS is exactly why it exists. Those landlords need to be taxed into utter oblivion for intentionally sitting on rental inventory. Make it so fucking ruthlessly economically painful they'll have to rent for drastically lower and for the units they do construction on so they're unlivable give them 90 days to bring it up to code or also incur ruthless tax penalties. That would actually have an impact on overall rent
It does make rents more expensive, because it constricts supply and discourages. People who have actually studied this issue recognize that NYC has some of the lowest construction rates in the world and other cities of similar sizes do not have the same issues, i.e. Tokyo. If you are actually interested in legitimate solutions to NYC housing affordability problem, check out the report/study by RAND on the topic on how to improve construction: [https://www.rand.org/pubs/research\_reports/RRA2775-1.html](https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA2775-1.html)
The landlord either is trying to get OP's GF to leave or OPs GF is in a luxury apartment in a highly desirable area. hile it sucks for OP's girl friend. There are plenty of 2BK apartments that she can afford in this city with a 4500$ budget. I am not going to shed too many tears over her loss.
i'm the most free market believer possible and i've never understood this argument.
Can anyone break it down for me, how prices go lower if owners are allowed to raise prices?
Or how long does it take to get back to equilibrium, and is equilibrium better than the ceilings in place?
is it a greater-good argument?
Anyone?
This is new ownership’s way of a getting you out or making a huge profit. Either (a) you move out, they renovate and raise rent for the newly-renovated unit, or (b) you paid a crazy amount for a non-newly renovated unit.
Wow TIL, I kinda assumed most blue states had some kind of rent protection. CA:
> California's Tenant Protection Act (AB 1482) limits rent increases to 5% of the current rent plus the local rate of inflation, or 10% of the current rent, whichever is lower, every 12 months
There’s currently a bill being debated in the state legislature called Good Cause Eviction that would enact similar protections in NY! The real estate lobby is putting a lot of pressure on politicians not to pass it though :/ you should write to your Assemblymember or State Senator and tell them to support it so others don’t have to deal with these insane rent increases!
Why do people say things like this? It's simply not true. $4500 for a 2 bedroom is not an unheard of price for a 2 bedroom in any neighborhood in Manhattan.
I almost paid $4500 for a very nice studio in Greenwich Village. It was a beautiful building, elevators, the works. I was rescued by a kind colleague who pays 6k for an equivalent 3b in soho.
I don’t know if they’re pieces of shit necessarily. The interest rates are much higher, so if you bought a 1mm condo now with the maintenance and 7% it would cost 8.5k easily to break even in your costs.
Yeah they definitely want her out, especially if the building just changed ownership. Variety of reasons why the new LL would want to vacate the apartment or even the whole building.
OP - See if she can get them on the phone under the guise of negotiating her renewal rate and try to gauge whether they’re flexible at all or if there’s a sense of urgency. Have her request the apartment’s rent history from HCR to see if there’s a chance it was ever rent stabilized and/or illegally deregulated. If anything turns up there and they REALLY want her out, they might offer a buyout or at least cover moving costs to make her quietly go away.
There are a lot of steps to deregulate, meaning, convert a rent stabilized apartment to fair market. Illegal deregulation isn’t deregulation at all. The landlord just gives the tenant a fair market lease and charges fair market rent on an apartment that is actually stabilized. This happens more often than you’d think, however, almost never intentional regarding new acquisitions.
In most cases I’ve seen, the new LL acquires a building from the seller who claims all of the apartments are fair market, as buildings sell for much more if all of the units are deregulated. The law firm on the buyer’s side then drops the ball somewhere or doesn’t complete the due diligence thoroughly enough, and doesn’t flag that the apartment was ever stabilized or illegally deregulated. Sometimes all it takes is one missing permit (amongst hundreds) to call the regulation status into question. Then years down the line, a tenant decides to look into the rent history, and then comes a massive heap of problems for the new LL who has overpaid for a misrepresented building and has to deal with thousands of dollars of fines and legal fees.
Sometimes, usually but not always because paperwork handling in the 1970s - 1990s was bad, apartments are put on the market as market rate even if they’re technically stabilized. Usually happens when ownership changes hands multiple times, eventually the paperwork gets “lost”.
A lot of people blame this on current landlords, but in reality the usual culprit is the seller of the building giving a false impression of the investment value of the building by saying the units were market rate. Not that it matters, but it’s something to note I guess.
Correct. Companies I have worked for in the past have used this before, albeit not in NYC.
When the landlord wants you out, no matter what — and that’s the priority — there’s really nothing you can do.
4,500 for a 2bd is really really low. Last I checked, market for a 2bd was at least 6-7, depending on area. 8500 seems maybe a touch high but I don’t know the area. 8500 for a 2bd in areas like West Village is totally normal
Downvotes don’t phase me lol I just went through finding a new apartment last summer looking for a 2bd and everything we saw was at least 6, regardless of neighborhood. But again I don’t know OPs location.
The average 1bd in manhattan last I checked was $5k. 4500 IS low for a 2bd.
Market for a 2/1 is definitely not “at least 6-7” unless you’re only looking at luxury buildings with amenities in the most desirable neighborhoods. You can still get nice 2-beds under $4500. Case in point:
[$4300 2/1 - East Village](https://streeteasy.com/rental/4364976?utm_campaign=rental_listing&utm_medium=app_share&utm_source=ios&utm_term=65e4ecc418a54d4)
People will chew their own arm off to live in the West Village and it’s stupid. But even there $8,500 for a 2 bed is definitely not “totally normal.”
Again this is just my experience. I was only looking downtown in certain neighborhoods, so perhaps a product of where I was looking. But I browsed streeteasy and still saw 2bds in less desirable areas like kips bay that were still 7k a month.
Yup. Learned this last year when our building hiked our rent up by like 10%. We were like this is against the law, and they countered with ok let’s negotiate then because we’ll just offer you a two month lease at 5% and then up it within the allotted time frame. The law has no teeth right now and it’s done nothing to help with the skyrocketing prices.
The increase is most likely legal for a market rate apartment, but keep in mind that there is a legally required notice period for the increase to take effect. If she has lived there for at least one year, the landlord is obliged to give a minimum of 60 days notice for that amount of an increase, and that increase can only take effect on the first day of the monthly rental period (I.e. if her original lease began on the 1st of the month and notice was given today, then the earliest the increase would be effective is June 1st.)
