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CUCS’s housing programs include transitional and permanent supportive sites. CUCS also excels in developing new housing in NYC.

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Queens Community District 3 | ANHD’s 2026 Housing Risk Map

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How is Affordable Housing Threatened in Your Neighborhood, highlights and ranks 15 indicators of demographics and housing risk in each of New York City’s 59 community districts to inform targeted, neighborhood-level action alongside citywide solutions.

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Driving into New York City from the north, an unavoidable cluster of thirty-five identical brick high-rises dominates the horizon just past the Bronx border. All of them over twenty stories tall, all with the same brick facades. They’re easily mistaken for a public housing project. But the complex is Co-op City, the largest housing cooperative

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Downloadable Resources​ - Violence Intervention Program

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Downloadable Resources If you need printed materials, click here

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Use this free tool from JustFix to research your building and investigate landlords! We use property ownership mapping to identify a landlord’s portfolio and provide data to indicate potential tenant harassment and displacement.

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City Owned and Leased Land - NYU Furman Center

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To be eligible for Magnolia Gardens, families must have a child under the age of 21.  Placement for transitional housing is  prioritized based on the child’s school and/or previous residence in Queens Community District 7.  When ready, counselors will work with each family to secure a rental voucher and obtain permanent housing.

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Magnolia Gardens | Asian Americans for Equality

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Magnolia Gardens is the first transitional housing facility for families with children in Flushing, Queens. The new building includes 90 apartments fully equipped with kitchens and bathrooms and offers robust social services to help families experiencing housing instability get back on their feet. Magnolia Gardens was co-developed by Asian Americans for Equality and Urban Resource Institute (URI).

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NYC Rent Increase Guide - What to Do If Your Rent Goes Up - nyc.gov

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Learn your rights and how to get help with rent increases in this step-by-step guide. Get guidance for different housing types, including rent stabilized and market rate housing.

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Access denied | www.outerbridgelaw.com used Cloudflare to restrict access

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Important Disclaimer

No Legal Advice:
The content on this website, including any information, tools, or materials generated through artificial intelligence (AI), is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice, counsel, or a substitute for professional legal services.

Limitations of AI:
While the AI system employed on this website may assist in providing general legal information, it is not capable of assessing the nuances of individual legal issues, jurisdictions, or fact-specific matters.

User Responsibility:
By using this website, you acknowledge that you are solely responsible for verifying any information provided and seeking professional legal counsel as needed.

I Understand and Accept

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Roxanne, AI Assistant, is here to help you navigate getting repairs in NYC. Important Disclaimer No Legal Advice: The content on this website, including any information, tools, or materials generated through artificial intelligence (AI), is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice, counsel, or a substitute for professional legal services.

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Membership Options – Diversified Resource Network

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You do not have access to all of our features and you cannot buy our webinars or upgrade your account as you are either not logged in or you do not have an account with us, please Login/Register

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Find affordable Housing Re-rentals - HPD

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New York City is committed to the principle of inclusivity in all of its neighborhoods, including supporting New Yorkers to reside in neighborhoods of their choice, regardless of their neighborhood of origin and regardless of the neighborhood into which they want to move.

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AffordableHousing.com - Affordable Houses & Apartments For Rent

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Find affordable apartments, condos, houses, townhouses, and section 8 housing at AffordableHousing.com.

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The Health x Housing Lab at NYU Langone Health hosts events with the goal of disseminating evidence-based information, amplifying the voices of people with lived experience of homelessness and housing insecurity, and educating a wide audience across sectors. Here, you may find recordings and materials from our previous events as well as research summaries, which offer relevant and timely research that present key findings from academic research in a clear, understandable fashion to audiences outside academia.

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File Decreased Services

File Rent Overcharge

File Lease Violation

Appeal an Order

Respond to MCI Case

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HomeFirst Down Payment Assistance Program

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The HomeFirst Down Payment Assistance Program provides qualified first-time homebuyers with up to $100,000 toward the down payment or closing costs on a 1-4 family home, a condominium, or a cooperative in one of the five boroughs of New York City.

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Re Rentals

https://fifthave.org/

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Fifth Avenue Committee: Building a Just and Equitable NYC. FAC transforms lives through affordable housing, adult education, workforce development, and community advocacy. Join us in creating a more equitable New York City.

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Depositron - Get Your NYC Security Deposit Back

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We handle all your applications for the NYC Housing Lottery, so you can find your dream home.

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Apartment Listings for Rent NYC | openigloo

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Browse apartment listings for rent in NYC on openigloo. Secure your ideal home with from reputable landlords and buildings.

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All Rental Availability is managed by C+C Apartment Management LLC. Visit all affordable housing rentals at CCManagers.com for more rental information.

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Housing Court Answers offers workshops on important housing and Housing Court issues throughout the year. Check our youtube channel to see full workshop recordings.

