The rules are so bad units sit empty

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]500,000 apartments in the city of New York rent below $1,500. Most people never believe me when I say that.

[00:00:04][music] Why? Because you never see those rents, and that's fine. People that live in those units should be afforded those units. But what happens is after living there for a long time, which most rent stabilized tenants do, 20-30 years, that apartment has to be brought up to the newest code because you're grandfathered in while a tenant is there. That renovation [music] is costly and very disruptive. You don't want to take out a 65-year-old senior citizen out of his or her apartment >> [music] >> for 6 months to do asbestos and lead and all this is important, but it has to happen on turnover. [music] There's a significant cost. Again, these laws have changed over the years. At a minimum, it's about $100,000 to renovate renovate these apartments.

[00:00:36]>> [music] >> NYCHA takes about $400,000 to do the same work. But when the rent cannot adjust to account [music] for that cost to renovate, owners find that it is cheaper to leave it empty than to put [music] it back on the market. And to me, that is just ridiculous policy if that's what we're having.

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