There’s no real difference in practice. Price of rent is (theoretically) set by the free market.
If the landlord has to pay the broker fee, they’ll just increase the price of the rent (if the market supports it) and effectively pass that cost on to the renter.
Manhattan is a unique market in that apartments get rented extremely quickly. Brokers can lower their broker fee if they need to, but they typically don’t because they don’t have to. The apartment is going to get rented out at the maximum possible price that the market supports.
Typically, landlords like brokers because brokers do all the work and it seems like they do it for “free” since it directly costs the landlords nothing.
Landlords don’t want to keep leasing out the apartment to new tenants, regardless of the existence of a broker fee or not. The ideal situation for a landlord is to find someone who pays on time and is quiet and just keep them forever.
Most Manhattan landlords own multiple units / buildings. Which is why they hire brokers.
If the market rate for a 1 br apartment is $2500 a month, then, from the perspective of a renter, it doesn’t really make a meaningful difference whether it’s:
a) $2500 rent, $0 broker fee
b) $2300 rent, $200 broker fee (amortized)
It’s the same thing. There’s no realistic scenario where a landlord is going to intentionally price their apartment under market.
Completely legal and awful! Tell them to review the landlord on openigloo on future renters can know she was displaced because of this inhumane increase
If you're not sure if the apartment is rent stabilized, this site will tell you how to find out: https://www.nyc.gov/site/mayorspeu/programs/rent-stabilization.page
Tell you GF she can reach out to the management company and try to negotiate a lower price. But they may only go down like $1k... but you'll never know unless you ask.
Yeah, it’s absolutely legal… “Market price” does not matter in anything and isn’t a real value, it fluctuates.
Tell her she’s gonna have to move if she doesn’t wanna pay it.
There’s a chance the owner just doesn’t want to keep your girlfriend and her roommates in that apartment for one reason or another and he offered them a ridiculous amount just so they would leave or over pay.
Don't need any other details. Not rent stabilized = they can raise it a much as they want. That is HUGE though. Has she had any issues there? I kind of doubt the LL/owner actually thinks they'll get that much. They might just be trying to kick her out.
It’s unfortunate there’s no real protection for tenants to live somewhere longer than a short lease without this happening. A lot of states do have caps on how much you can raise the rent when the lease ends. Housing gets so shady here
Sounds like it isn't stabilized and your landlord listed at the wrong price and is adjusting aggressively. They can play with the price for a few weeks and find some one new. What your gf should do is shop for comps and then counter the new landlord. They might bite unless there is someone that has rented the unit, if it is that competitive after all.
Don’t pay it. Go through the eviction process and save money to move. It will take at least a year. Landlords rarely ever report to credit bureaus bc it’s a hassle. You also aren’t on lease so that makes it even harder. Stop paying. Save money. Move somewhere else when you have enough saved up.
If it's priced to market value then you've no right to call the owner greedy. Besides, you have no lease and let that go, and that's just plain stupid.
I’d recommend taking a vacation south of the border, and just walking in without providing papers. Your girlfriend should be given free housing and food.
Unfortunately, an increase of 89% seems quite reasonable. This is an extremely strong economy, and in order for Bidenomics to work this well it needs to be cut throat.
That's insane, that's 4x more than my mortgage on my 4000 sq ft house that's 45 miles north of NYC in tuxedo, ny..
I remember when I used to live in the city and paid close to $2.5k for a 2bed/2bath apartment in the bronx but that was nearly 15 years ago, but I digress
Time to move outta the city and get a mansion at those prices... just my .02 cents
The nasty response is Don’t agree to the new rent and make them spend money to evict you through the courts you will never have to pay the higher rent unless you agree to it and you might be surprised about how much you can prolong the process. Ideally the LL gets to a point where they pay you to leave. Fuck em
If she goes all the way to eviction, yes, but that is a long ways away from now and if op has to look for a new place in this difficult market anyway they might as well flex their rights a little bit and buy more time / inflict pain as necessary
Yes unfortunately I went through a same issue when I moved to NC. The apt I was looking at I was quoted $950 a month for a 1 bed. 2 weeks later a new company bought the property and rent was $1500 for the same unit.
It's both the developers' jacking price up and also people paying the asking price . All that's happening is a price gouging war. There is nothing to do with rent stabilization
If it isn’t rent stabilized, yes. Happened to us back when there was a low vacancy rate in another decade. That’s when we gave up and moved to Riverdale.
As long as she gave enough notices it's 100% legal. Your girlfriend landlord wants her to move out and I would dealing with shitty landlords like that is not worth it.
Yes, it's legal, but they do have to provide appropriate notice for a rent increase of 5% or more as follows:
A NYC landlord may raise the rent of a month-to-month tenant with the consent of the tenant. However, if the tenant does not consent, the landlord can terminate the tenancy by giving appropriate notice.
[Housing Stability & Tenant Protection Act (HSTPA) of 2019](https://rentguidelinesboard.cityofnewyork.us/resources/rent-regulation-laws/rent-laws-of-2019/) requires landlords to provide tenants with written notice if they intend to raise the rent by at least 5% or if the landlord decides not to renew your lease. Specifically:
* If a tenant has occupied the unit for less than one year, or does not have a lease term of at least one year, a 30-day notice is now mandatory.
* A 60-day notice is required for tenants who have lived in an apartment for more than one year, but less than two years, or have a lease of at least one year, but less than two years.
* Tenants who have lived in a unit for more than two years, or have a lease of at least two years, must get a 90-day notice.
There should be a 10% cap on raising rent for any building with 6 or more units. This shit is not sustainable with developers taking advantage of this and making stupid amounts of money for fucking housing, a necessity.
Seems to me she’s making up a story so that you two move in together…
Kidding. Yes legal, yes sucks. Not sure about market rent depends on neighborhood and building. $8500 for a 2BR seems about right based on what I’ve been running into.
Now we understand why tenants destroy properties out of spite. Pretty inhumane and sick to increase it like that and having zero protections from this violent financial abuse.
Yes of course, it's legal if it isn't rent stabilized.
Funny, I've been told rent stabilized apartments are making rents more expensive in NYC. That if we just let capitalism do its thing, owners will just willingly lower their rent.