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The plan would bring thousands of new homes, including income-restricted homes, new jobs, enhanced infrastructure, and safer streets to the heart of the world’s borough.

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Disclaimer: The information provided on this website does not constitute legal advice. All information, content, and materials available on this site are for general informational purposes only

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We're a city of renters and we want to make sure all renters have the resources they need to understand their rights and responsibilities.

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Are you facing an eviction? You may have the right to a free lawyer!

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Eviction Free NYC will help you learn how to respond to an eviction notice and connect with available resources.

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Verifying you are human. This may take a few seconds.

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Before filing a compliant, contact your property owner or landlord first -- this is the easiest way to resolve a housing quality or safety issue. If your landlord is unresponsive, file a complaint with 311.

How to File a Complaint

You can file a complaint by:

After you file a complaint, you will be given a Service Request number. You can check the status of these complaints using the Service Request number through 311ONLINE, 311MOBILE (if you filed it through 311MOBILE) or through HPDONLINE.

What Happens Next?

HPD will attempt to contact your building's managing agent to advise them that a complaint has been filed and that a violation may be issued if the condition is not corrected immediately. HPD will also attempt to call you back to see if the condition was corrected. If you indicate that the condition was corrected, HPD will close the complaint.

View the Guide on What to Expect when calling 311 about a housing quality or safety issue. The guide is also available in additional languages:

Inspections

If it was not corrected or HPD cannot reach you, a uniformed Code Enforcement inspector will be sent to inspect the reported condition. If English is not your primary language, let the Inspector know and they can call a translator to help. The owner/agent is not notified of the inspection date. Inspectors will also check for the following violations: smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors, lead-based paint (if there is a child under six), window guards (if there is a child under 11), double cylinder locks, and bars on the fire escape windows.

Violations

If the Inspector writes a violation, HPD will send a Notice of Violation to the managing agent instructing him/her to repair the condition within a specified time period, which depends on the severity of the violation. The owner has the following amounts of time to correct a violation from the time he/she receives it:

CLASS A (non-hazardous) - 90 days

CLASS B (hazardous) - 30 days

CLASS C lead-based paint - 21 days

CLASS C window guards - 21 days

CLASS C heat or hot water - immediately

CLASS C (all other types) - 24 hours

If the owner certifies that the condition was corrected, you will receive notice of certification in the mail. If the owner does not certify, the violation remains open on the building record.

If the tenant challenges the certification and a re-inspection finds that the condition is not correct, the violation remains open. If the violation is certified and HPD does not re-inspect the condition, the violation will be closed after 70 days. If the violation remains open, you may initiate legal action against the landlord in Housing Court. You can seek free legal counsel if you qualify or can see a representative in any Housing Court for assistance with filing a case.

If the violation condition is considered immediately hazardous, HPD will attempt to contact the managing agent to advise him/her that the condition must be corrected as soon as possible. HPD will also attempt to contact you to confirm whether the owner corrected the condition. If the owner does not correct the condition, HPD's Emergency Repair Program may repair certain conditions and bill the owner. Tenants can ask about the status of emergency repair work in their apartments by calling 212-863-5510. Note: this number is for status requests only for HPD-sponsored emergency repair work already in progress.

New!

Schedule an Appointment Online

You can schedule an appointment online to speak with a representative from HPD's Code Enforcement office either virtually or by telephone. While we pilot this new service, we are offering a limited number of time slots. We may adjust the number of time slots offered based on demand.

Services Available by Appointment

1. Complaints

2. Violations (certifications)

3. Dismissal Request

4. Mold/Pest (documentation to remove violations)

5. Lead Violations (Defect Status, Exemptions, and Contestations)

Schedule an Appointment

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Before filing a compliant, contact your property owner or landlord first -- this is the easiest way to resolve a housing quality or safety issue. If your landlord is unresponsive, file a complaint with 311. You can file a complaint by: After you file a complaint, you will be given a Service Request number.

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A little more housing in every neighborhood

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NYSCEF Create an Account Forms FAQs Follow UCS - Twitter Request for Public Comment Unrepresented Litigants Fact Sheet E-File Report Remove Attorney Representation Training Terms of Use User Manual Filing Requirements VEC Resources Contact Us Authorized Courts Available Documents Rules & Legislation Protocols NYSCEF Updates Login Search as Guest Unrepresented Litigants

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New York Immigration Coalition - Revision

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Community Resources for Immigrant NYers - NYC, Long Island, New York State | New York Immigration Coalition - Revision

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New York State Community Toolkit Know Your Rights Immigrants & NY Know Your Rights Wallet Cards Know Your Rights Presentations Know Your Rights Roleplaying Exercise Asylum Seeker Resources What is Asylum Crossing the Border with Canada NYS Policy Guides NY HERO Act Guide Health & Safety Resources Medicaid and Child Health Plus Postpartum Coverage Abortions […]

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The Coalition for the Homeless is the nation's oldest advocacy and direct service organization helping homeless individuals in New York City.

