June 29, 2025
If you’ve been keeping up with the NYC mayoral race, you’ve probably noticed one thing all the Democratic candidates agree on: New York City has a housing affordability crisis.
From Brad Lander’s “state of emergency” to Cuomo’s fears of losing the city’s “soul,” housing is the hot-button issue everyone wants to fix. The problem? Most of their proposed solutions risk making things worse, not better.
Let’s be real — it’s not just tenants feeling the squeeze. Small landlords, especially those who own rent-stabilized buildings, are under serious financial pressure. Costs like property taxes, insurance, utilities, and repairs keep rising, but rents are often frozen or severely capped.
For landlords in The Bronx, many are losing an average of $120 per unit each month. That’s not sustainable — it’s a slow bleed that could lead to more building abandonment, foreclosures, and deteriorating living conditions.
Candidates like Zohran Mamdani are pushing for a full rent freeze. That may sound great to tenants in the short-term, but if landlords can’t cover basic expenses or finance repairs, we’re just repeating the mistakes of the 1970s — back when entire buildings were burned out and boarded up.
Adding to the problem is the push for more public housing construction, like Mamdani’s call for 200,000 new NYCHA units. Meanwhile, NYCHA is struggling to manage the buildings it already owns, with billions in backlogged repairs. More public housing isn’t the answer when the current stock is already falling apart.
And what about the obsession with “affordable housing” units that cost $500,000+ to build and are permanently rent-stabilized? These properties start facing the same challenges as older rent-stabilized buildings once their costs outpace controlled rents.
We’re locking ourselves into a cycle that keeps underfunding maintenance while trapping tenants in units they never want to leave, all while younger, working professionals can’t find a foothold in the city.
Even inclusionary zoning — which mandates a percentage of new developments be set aside for affordable housing — can backfire. Developers raise the price on market-rate units just to make the numbers work. That doesn’t bring prices down — it does the opposite.
There is a better path, and some candidates are starting to lean toward it: it’s called the abundance agenda. Instead of fighting over who gets a piece of the pie, let’s just bake a bigger pie.
We need to build more housing across the board — market-rate, luxury, middle-income, subsidized — all of it. Because when supply goes up, prices stabilize, and the market becomes more accessible to everyone.
As a realtor who works in this city day in and day out, I see the ripple effects of policy in every lease signed, every property sold, and every building left vacant. Housing affordability is about more than just rent control — it’s about creating a sustainable, dynamic housing ecosystem that works for tenants, landlords, and the future of New York.
Let’s hope our future mayor sees that too.
Disclaimer: This content is meant for informational purposes only and is not intended to be construed as financial, tax, legal, or insurance advice.