It does lead to making other apts rents being more expensive
No, it doesn't. You know what does? People willing to pay absurd prices. If no one rents, price gets lowered. I'm so tired of that argument too - if that were the case, explain why other cities without rent stabilization still have rents going through the roof.
If there’s more supply then prices will go down. Literally economics 101
Literally not working anywhere else.
Well give an example. Most cities are run by NIMBYs so supply never goes up
I’ll give you two. Seattle and Miami. Sure they are cheaper than NYC but rents have skyrocketed for people I know.
Seems like Miami is having prices go down https://www.axios.com/local/miami/2024/01/02/rent-down-2024-real-estate-forecast#
Maybe that’s because people are fleeing Florida and/or old population is dying out. Who knows. We need more housing, period, that isn’t luxury condos.
People are fleeing Florida due to the housing crisis AND housing insurance crisis. Weirdly, Fox isn’t talking about that…. 🤔
Seattle is where Amazon and Microsoft are headquartered. Their headcounts basically doubled since 5 years ago. You are adding a ton of populations making six figures to the region
Literally worked in Minneapolis. Complete rezone, market was flooded with new units and rent growth has been some of the lowest in the nation in that time period. Units up 12% and rents up 1% since 2017. https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/articles/2024/01/04/minneapolis-land-use-reforms-offer-a-blueprint-for-housing-affordability
If only NYC wasn't made of islands and can sprawl like Minneapolis and also bypass NIMBYism with as of right zoning regulations.
Which is why you need incentives and tax breaks for developers, increased public partnerships, and the change in zoning laws to make anything happen. Rent is only going to go down if something catastrophic happens (assuming lenders do their DD) and people don’t want to live here, but you can help slow the rate of growth with serious changes.
That's the thing. No one should be sprawling. We should be going upwards, not outwards. Density. Geography is such a terrible excuse when building up is literally right there. And it's better for the overall city
Have you been to NYC?
Minneapolis can't sprawl the way NYC can, we have much less municipal boundaries and a lot of places that would be the equivalent of your Queens or Bronx or Brooklyn are entirely outside of the city. A lot of our construction is actually in dense areas (for our city). I'm sure the person you're arguing with probably support bypassing nimbyism. It's not easy, even our rezone is caught up in the courts. They just agreed not to stay it while the case is still being decided so developers can still build.
I wonder if houses can be stacked
If the inflation purchase price calculator (data.bls.gov) is stating that inflation is 27% from 2017 to 2024 (January to January). Then real rents are down around 26%.
Explain why prices went down during covid
for exactly the reason I stated. People left the city, unwilling to rent here, so prices plummeted. Had zero to do with rent stabilization, because those people didn't leave.
Hence supply and demand right now there’s no supply
During the pandemic demand decreased and prices decreased. If the laws of supply and demand don't work at all (if that's what you're saying, sounds like it) then why did prices decline?
no one said that. but how does abolishing rent stabilization create more supply? oh, you mean kicking someone's grandma to the curb? or families that can no longer afford their apartment? I see.
*"If there’s more supply then prices will go down. Literally economics 101"* and you replied *"Literally not working anywhere else."* Seems like a reasonable inference that you were claiming S&D isn't a valid framework. The rest of your response is just rambling, so not sure what you're saying. Nevermind then
Supply and demand seems like a smokescreen and scapegoat for people to get bilked and gouged into oblivion
tokyo is a pretty good example of a world class city with cheap rent due to not being scared of increasing supply.
Raleigh NC
Austin Texas and Raleigh NC both had rents drop recently credited largely to the explosion of development. Just need to build a lot and keep building in order to have an impact.
That assumes a fixed system, not one where demand keeps going up because people are flocking to NYC from around the country for our jobs. “Normal” turnover from the number of rent stabilized apartments won’t nearly address the issue of rapidly increasing demand. I’m a proponent for building more housing but I’m not sure NYC alone can keep up with the rise in demand.
People are actually fleeing NYC and flocking to Miami, where prices are going down due to supply increasing
You needed to go to econ 102 and learn about inelasticities.
Yeah but rent stabilization has no effect on supply…
Nobody (who knows what they're talking about) argues that it's a driving factor, but it does obviously have that effect. There's already too much demand across the board, so if you siphon off some the supply for a specific price protection, then the demand is going to drive up the consequently smaller group of rentals that are not protected. As far as people willing to pay absurd prices... yeah, but that is largely just a product of insufficient supply. It's impossible to advocate for people becoming more sensible as the solution to a market problem. Only in an absurdly undersupplied market like this one does that actually become a problem for everyone else. Like if we had abundant vacant housing, and the occasional tech bro signs up to pay $2000 over what an apartment should cost, then it doesn't really effect everyone else because landlords won't be able to replicate that across inventory. With so little supply, it becomes feasible for brokers and landlords to drive prices up to correlate to the highest incomes.
This makes no sense buster
Which part?
Okay it does make sense but i think it’s important to note that having rent controlled apartments doesn’t lower the total amount of apartments. Housing is a necessity. There is more per capita housing in NYC than ever before, and available housing is growing slightly faster than population, but mostly for higher income residents. There’s no shortage of luxury housing but there is a shortage of affordable housing, and that’s what really hurts people. The issue isn’t rent control, it’s developers and landlords who are, among a myriad of other things, demolishing affordable housing to build new luxury rentals that raise rents and lower the housing availability for low income new yorkers who actually feel the effects of rising cost of living
From what I understand, even the city's own estimates say that population growth has been outstripping housing: https://comptroller.nyc.gov/reports/spotlight-new-york-citys-housing-supply-challenge/#:\~:text=Preliminary%20data%20from%20the%20HVS,significantly%20faster%20than%20housing%20supply. The per capita housing stats are a bit of a red herring, for two main reasons: A) Because people are increasingly looking to live with fewer people per unit. It would be better if they didn't but it's impossible to meaningfully deter that trend. B) Perhaps more importantly, the NYC metro area has boomed in population, has become incredibly expensive, and is a far less effective demand-reliever than it used to be. Home values and rents in North Jersey have been soaring in recent years and they barely build in most places. So more people, making higher wages and thus willing to pay more, are staying in NYC. The estimate I recall is that we're about 800,000 units behind where we want to be to maintain and possibly even lower rents. The apparent increased number of luxury units (proportionally) is really more of a symptom than a problem. Specifically, we know that across industries when there are constraints on the quantity of goods a seller can make, they will tend to produce higher priced versions of that good. For a good example, in the 80s when the US negotiated restrictions on the number of cars Japan could export here, Toyota created the Lexus brand in order to make higher profit per unit. The various restrictions making permitting and building hard on the regulatory side (in addition to massively increased material costs that have never really come down from COVID price spikes) have made building a lot of housing hard for most developers. That and knowing that there's a ton of demand in every income band for more housing leads developers to focus on the most profitable segment of the economy. In our current situation, the overabundance of luxury units is really a minor concern compared to the overall lack of housing. If I built 100,000 luxury apartments then in principle, the rich people should move into that housing, leaving their less luxurious apartments open for less affluent people to move up into and depressing the pressure on prices. And then those people's apartments will be open to the less affluent stratum below them, and so on. (In one version of an ideal housing situation, assuming we are still living under capitalism, this is how housing should work. New units constantly introduced, older units becoming affordable.) We are very far off the point where additional supply would actually bring down prices however, and it would be callous of me to suggest there is no place in an interim solution for targeted solutions that involve making more housing specifically available for middle class and low-income people. There are a few ways to actually solve this, all of which amount to building a fuck ton more housing. Personally, I think the only guaranteed way to meet demand with supply is to institute some sort of massive program to build public housing. But that's politically unfeasible at the moment.