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New York City Services & Resources For Unhoused People | YourPeer

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Find housing, food pantries, clothing assistance, personal care resources, healthcare services, and more resources for unhoused people in NYC verified by the community with YourPeer.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In 1938, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia delegated to the Commissioner of Investigation the responsibility to supervise New York City Marshals. Sixteen years later, in 1954, the Bureau of City Marshals was formally established at the Department of Investigation to carry out the Mayor's mandate. During Mayor Robert Wagner's third term, the State Court underwent reorganization, and as a result, the Municipal Court and City Court were replaced by the Civil Court of the City of New York.

Pursuant to Article 16 of the New York City Civil Court Act, marshals became officers of the Civil Court of New York City. The authority to appoint City Marshals remained with the Mayor; however, the power to suspend and remove City Marshals became vested in the Appellate Divisions for the First and Second Judicial Departments. In 1968, these courts held that "the Appellate Divisions in the First and Second Judicial Departments are jointly vested with the power to supervise the activities of New York City Marshals and that the routine exercise of that power was lawfully delegated by the Appellate Divisions, through the Mayor, to the Department of Investigation."

During the period of its supervision of marshals, the Department of Investigation has issued numerous directives from time to time prescribing the standards for marshals' official conduct, as well as the standards for the maintenance of official books and records.

On November 12, 1975 and February 27, 1976, the Appellate Divisions for the First and Second Judicial Departments issued Joint Administrative Orders 453 and 456, concerning the supervision of City Marshals. These orders formally set forth the Department of Investigation's supervisory powers, which include the power to conduct investigations into marshals' activities, examine their books and records, promulgate directives concerning the official records to be kept by them and the procedures for performing their official duties, as well as the power to discipline them.

Joint Administrative Order 453 specifically authorized the Department of Investigation, with the approval of both Appellate Divisions, to promulgate a "handbook of regulations" for City Marshals. Thus, this handbook is a direct result of the authority vested in the Department of Investigation by the Appellate Divisions for the First and Second Departments. This handbook, which the Appellate Divisions approved on March 25, 2013, replaces the previous Handbook of Regulations, issued in 1997.

The purpose of updating the Marshals Handbook is to set forth in one reference this Department's directives, issued through the years (as well as certain new directives), for official conduct and record keeping. All current directives have been codified within this handbook. As always, a marshal shall be accountable for the duties, functions, and responsibilities that are delegated to him or her pursuant to judicial order, Department of Investigation directive, and this Handbook of Regulations.

About the Handbook

The Marshals Handbook that follows is an electronic reproduction of the actual handbook in PDF format, posted here for the convenience of the public.
NYC Marshals Handbook PDF
The official Handbook is available for viewing at the City Hall Library (located at 31 Chambers Street, Room 112, New York, New York 10007). The official Handbook may be purchased for $25 in any of the following ways:

1) In person at CityStore:
Municipal Building North Lobby
New York, New York 10007;
2) By phone at: (212) 386-0007;
3) Online through the CityStore's secure E-commerce site.

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Marshals Handbook - Department of Investigation

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In 1938, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia delegated to the Commissioner of Investigation the responsibility to supervise New York City Marshals. Sixteen years later, in 1954, the Bureau of City Marshals was formally established at the Department of Investigation to carry out the Mayor’s mandate. During Mayor Robert Wagner’s third term, the State Court underwent reorganization, and as a result, the Municipal Court and City Court were replaced by the Civil Court of the City of New York.

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Kindful Nonprofit Glossary - Fundraising & Nonprofit Terms

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The nonprofit industry can be full of jargon. That's why we put together essential terms and definitions for fundraisers and nonprofit professionals.

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On the Open Data Project Gallery, you can find examples of open data in action and gain inspiration for projects of your own. See how NYC Open Data is used by activists to advocate for change, by entrepreneurs to develop products, by teachers to build analytics skills in the classroom, by government agencies to make data more accessible, and much more.
We're always looking to publish projects highlighting NYC Open Data in action and encourage you to share your work by submitting it to the Project Gallery!
The Project Gallery encourages a diverse array of submissions - visualizations, tools, tutorials, and much more. The best projects meet one or more of the following criteria:

Does the project improve upon a user's ability to understand a specific NYC Open Data dataset?

Does the project help New Yorkers answer a question or solve a problem using NYC Open Data datasets?

Does the project feature compelling and user-friendly visuals and design ?

Does the project engage with an NYC Open Data dataset using a novel format or perspective?

Does the project provide an instructional overview, share code, or explain design choices of the analytics work behind it?

Note that a submission does not need to meet every criteria in order to be considered for publication, but all projects must use NYC Open Data.

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NYC Open Data helps New Yorkers use and learn about City data

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HUD.gov / U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)

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THE HOUSING CHOICE VOUCHER PROGRAM GUIDEBOOK

The HCV Guidebook is being published as chapters are completed in order to provide our stakeholders with the most current information as soon as possible. The list of chapters below identifies those that have been published and those that are coming soon.

The purpose of the Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) guidebook is to provide an easy-to-use, one-stop resource to assist public housing agencies (PHAs), families and other stakeholders in the administration of the tenant-based housing subsidy programs. The guidebook consolidates into one document the most up-to-date guidance and requirements outlined in multiple publications: regulatory requirements, PIH Notices, Federal Register Notices, and other forms of guidance issued by HUD.

One major improvement viewers will find in the new guidebook chapters is a footnote with a citation whenever the word "must" is used. In many policy areas, HUD allows PHAs the flexibility to make local policy decisions, so it is important to note when a policy must be adopted as required by HUD.

To ensure HUD continually provides the most up-to-date guidance on evolving program policies and procedures, the HCV Guidebook chapters will be living documents on HUD's website. Individual chapters will be amended as policies are refined.

Chapter Titles

Rent Reasonableness, (Updated, September 2020)

Calculating Rent & Housing Assistance Payments (HAP), January 2023

Fair Housing Requirements, Coming soon
Waiting List & Tenant Selection, Coming soon
Terminations, Coming soon

Informal Hearings & Reviews, Coming soon

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Housing Choice Voucher Program Guidebook

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THE HOUSING CHOICE VOUCHER PROGRAM GUIDEBOOK The HCV Guidebook is being published as chapters are completed in order to provide our stakeholders with the most current information as soon as possible. The list of chapters below identifies those that have been published and those that are coming soon.

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In searching for a dwelling, many households face discrimination by landlords who are unwilling to rent to voucher holders. As a result, several states and municipalities have adopted laws prohibiting housing discrimination based on source of income. Owners of Low-Income Housing Tax Credits and certain types of federally assisted housing are prohibited from discriminating against voucher holders. Source of income protections are invaluable in maximizing a voucher family's ability to secure safe and decent housing. Below are materials describing efforts to enforce source of income laws on behalf of voucher holders and other useful materials for advocates.

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In searching for a dwelling, many households face discrimination by landlords who are unwilling to rent to voucher holders. As a result, several states and municipalities have adopted laws prohibiting housing discrimination based on source of income. Owners of Low-Income Housing Tax Credits and certain types of federally assisted housing are prohibited from discriminating against voucher [...]

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Visiting NYC? Find events, attractions, deals, and more at nycgo.com

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MAP: See Where NYC Landlords Stopped Registering Rent-Stabilized Units

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MAP: See Where NYC Landlords Stopped Registering Rent-Stabilized Units - THE CITY

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Interactive map showing where rent-stabilized apartments in NYC are no longer registered.

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Housing Rights of Immigrants and Right to Access Shelter

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Order FREE Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Publications.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is a 21st century agency that implements and enforces federal consumer financial law and ensures that markets for consumer financial products are fair, transparent, and competitive.

You may download publications by clicking on each title. Adobe Acrobat Reader is required to view the publications and is available for download at: http://get.adobe.com/reader

In most cases, you may order up to 200 free copies of each publication. All publications are free from the CFPB. If you need larger quantities, contact [email protected]

For single copies or small quantities, place your order for pueblo.gpo.gov.

Please allow 3-4 weeks for delivery.

Older Adults Housing Guides

Click on the plus sign in the table below to view details of each publication or its subtopics.

Expand All

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Order FREE and low cost federal consumer publications from CFPB

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The Anti-Eviction Mapping Project is a data visualization, data analysis, and digitial storytelling collective documenting the dispossession of San Francisco Bay Area residents.

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This Fact Sheet contains information on the requirements that generally must be met for a building to be considered rent stabilized, or for an apartment to be considered rent controlled. It also contains general information on rent increases, rent overcharges, rent reductions for decreases in services, harassment, and rent registration.

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In September 2023, New York City Mayor Eric Adams proposed "Zoning for Housing Opportunity," an ambitious set of changes to the city's Zoning Resolution, intended to facilitate increased housing production. The proposal, which incorporates zoning liberalizations widely adopted by other U.S. state legislatures and local governments, aims to distribute moderate housing growth widely in every one of the city's 59 community districts.

The proposed changes overturn, in part, the effects of the city's 1961 comprehensive rezoning, which increased zoned densities in parts of Manhattan but greatly diminished the amount of new housing allowed in the other four boroughs. The changes are also a direct repudiation of the policies of recent past mayoral administrations, in which affluent, high-opportunity neighborhoods were "downzoned" (reduced in terms of permitted built densities) and new housing construction was focused on a handful of neighborhoods, mostly onetime industrial areas or commercial districts with little legacy population. In introducing the proposal, Adams emphasized the need to overcome the racially discriminatory effect, and perhaps intent, of decades of restrictive zoning. These zoning restrictions occurred just as African American, Hispanic, and Asian American groups were becoming most of the city's population.