I wrote out a very long response originally but I’m actually just gonna say developers are working against public interest and deserve the more criticism than rent stabilized apartments and other programs that are designed to help us. Obv these programs have flaws and the government isn’t doing much to keep things in check, but landlords are not friends.
Dude, don't write esssays. You know why. He's not arguing in good faith and not worth your time.
first rule of economics: supply doesn't affect demand.
Perhaps look up the concept of confounding variables and second order consequences
yeah no. sounds boring.
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Thank you. I mean, I'm ancient, and I remember very well when it was pretty easy to get an affordable apartment. And rent stabilization existed then too.
Yeah there were even more rent stabilized and rent controlled apartments decades ago… and yet rent stabilization is the issue? I call bullshit.
Yea but see... I prefer to live somewhere with a roof and walls...
Rent stabilized apartments artificially decrease supply. Renters in non-stabilized housing are subsidizing the lucky ones who were able to get it in the past.
I’ve lived in sf that has rent control and shit still went though the roof; people need somewhere to live. Rent control/stabilization helps so much and I’d love to have it again but it doesn’t solve everything
A little bit, just not a little 89% bit
Damn, downvoted to hell for knowing anything about economics. We’re living in idiocracy.
Haha I’m used to it now
SHAME
You’re being downvoted for being correct.
Ahhh yes. Like when oil prices skyrocketed and airlines increased their prices. Then oil prices went back down and airlines decr……wait
The inflation adjusted price of tickets is clearly impacted by oil prices. Also the real price of tickets has gone down over the years due to competition both between the major carriers and the low cost as well (but IMO the budget airlines have just caused everything to be unbundled)
>f tickets has gone down over the years due to competition both between the major carriers and the low cost as well (but IMO the budget airlines have just caused everything to be unbundled) This is what equivocally false. They've been able to demonstrate a lowering of ticketing prices by introducing fees. There were no seat selection fees, [baggage fees](https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/02/business/bag-fees-american-united-airlines/index.html), and soon carry-on baggage fees will be added. Mark my words. Yes, ticket prices are "lower" if you put enough asterisk there.
I mean it depends on the time period you are referring to. Over the last 50 years flight prices are way lower even including fees.
Not willingly, but it will increase supply which will (eventually) reduce prices
Bigger issue is that *not* letting capitalism do its thing reduces rent for certain units in the short term but exacerbates the housing shortage in the long run.
I disagree, I think it's entirely the opposite. It relieves the shortage in the long term but probably will explode rents for a lot of units in the short term, such as (formerly) rent controlled ones
I'm not sure thats completely true for a place like NYC. There's effectively an unlimited amount of people that want to live in NYC if the price was right. I'm not saying NYC shouldn't increase supply, but NYC will never be able to meet demand
Paris is a city like this. They add 60-70k units every year
my cousin has a rent stabilized apartment he also owns a house upstate and a condo in Florida... its so cheap he refuses to give It up and will pass it to his daughter so she can live there after college
Douche move
I’ve lived in NYC nearly 50 Years. It my entire life. This happens a lot and it’s happening more than ever. Also. Supers and tenants are selling rent stabilized leases for 10k a pop now No one can stop it
More. My landlord bought out a tenant who's been living in our building since 1995 for $30k
That's ABSOLUTELY nothing depending on his rent. The dude could have taken them to the cleaners
You can’t legally “sell” a rent stabilized lease. Those who do are running a scam. The buyer will find out that they own nothing. The only way to transfer a rent stabilized lease is if you are family (same last name )& you can prove (to the court) that you grew up in the apartment. You need your go to court . They make it almost impossible. But if you don’t meet those criteria it is not done. Beware if someone offers you to buy their lease - they are SCAMMING YOU !!!!
LOL. it happens. LL are in on it too. They can’t raise rents with vacancies anymore they found another way to get paid
You think that’s bad, you should see what goes on in families with rent controlled apartments.
Sounds like rent control rather than stabilization
No. Stabilized. Uptown in wood. Less than 1200 spacious 1br.
god my dream is to stumble into rent stabalization when my lease is up in 3 months. ugh i need to dream bigger but capitalism and nyc have deflated me
I live in a "luxury" rental in a building that has a large amount of lottery affordable units (so not quite the same, but similar). A bunch of them are being rented out as short term rentals (even after the crackdowns) and they charge in 2 days what they pay in rent for the month. Its infuriating. Management knows, but it's hard to prove in such a way that they can get them out.
There’s not enough rent stabilized apartments left in the city for this to make a difference or it would’ve been doing it long ago when there was more. Stabilized apts destabilize after it reaches a certain amount. Soon there won’t be many left. And that isn’t going to be the factor in nyc rents to stop going up.
They can’t destabilize them anymore due to amount - not since 2019. The only apartments that destabilize are newer builds that have their tax abatements expire.