This report's analysis finds the proposed changes an appropriate response to the city's ongoing housing-supply crisis. Many changes are likely to be effective in increasing the housing stock. For example, eliminating off-street parking requirements will unlock housing growth in currently commercial areas where high parking requirements make such developments prohibitively expensive to build. Allowing accessory dwelling units (ADUs) and increased floor area while reducing minimum lot size in "low density" neighborhoods, characterized by small homes and walkup apartment buildings, can lead to a substantial increment of unit density on redeveloped lots.

However, the report finds ways in which the proposal can be improved. A proposed floor area increase for new buildings that include affordable housing admittedly would be effective only with state legislation to reinstate a property-tax exemption, called Section 421a, that compensates developers for the cost of constructing below-market rental units. In the absence of tax benefits, property owners in areas with strong housing markets could still build market-rate condominiums, albeit without the floor area increment.

However, the current proposal fails to clarify the relation of the new affordable housing incentive to a past policy, which has continued under Adams, mandating that a portion of units in new buildings in rezoned areas be provided at below-market rents. Properties ensnared by that policy are entirely dependent on tax incentives that do not currently exist. These properties should also have the development flexibility afforded by the proposed affordable housing floor area incentive.

Another issue relates to the proposal to allow more housing to be built in low-density neighborhoods. These areas are characterized by high levels of car ownership per household, and planners justified earlier downzonings as necessary to ensure that communities were not overwhelmed by parked cars. The plan needs to include simple site-design provisions that preserve on-street parking spaces and locate parking in the rear of the lot, as well as measures to encourage households to own fewer cars. These measures include zoning changes to allow more services within walking or bicycling distance and improved public transit frequency and reliability.

Whether the New York City Council will adopt the Adams administration's proposals is uncertain. The plan takes on many issues that have been highly controversial in the past. However, the council has been receptive to past legislative proposals that are justified as remedying past discrimination against nonwhite New Yorkers. If the administration can succeed in making a similar case, it will have achieved meaningful progress toward the mayor's stated "moon shot" goal of producing 500,000 new housing units over a decade.

Summer's end this year brought welcome news of "Zoning for Housing Opportunity," an aggressive proposal by the administration of New York City mayor Eric Adams to reform zoning, with the objective of boosting housing construction. The proposed zoning changes-which were first announced in general terms in a September speech by Adams,[ 1] and then in greater detail in a document posted online by the Department of City Planning (DCP)[ 2]-represent the city's first attempt since 2016 at changing the text of the city's Zoning Resolution to spur housing construction.[ 3] Since 2016, the long-term trend of housing scarcity and rising market rents and sales prices continued, with a short interruption during the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic, when the city suffered a population outflow. With economic recovery, the housing crisis is back-and worse than before.

The city's proposed changes, if approved by the City Planning Commission and city council, have the potential to produce a meaningful uptick in housing construction. These zoning amendments also represent a significant ideological change. During the eight-year mayoral administration of Bill de Blasio, the city took the position that private housing investment should serve public purposes-namely, the production of new housing at below-market rent-and be dependent on public subsidies to address those public purposes. That policy could never work: first, because the city does not have the fiscal capacity to supply enough funding to meet housing's vast capital needs; and second, because the success of the city's housing policies depended on the reauthorization by a recalcitrant state legislature of a lapsed-but key-property-tax-exemption program. Furthermore, the policy constrained overall housing production because developments that did not achieve financial feasibility under the city's complicated system of affordable housing requirements and compensating subsidies simply would not get built. Moreover, potential housing developers who had access to capital but didn't want to be in the affordable housing business would take their investments elsewhere.

The city now proposes zoning changes that, in some cases, would benefit private developers but leave them control over the rents, sales prices, and occupancy of their own development projects. Other changes still anticipate new housing that includes affordable units but on a voluntary basis, leaving property owners with a market-rate alternative if tax incentives are not reinstated. These changes would help the city make progress toward the "moon shot" goal that Adams set in December 2022 of producing 500,000 new housing units in a decade.[ 4]

This report describes the effects of the proposed changes, and how the proposal can be improved. The Adams administration deserves praise for what it wants to do, but also a caution that true housing abundance requires more.

The proposed zoning amendments are now subject to preparation of an Environmental Impact Statement, and the city's seven-month public review process kicks off in the spring of 2024. The following year, 2025, has a mayoral election, meaning that nothing controversial is likely to be proposed. Sadly, the process of conceiving, and securing approval of, complex citywide zoning text amendments is so time-consuming that the next phase (after this new Zoning for Housing Opportunity proposal) of NYC zoning reform must wait for the next four-year mayoral term, starting in 2026.