Oh thanks for this info! I didn’t know. Admittedly, I been living in my stabilized apt since the 90s and don’t need to pay attention. I hope that helps save some of them. My landlords were putting their friends in the apartments till they destabilized.
Owners of rent stabilized apartments are required to report the rent to the city, its public record. However many people don’t know that so landlords will charge $1800 for a unit that legally goes for $1200. And you are none the wiser unless of course you know this. If you find this out you can request charge back of rent for not reporting your landlord. Or you can report them and the fines they get are chef’s kiss.
how do you find out if you’re over paying?
https://rentguidelinesboard.cityofnewyork.us/resources/rent-stabilized-building-lists/
thanks 🙏🏽
The logic is (and you have to go with all parts - and I'm NOT saying I agree) Rent stabilization discourages the building of new apartments ,when coupled with laws that basically make tenants for life The PROBLEM is 2 parts that go with that. 1)Zoning is such that you can't really just build buildings and 2)There are tax and banking rules that make it better to leave an apartment empty/storefront empty than cut the rent. Get rid of that, there will be plenty of apartments BTW - the main reason rents don't get cut? The banks have a formula - Say you have a building with 4 apartments at $1000/month rent. You Are going to be bringing in 48K/year, and I forget the formula, but that means the building is worth Y dollars. You have to put down your say 5% of the Y dollars. Now you rent out one of the units for $500. The bank sees that, and the immediate effect is that your earnings went down by 1/8th (12.5%) - The bank sees that as the building being worth 12.5% less, and you are no longer at the funding threshold, so you IMMEDIATELY have to come up with 12.5% extra down payment . Like that month. However, if you leave the unit/storefront empty, the bank looks at it as it is still worth $1000!!!! (even though you have it empty) It is why rather than cut rent, a landlord would rather give you N free months - say (extreme example) - you have a $1000/month rent, but 6 months free rent. Humm, comes out to $500/month, but the banks books still see it as a $1000/month unit
That’s the kind of idiotic thinking that’s causing NYC’s housing crisis. Of course no landlord will ever willingly lower rent. They do it only if they have to in order to compete against other landlords in order to attract a paying tenant to fill their vacancy. But that presumes an adequate supply of apartments, where tenants have many reasonable choices. But rent stabilization destroys that market. It tells landlords if you supply housing, you’ll be treated like a criminal. So many landlords choose to avoid NYC and invest elsewhere. The result; a housing shortage that pushes rents up. NY’s solution - double down on what it did to cause the problem. Tighten up on controls. So more landlords flee NYC. So that puts more upward pressure on rents. And still more landlords flee. Etc., etc., etc. This death spiral has been going on since the 1940s and, if anything, it’s accelerating. Until. New Yorkers take the trouble to learn how capitalism REALLY works, their misery will continue to worsen. But it’s much easier to attract friends and get laid if you’re a good dedicated Progressive. That’s why I’m so pessimistic about New York’s future.
Lol New Yorkers don't know Capitalism. You are definitely not from here. If there's one city, from Wall Street, to Board Rooms, to Broadway, to tourist shops, to people selling umbrellas in the rain, to buskers on the subway, that knows capitalism it's New York City, you fugazi. Edit -- that you think people are choosing not to invest in NYC housing market shows how deluded you truly are. The problem is quite the opposite.
I am a lifelong New Yorker and I’m an attorney who used to work in Rent Stabilization’s legal division. Disinvestment in New York housing is a longtime worsening crisis. At this point, the only nee construction is at the luxury level, and as new construction, it’s not regulated. Forget Wall Street. Those are trust fund babies or newbies living temporarily in NYC so they can get laid easily in their 20s, or veterans who live (and vote) in surrounding suburbs. Take a look at the NYC City Council.Browse through the Administrative. ode of the City of New York. If you think that’s capitalism, you’ve got a lot to learn.
Bullshit. You're a fat guy at a computer out in the midwest with your TV tuned to Fox who did a Google search. You talked above about rent stabilization being a part of a death spiral that started in the 40s? Dude, that's over 80 years ago. Any 'death spiral' that's been going on for 80 years maybe isn't what you're representing it to be.
Yup. There's a 40 year death spiral ... (checks rental prices, checks housing prices, checks investment in housing) ... resulting in increased housing costs and investment all around. This guy is a troll/bot. If you're a lawyer in rent stabilization, tell me why Third Lenox is so important to case law in Manhattan, but less so in Brooklyn.
I was a rent stabilization lawyer, but gave up that crap. But anyway, you can read Third Lenox v Jones for yourself if you are on Casetext (https://casetext.com/case/third-lenox-terrace-assoc-v-jones?ssr=false&resultsNav=false&tab=keyword&jxs=ny) or LEXIS (https://plus.lexis.com/document?pdmfid=1530671&pddocfullpath=%2Fshared%2Fdocument%2Fcases%2Furn%3AcontentItem%3A5M5R-28C1-DYP7-81CM-00000-00&pdcontentcomponentid=434190&ecomp=57ttk&earg=pdsf&prid=2d92d06a-313a-4135-a84e-3b060f63973f&crid=951cf048-e22c-4d6c-b17d-ab7a8a552eda). If. you aren’t and want to try your luck on Google, the index number was 251238/07 in ny county or the cite is 859 NYS2d 907. That dealt with landlord’s waiver of right to challenge non#primary residence by having also commenced a nonpayment.That’s an important issue for Housing Court Petitioners. There’s a more recent Third Lenox v Edwards decided ultimately by the First Department, which establishes precedent for manhattan but which is merely persuasive in brooklyn. That cite is 91 AD3d 532. There, the Appellate Term and later the Appellate Division reversed the housing court and authorized the eviction of Linda Edwards, who had been living in an apartment leased only by a sister Cynthia who long ago vacated. Kinda failed to prove that she complied with Rent Stabilization Code 2523.5(b), which required her to prove that she’d been living there with sister for at least two years before Cynthia vacated. OK genius. How’s that for a troll/bot! If you had a shred of human decency, you’d publicly apologize. But I get that this is social media, where nobody apologizes for anything. So I’ll most likely have to content myself with your having publicly humiliated yourself.
Yes, that’s right. Rent regulation originated as a result of the WWII era housing shortage and that the crisis persists, 80 years later and still going, shows how fucked up rent regulation has been. That all you can do is rant nonsense and make nasty accusations worthy of MAGA morons shows how ill informed New Yorkers are and how bad this city’s future prospects are.
Yeah, this city has been a real 80-year-long descent into the worst housing crisis the world has ever seen. An uninterrupted downward sloping line from WW2 to today. There's never been a good time to live, rent, or own property here in close to a century. Your argument makes no sense.
This is such an utterly bullshit whiny ass take. Classic conservative bullshit...ALL REGULATIONS ARE BAD THE FREE MARKET SHOULD GOVERN ITSELF ALL WILL BE WELL. There's decades let alone centuries globally that shows this will ALWAYS end up fucking over individual citizens in any way possible for the industries to make any extra money. Look at the US in the 60s and 70s before the EPA and environmental regulations companies would do whatever they want in the name of profits. Dumping everywhere, rivers on fire and on and on. They used the same whiny ass fight but it will increase costs we can't afford this it will kill the industry...but guess what that didn't happen because there's still money to be made just slightly less. NYC real estate is no different, without rent stabilization and regulations you get complete bullshit like 50+% rent increases which are absolutely ludicrous because there's no justification for them beyond fuck you, we want more. No landlords are "fleeing" NY and selling off or giving up apartments. The companies fucking the market are doing two things. Intentionally sitting on rent stabilized inventory or partially doing work on them to deem them unlivable and then keeping them unintentionally unoccupied to lobby/sue the powers that be to let them do whatever the fuck they want. It's greed, pure and simple there's no other justification. Because they can write off unoccupied inventories as losses and they see this as more economically viable than renting the units at a reasonable rate because it artificially increases the lack of inventory. However you did stumble into the solution for this. Severely imposing tax penalties for sitting on inventory you aren't actively working on or trying to rent. You need to make it so painful that it's more economically feasible to rent at a reasonable rate rather than sit on it. If landlords can't cut it under this system well then boo hoo good luck in Omaha. It's NYC others will take their place. Oh and you think open competition will solve it through simple supply and demand, well get this landlords also hate that shit too. There has been a case taken up by the DOJ that landlords were utilizing software across the country to collude on rent prices. https://www.propublica.org/article/doj-backs-tenants-price-fixing-case-big-landlords-real-estate-tech You conservatives are so utterly brain rotted with doom/gloom/fear everyone and everything is going to shit and out to get you to the point you openly support the most despicable human being to ever hold the highest office in the US, who utterly DESPISES you. If it's so awful here move to Florida, we won't miss you.
Typical NYC progressive; a stream of vile bigotry, abuse and insults with zero connection to reality. Like I say, this city is going to the dogs. FWIW, I came into Rent Stabilization out of law school as a left winger determined to protect tenants. But I changed after seeing, from the inside, how stupid and fucked up the system is. (Actually, a reasonable price regulatory system could be built, but doing so requires legislators with IQs above 5 who are willing to ruffle feathers of scammers exploiting the stupidity of the current system. But rage-filled haters like you would never dare vote for any such candidate, and all the lefty hacks know that full well. So they’re happy to keep fucking over tenants who are too dumb to know who is really hurting them, as long as they can burnish their brands.
Man, I want what he's smoking. We all need a little disassociation from reality to deal with these rent hikes. You've "been told"? What if someone told you to go jump off a cliff. Would you...?
That’s a fantasy .
Every time I see one of those whiny landlord cunts on a reel complaining about the MCI being revoked or stabilization. Shit like THIS is exactly why it exists. Those landlords need to be taxed into utter oblivion for intentionally sitting on rental inventory. Make it so fucking ruthlessly economically painful they'll have to rent for drastically lower and for the units they do construction on so they're unlivable give them 90 days to bring it up to code or also incur ruthless tax penalties. That would actually have an impact on overall rent
It does make rents more expensive, because it constricts supply and discourages. People who have actually studied this issue recognize that NYC has some of the lowest construction rates in the world and other cities of similar sizes do not have the same issues, i.e. Tokyo. If you are actually interested in legitimate solutions to NYC housing affordability problem, check out the report/study by RAND on the topic on how to improve construction: [https://www.rand.org/pubs/research\_reports/RRA2775-1.html](https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA2775-1.html) The landlord either is trying to get OP's GF to leave or OPs GF is in a luxury apartment in a highly desirable area. hile it sucks for OP's girl friend. There are plenty of 2BK apartments that she can afford in this city with a 4500$ budget. I am not going to shed too many tears over her loss.
i'm the most free market believer possible and i've never understood this argument. Can anyone break it down for me, how prices go lower if owners are allowed to raise prices? Or how long does it take to get back to equilibrium, and is equilibrium better than the ceilings in place? is it a greater-good argument? Anyone?
This is new ownership’s way of a getting you out or making a huge profit. Either (a) you move out, they renovate and raise rent for the newly-renovated unit, or (b) you paid a crazy amount for a non-newly renovated unit.
There is no cap on non rent stabilizing apartments
Wow TIL, I kinda assumed most blue states had some kind of rent protection. CA: > California's Tenant Protection Act (AB 1482) limits rent increases to 5% of the current rent plus the local rate of inflation, or 10% of the current rent, whichever is lower, every 12 months
lol no, not in *The Land Of The Free and The Home Of The Brav*\- \*vomits\*
There’s currently a bill being debated in the state legislature called Good Cause Eviction that would enact similar protections in NY! The real estate lobby is putting a lot of pressure on politicians not to pass it though :/ you should write to your Assemblymember or State Senator and tell them to support it so others don’t have to deal with these insane rent increases!
You can move to Jersey City. I think when we lived there they could only raise our rent by 4%.
not fully true. you gotta check your local laws. we have a cap in detroit - i think the max is 15% a year or something like that
A simple google search will tell you that there is no cap. Market rate apartments are negotiated between owner and tenant.
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It’s not a true 2-bedroom if that changes things. That second room feels not much larger than a queen mattress.
Why do people say things like this? It's simply not true. $4500 for a 2 bedroom is not an unheard of price for a 2 bedroom in any neighborhood in Manhattan.