The Origins of NYC's Housing Shortage: Zoning and Regulations Since the 1960s

In his September speech, Adams looked back to the city's 1961 comprehensive zoning amendment for the origins of today's crisis: "The 1961 Zoning Resolution drastically changed the way our city would build housing ... for decades to come, and those changes were not for the better [T]he 1961 code limited growth rather than encouraging it-ultimately, leading to a massive housing shortage, one that we are still reckoning with 62 years later." There is a lot of truth in this.

As I have written,[ 5] NYC had abundant and affordable housing by the early 1960s, under the relatively permissive zoning system created by the city's first Zoning Resolution, enacted in 1916. In that era, zoning allowed six-story semi-fireproof apartment buildings almost everywhere, and any spike in housing demand led to construction of more of these ubiquitous residential buildings. In support of its permissive zoning policies, the city built and continually expanded its subway system out to its edges. That enabled the growing city to function at relatively high built densities. In the post-World War II period, the subways saw ongoing improvements: the completion of the Queens IND line to Hillside Avenue and 179th Street in Jamaica, construction of the Rockaway branch, the connection of the Dyre Avenue line in the northeast Bronx (originally commuter rail) to the rest of the subway system, and the union of the IND and BMT rail networks. The most important portion of that last project, known as the Chrystie Street connection, which greatly improved subway service between Brooklyn and Manhattan, was completed in 1967.[ 6]

The 1961 Zoning Resolution eliminated the ability of the city's housing production to respond rapidly to surges in housing demand. The political deal underpinning the new zoning traded a massive reduction in zoned densities in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island for an increase in effective zoned densities in parts of Manhattan south of 96th Street, both for commercial and for residential buildings. While Manhattan boomed, and vacant land on Staten Island continued to see the construction of small homes, overall new housing construction was stifled dramatically.

At the same time, the creation of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) in 1968, which combined NYC's transit system with commuter railroads and tolled road bridges and tunnels, largely led to the end of subway expansion. It was not supposed to be that way: MTA published, at its formation, an exciting "Program for Action" with many new and expanded lines.[ 7] However, little of this planned system has been built. Substantial portions of the boroughs outside Manhattan are left without subway service within walking distance. The one line in Staten Island connects only to the St. George ferry terminal.

Adams stated in his speech that the 1961 zoning has "barely changed" in the years since. That is not true, as indicated by the table of housing completions provided in the Rent Guidelines Board's annual Housing Supply Report.[ 8] In 1964, there were nearly 52,000 new housing units completed as buildings continued to be built under the old zoning rules.[ 9] But by the late 1960s, completions had fallen off sharply. In 1980, in an economically weakened city, and amid sharp reductions in city, state, and federal funding for affordable housing, completions were under 9,000 units. Most new units were located in Manhattan and on Staten Island.

In 1987, the city adopted Quality Housing, a major zoning reform that partially reversed the 1961 downzoning, or zoning to permit less density.[ 10] That change took a long time to pay off, as the city's economy became strong enough to support a significant volume of private housing investment only in about 2000. Around that time, completions began to show notable growth, particularly in Brooklyn and Queens. These data also show the effect of localized zoning map changes that allowed growth in locations where the housing market had been suppressed, including downtown Brooklyn and Greenpoint-Williamsburg in Brooklyn and Long Island City and Downtown Flushing in Queens. By 2007, new housing completions were approaching 26,500.

Downzoning and Attempts at Urban Renewal

That was not all that was happening in NYC zoning. There was further downzoning, curtailing new housing construction in many neighborhoods.

Any discussion of downzoning in the city must grapple with exclusionary intent. Adams, in his speech, said, "We can never lose sight of the fact that many ... who pushed for the 1961 Zoning Code aimed to promote ... segregation." The reality is perhaps more nuanced. The best source of information that we have about what the 1961 zoning was intended to do is an oral history transcript from Edwin Friedman, one of the planners who worked on it.[ 11] Friedman states:

The single most important objective of residential recommendations was to effectuate more evenly distributed residential densities without impinging upon individual freedom of locational choices. This objective resulted from the conclusion that overbuilding in some parts of the City was only at the expense of the sterilization of other parts.

The 1961 zoning took place during the urban renewal era, when public officials like Robert Moses used medicalized language describing urban "blight" as a "cancer" that had to be "excised."[ 12] By this time, large numbers of poor African Americans from the South and Puerto Ricans were migrating into some of NYC's oldest and most run-down neighborhoods-the neighborhoods that were then targeted for urban renewal. For example, in the 1940s and 1950s, the city cleared tenements from the previous century and built several high-rise public housing developments in East Harlem in Manhattan and elsewhere, which seem intended to prevent the spread of these newer populations.[ 13]

Faced with the flight of better-off whites to the suburbs, city planners wanted to keep the working-class white population in declining inner-city areas like the South Bronx and central Brooklyn, rather than seeing them move to new apartment buildings in outlying city neighborhoods. That would help stop the spreading "blight" represented by racial and ethnic change. Planners viewed this policy as neighborhood stabilization, but the upshot would be that the incoming poor nonwhite migrants were constrained in their housing choices to a small number of overcrowded neighborhoods.

That attempted social engineering was undercut by the city's own policies, shaped by ongoing political pressures. High levels of housing construction continued through the grace period in the downzoned neighborhoods, and city and state officials continued to approve large publicly subsidized developments, such as Co-op City in the Bronx and Starrett City in Brooklyn, that emptied inner-city neighborhoods of their remaining white residents. Neighborhood racial and ethnic change became commonplace. Meanwhile, urban renewal became discredited through the writings of critics such as Jane Jacobs, whose Death and Life of Great American Cities was published in 1961. City officials ultimately understood by the early 1980s that blight could be remediated much more humanely by housing rehabilitation rather than clearance, avoiding the displacement of neighborhood residents.

However, the city did not, in that more enlightened era, forswear further downzoning. In 1973, zoning had been amended to create "infill" zoning, which allowed larger walkup multifamily residential buildings in certain zoning districts where new housing had been severely curtailed in 1961.[ 14] By the 1980s, the change had been modestly successful in facilitating teardowns of older homes and the construction of larger new residential buildings. The new buildings often had two legal units and a third carved illegally out of the ground floor, in order to avoid implicating the requirements of the state Multiple Dwelling Law (MDL), which applied to buildings of three or more units. By 1987, the zoning provision had become unpopular enough in Queens to induce a new zoning amendment to curtail its applicability.[ 15]

"New Urbanist" Reactions to Car-Centric Housing Growth

Another zoning change important for understanding the historical background of Adams's Zoning for Housing Opportunity is Lower Density Contextual Zoning (LDCZ), enacted in 1989.[ 16] This zoning text amendment rewrote the rules for zoning districts widely mapped in low-density areas, mostly auto-dependent neighborhoods where the characteristic housing development consists of one- and two-family homes and small walkup multiple dwellings.

LDCZ was drafted in response to a widespread perception among planners, community activists, and elected officials that the zoning then in effect was encouraging the construction of new buildings with illegal basement units in small homes, and that these units in turn were flooding neighborhoods with parked cars, leading to the widespread paving of front yards, continuous curb cuts, and the loss of on-street parking. Zoning, at that time, exempted the lower floor of each house containing a garage and a "recreation room" from the calculation of floor area. That space could be converted into an additional apartment.

As an illustration of this problem, the NYC DCP study[ 17] and presentation materials used a group of five, ostensibly two-family homes at 371-81 Bradley Avenue in the Manor Heights neighborhood of Staten Island ( Figure 1). Three electric meters are visible from the street for some of the buildings, and the development may contain as many as 15 units. The front yard effectively was converted into a large parking lot, eliminating all on-street parking that otherwise might be available to nonresidents, and creating an aesthetically unappealing streetscape.

LDCZ incorporated "New Urbanist" principles as planners essentially rediscovered site-planning practices that architects of previous decades had understood well. These principles had been incorporated into well-publicized communities, such as Seaside and Celebration in Florida.[ 18] One of the most important principles was to move off-street parking out of the front yard. Older one- and two-family homes typically had parking located in a garage in the rear yard, accessed through a side-yard driveway. That simple design change preserved on-street parking and made front-yard planting much more likely ( Figure 2).

In addition to curtailing the ground-floor floor area exemption and incorporating New Urbanist design principles, LDCZ created "contextual" zoning districts that could be (and were) used to fit zoning to a neighborhood's built context and forestall physical change in the neighborhood.

Vehicle Ownership vs. Transit Access

A long list of downzoning actions followed, intended to curtail growth in the lower-density parts of the city, which continued through the mayoral administration of Michael Bloomberg, who left office at the end of 2013. Hostility to racial and ethnic change was often present in communities that organized to demand restrictive zoning.[ 19] However, bona fide land-use concerns also existed. Many areas that were downzoned had high levels of car ownership and were seemingly flooded with parked cars. A 2009 NYC DCP study found that in "outer ring" community districts in the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens-corresponding to an area over 8 miles from Times Square where many of the downzonings took place-the average car ownership in new one- and two-family housing was 1.45 per household.[ 20] These are, in many cases, the neighborhoods that the subway never reached. Almost every neighborhood has bus service within walking distance, but residents did not perceive the available service as an adequate substitute for car ownership. As a result, street parking and homes' onsite open spaces were overutilized to store vehicles.

A more vehement demand for downzoning swept Staten Island, encouraged by local elected officials, in the early 2000s. Unlike in the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens, where DCP negotiated with city council members to "trade" downzonings in low-density areas for upzonings in areas better served by transit, on Staten Island the trade was for political support for relatively pro-growth mayors (if that growth did not happen on the island).