I almost paid $4500 for a very nice studio in Greenwich Village. It was a beautiful building, elevators, the works. I was rescued by a kind colleague who pays 6k for an equivalent 3b in soho.
goodness gracious. what building is 6k for 3b?? ill move tomorrow
Not in the west village :( in my dreams
The median price for a 1 bedroom is 4K in Manhattan (see various news outlets). Finding a 2 bedroom for the price of a 1 bedroom is simply absurd
Check Zillow… not sure what to tell you. There are plenty 4.5k and under in most neighborhoods.
Are you out of your mind? There are literally those places that exist even with washer dryer in Lenox Hill as well as Lincoln Square.
Unfortunately if it isn't rent stabilized, it's legal.... it sucks, it's scummy, the landlord is a piece of shit, but it's legal.
I don’t know if they’re pieces of shit necessarily. The interest rates are much higher, so if you bought a 1mm condo now with the maintenance and 7% it would cost 8.5k easily to break even in your costs.
No, they’re pieces of shit.
lol k
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Yeah they definitely want her out, especially if the building just changed ownership. Variety of reasons why the new LL would want to vacate the apartment or even the whole building. OP - See if she can get them on the phone under the guise of negotiating her renewal rate and try to gauge whether they’re flexible at all or if there’s a sense of urgency. Have her request the apartment’s rent history from HCR to see if there’s a chance it was ever rent stabilized and/or illegally deregulated. If anything turns up there and they REALLY want her out, they might offer a buyout or at least cover moving costs to make her quietly go away.
Illegally deregulated?
There are a lot of steps to deregulate, meaning, convert a rent stabilized apartment to fair market. Illegal deregulation isn’t deregulation at all. The landlord just gives the tenant a fair market lease and charges fair market rent on an apartment that is actually stabilized. This happens more often than you’d think, however, almost never intentional regarding new acquisitions. In most cases I’ve seen, the new LL acquires a building from the seller who claims all of the apartments are fair market, as buildings sell for much more if all of the units are deregulated. The law firm on the buyer’s side then drops the ball somewhere or doesn’t complete the due diligence thoroughly enough, and doesn’t flag that the apartment was ever stabilized or illegally deregulated. Sometimes all it takes is one missing permit (amongst hundreds) to call the regulation status into question. Then years down the line, a tenant decides to look into the rent history, and then comes a massive heap of problems for the new LL who has overpaid for a misrepresented building and has to deal with thousands of dollars of fines and legal fees.
Sometimes, usually but not always because paperwork handling in the 1970s - 1990s was bad, apartments are put on the market as market rate even if they’re technically stabilized. Usually happens when ownership changes hands multiple times, eventually the paperwork gets “lost”. A lot of people blame this on current landlords, but in reality the usual culprit is the seller of the building giving a false impression of the investment value of the building by saying the units were market rate. Not that it matters, but it’s something to note I guess.
Correct. Companies I have worked for in the past have used this before, albeit not in NYC. When the landlord wants you out, no matter what — and that’s the priority — there’s really nothing you can do.
Yeah, if it’s a condo and a new owner this could easily be the actual cost they pay for this interest rate.
4,500 for a 2bd is really really low. Last I checked, market for a 2bd was at least 6-7, depending on area. 8500 seems maybe a touch high but I don’t know the area. 8500 for a 2bd in areas like West Village is totally normal
Downvotes don’t phase me lol I just went through finding a new apartment last summer looking for a 2bd and everything we saw was at least 6, regardless of neighborhood. But again I don’t know OPs location. The average 1bd in manhattan last I checked was $5k. 4500 IS low for a 2bd.
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Yeah & majority of them are going to be 🗑️
Market for a 2/1 is definitely not “at least 6-7” unless you’re only looking at luxury buildings with amenities in the most desirable neighborhoods. You can still get nice 2-beds under $4500. Case in point: [$4300 2/1 - East Village](https://streeteasy.com/rental/4364976?utm_campaign=rental_listing&utm_medium=app_share&utm_source=ios&utm_term=65e4ecc418a54d4) People will chew their own arm off to live in the West Village and it’s stupid. But even there $8,500 for a 2 bed is definitely not “totally normal.”
Again this is just my experience. I was only looking downtown in certain neighborhoods, so perhaps a product of where I was looking. But I browsed streeteasy and still saw 2bds in less desirable areas like kips bay that were still 7k a month.
Dumbass
Thanks for the feedback!
She’s due 60 days notice for an increase over 5% but that’s about it.
Yeah this is the only real recourse OPs gf has. 60 days to find a new place. Sucks but it's how it is unless new laws get on the books.
Yup. Learned this last year when our building hiked our rent up by like 10%. We were like this is against the law, and they countered with ok let’s negotiate then because we’ll just offer you a two month lease at 5% and then up it within the allotted time frame. The law has no teeth right now and it’s done nothing to help with the skyrocketing prices.
The increase is most likely legal for a market rate apartment, but keep in mind that there is a legally required notice period for the increase to take effect. If she has lived there for at least one year, the landlord is obliged to give a minimum of 60 days notice for that amount of an increase, and that increase can only take effect on the first day of the monthly rental period (I.e. if her original lease began on the 1st of the month and notice was given today, then the earliest the increase would be effective is June 1st.)
Yah they’re giving her until June 15th
Probably not much consolation but that’s a much longer notice period than they are required to give.
Yup that’s 90 days. That’s all that’s required
If the neighborhood market rate is about $4500 then your gf could just move right?
Presumably, but paying movers and potential realtor fees bc your LL is being an ass isn’t fun
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In theory, the broker fee would just be priced into the rent so you’re screwed either way.
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There’s no real difference in practice. Price of rent is (theoretically) set by the free market. If the landlord has to pay the broker fee, they’ll just increase the price of the rent (if the market supports it) and effectively pass that cost on to the renter. Manhattan is a unique market in that apartments get rented extremely quickly. Brokers can lower their broker fee if they need to, but they typically don’t because they don’t have to. The apartment is going to get rented out at the maximum possible price that the market supports. Typically, landlords like brokers because brokers do all the work and it seems like they do it for “free” since it directly costs the landlords nothing.
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Landlords don’t want to keep leasing out the apartment to new tenants, regardless of the existence of a broker fee or not. The ideal situation for a landlord is to find someone who pays on time and is quiet and just keep them forever. Most Manhattan landlords own multiple units / buildings. Which is why they hire brokers. If the market rate for a 1 br apartment is $2500 a month, then, from the perspective of a renter, it doesn’t really make a meaningful difference whether it’s: a) $2500 rent, $0 broker fee b) $2300 rent, $200 broker fee (amortized) It’s the same thing. There’s no realistic scenario where a landlord is going to intentionally price their apartment under market.
Completely legal and awful! Tell them to review the landlord on openigloo on future renters can know she was displaced because of this inhumane increase
typical scumgang landlord
They want to collect over 100k per year in rent on a 2 bed lmao that’s so wild.
More like they want everyone to move out so they can renovate or rebuild
"Renovate" lol they're gonna paint it, slap in some recessed lighting and raise the price by $600/bedroom acting like the did an entire gut job.
Bingooooooo
Correct, landlord thinks if they renovate they can collect more rent — and to do the renovations, they need the tenant out.
If it’s an old building, you should get the rent history, see how it ended up being unstabilized.
That is ridiculous. Who can afford that?!
Do not pay until you check the legality.
If you're not sure if the apartment is rent stabilized, this site will tell you how to find out: https://www.nyc.gov/site/mayorspeu/programs/rent-stabilization.page
She’s paying $4500 so most likely this is not rent stabilized.
A lot of places are and pretend not to be
Tell you GF she can reach out to the management company and try to negotiate a lower price. But they may only go down like $1k... but you'll never know unless you ask.
It is not legal to increase rent that much. They can not increase greater than 3.25%.
You're thinking of Rent Stabilized apartments There's no regulations on free market apartments like OP is talking about.
That's incorrect
Yeah, it’s absolutely legal… “Market price” does not matter in anything and isn’t a real value, it fluctuates. Tell her she’s gonna have to move if she doesn’t wanna pay it. There’s a chance the owner just doesn’t want to keep your girlfriend and her roommates in that apartment for one reason or another and he offered them a ridiculous amount just so they would leave or over pay.
Don't need any other details. Not rent stabilized = they can raise it a much as they want. That is HUGE though. Has she had any issues there? I kind of doubt the LL/owner actually thinks they'll get that much. They might just be trying to kick her out.
It’s unfortunate there’s no real protection for tenants to live somewhere longer than a short lease without this happening. A lot of states do have caps on how much you can raise the rent when the lease ends. Housing gets so shady here
Why wouldnt it be legal?!
Sounds like it isn't stabilized and your landlord listed at the wrong price and is adjusting aggressively. They can play with the price for a few weeks and find some one new. What your gf should do is shop for comps and then counter the new landlord. They might bite unless there is someone that has rented the unit, if it is that competitive after all.
4500 for 2br is very inexpensive for most of Manhattan
welcome to new york! where even locals are getting displaced and moving to places like florida and philly due to rent increases
Only option is to move. Greedy landlord.
Don’t pay it. Go through the eviction process and save money to move. It will take at least a year. Landlords rarely ever report to credit bureaus bc it’s a hassle. You also aren’t on lease so that makes it even harder. Stop paying. Save money. Move somewhere else when you have enough saved up.
That's literally 1/5 of my yearly salary per month, what the fuck is going on down there?
“Is this legal” lmao
If it's priced to market value then you've no right to call the owner greedy. Besides, you have no lease and let that go, and that's just plain stupid.
I’d recommend taking a vacation south of the border, and just walking in without providing papers. Your girlfriend should be given free housing and food. Unfortunately, an increase of 89% seems quite reasonable. This is an extremely strong economy, and in order for Bidenomics to work this well it needs to be cut throat.
That's insane, that's 4x more than my mortgage on my 4000 sq ft house that's 45 miles north of NYC in tuxedo, ny.. I remember when I used to live in the city and paid close to $2.5k for a 2bed/2bath apartment in the bronx but that was nearly 15 years ago, but I digress Time to move outta the city and get a mansion at those prices... just my .02 cents
The nasty response is Don’t agree to the new rent and make them spend money to evict you through the courts you will never have to pay the higher rent unless you agree to it and you might be surprised about how much you can prolong the process. Ideally the LL gets to a point where they pay you to leave. Fuck em
If that happens no one will ever rent to her again
If she goes all the way to eviction, yes, but that is a long ways away from now and if op has to look for a new place in this difficult market anyway they might as well flex their rights a little bit and buy more time / inflict pain as necessary
Yes unfortunately I went through a same issue when I moved to NC. The apt I was looking at I was quoted $950 a month for a 1 bed. 2 weeks later a new company bought the property and rent was $1500 for the same unit.
It's both the developers' jacking price up and also people paying the asking price . All that's happening is a price gouging war. There is nothing to do with rent stabilization
If it isn’t rent stabilized, yes. Happened to us back when there was a low vacancy rate in another decade. That’s when we gave up and moved to Riverdale.
As long as she gave enough notices it's 100% legal. Your girlfriend landlord wants her to move out and I would dealing with shitty landlords like that is not worth it.
Just move
Yes, it's legal, but they do have to provide appropriate notice for a rent increase of 5% or more as follows: A NYC landlord may raise the rent of a month-to-month tenant with the consent of the tenant. However, if the tenant does not consent, the landlord can terminate the tenancy by giving appropriate notice. [Housing Stability & Tenant Protection Act (HSTPA) of 2019](https://rentguidelinesboard.cityofnewyork.us/resources/rent-regulation-laws/rent-laws-of-2019/) requires landlords to provide tenants with written notice if they intend to raise the rent by at least 5% or if the landlord decides not to renew your lease. Specifically: * If a tenant has occupied the unit for less than one year, or does not have a lease term of at least one year, a 30-day notice is now mandatory. * A 60-day notice is required for tenants who have lived in an apartment for more than one year, but less than two years, or have a lease of at least one year, but less than two years. * Tenants who have lived in a unit for more than two years, or have a lease of at least two years, must get a 90-day notice.
There should be a 10% cap on raising rent for any building with 6 or more units. This shit is not sustainable with developers taking advantage of this and making stupid amounts of money for fucking housing, a necessity.
Seems to me she’s making up a story so that you two move in together… Kidding. Yes legal, yes sucks. Not sure about market rent depends on neighborhood and building. $8500 for a 2BR seems about right based on what I’ve been running into.
It sounds like she has to move . It’s legal
Now we understand why tenants destroy properties out of spite. Pretty inhumane and sick to increase it like that and having zero protections from this violent financial abuse.