Staten Island is even more heavily affected by auto dependency, high vehicle ownership per household, and the conflicts between even modest levels of built density and the amount of land needed to store motor vehicles. An analysis of five-year (2012-17) American Community Survey data found that the average number of vehicles per household in the borough was 1.49. This figure increased as one moved from north to south among the borough's three community districts. For Community District 3, in the southern part of the borough, the average number of vehicles per household was 1.75. That compares with averages of 0.58 for Brooklyn and 0.92 for Queens.[ 21]

The housing completions data demonstrate the effect of downzoning: Staten Island had nearly 3,500 new housing units completed in 2003, but those totals fell off rapidly, reaching a low of 463 in 2022.

Still, NYC could perhaps have tolerated these downzonings in small-home areas, and still retained a relatively fluid housing market, as long as the policies did not affect housing locations better served by transit and less impacted by auto dependency.

However, another variety of downzoning also took place. In Manhattan, particularly, but also in increasingly affluent residential neighborhoods surrounding downtown Brooklyn, residents organized to ensure that they would have few new neighbors. Local groups lobbied for both the creation of new historic districts, effectively stopping development, and downzonings. Consequently, housing construction has fallen dramatically in Manhattan, the most affluent and best transit-served borough. Between 2001 and 2011, an 11-year period, Manhattan housing completions fell below 5,000 units in only one year, 2003, when 4,718 units were completed. But from 2012 to 2022, Manhattan housing completions fell below 5,000 in nine of those 11 years. The focus of the city's housing construction has shifted to Brooklyn, where, in recent years, the number of completed housing units has sometimes been more than double Manhattan's.

Much of the Manhattan downzoning took place in the 1980s and early 1990s. For much of this period, the final decision-maker on zoning was the Board of Estimate, in which the mayor, city council president, and comptroller each had two votes, and each borough president had one. This structure overrepresented Manhattan, since the mayor and often one or both other citywide officials, as well as the borough president, were Manhattan residents. As a consequence, today Manhattan has limited zoned capacity for new housing.

An additional, deleterious set of policies relates to the ongoing retention of manufacturing zones where new housing is prohibited. Here, a sound idea is undermined by a lack of attention to changes in land-use conditions over time. There exist land uses that should be separated from residences. While the city no longer has a large presence of manufacturing, it does have a large and, until recently, growing distribution sector that depends on the movement of large trucks at all hours. Sites also need to be found for land uses such as bus garages and recycling facilities that should not be located close to housing.

The city retains many manufacturing zones, however, that do not include such land uses and where housing is desirable. In 2001, for example, MTA completed the subway connection to the 63rd Street tunnel, part of the Program for Action, resulting in frequent service from the 21st Street-Queensbridge station in Long Island City, Queens, to midtown Manhattan. However, the city failed to rezone the large manufacturing zone near the station to permit housing, an obviously desirable land use given the transit access. Seizing what opportunity existed, real-estate developers constructed large numbers of hotels in the area, ending any meaningful possibility of industrial investment. Yet the antiquated housing restrictions remain.[ 22]

High Rents, High Sale Prices: NYC's Housing Shortage Today

Despite these ill-considered zoning policies, the city has prospered, which means that it has been consistently unable to house its own labor force. As NYC DCP's "City of Yes for Housing Opportunity" online presentation points out, jobs have increased much faster than housing supply.[ 23] To close this gap, the city has relied, to some extent, on high housing production in northern New Jersey;[ 24] but it has also experienced a rent squeeze on newcomers who lack access to rent-regulated apartments and who seek housing in the unregulated market. In July 2023, average and median Manhattan market rents, as well as rental price per square foot, were at a record high.[ 25] Manhattan rents act as a pacesetter, pulling up rents throughout the city. While there were no new Manhattan rent records in August, Brooklyn and northwest Queens set new highs for average market rents and rental price per square foot, and northwest Queens also set a new high for median rent.[ 26]

High rents in the city's strongest-market neighborhoods cause prospective renters to look elsewhere and put pressure on unregulated rents throughout the city. The rent squeeze discourages all but the best-paid workers from taking jobs in NYC and encourages young-adult high school and college graduates to take jobs in other cities where housing is more affordable, even at lower levels of pay.

High rents also influence housing prices, since homeownership is an alternative to renting. However, the transmission of these rent pressures to housing prices is affected by rising mortgage interest rates, which exert pressure on prices in the opposite direction. The median co-op and condominium sales price in the third quarter of 2023 in Manhattan fell somewhat from its 2022 peak but remains well above pre-pandemic levels.[ 27] In Brooklyn, the median sales price for co-ops, condominiums and one- to three-family houses in Q2 2023 was below the record set in Q2 2022, but also well above pre-pandemic levels.[ 28] Queens in Q2 2023 was much the same, although median sales price peaked at the end of 2021 in that borough.[ 29]

NYC's Proposed Zoning Changes: A Necessary Political Gamble

The city's proposal represents a repudiation of much of the zoning enacted in the City Planning Commission's 85-year history. Even preceding the 1961 zoning, detached-single-family residence districts were created in a 1938 amendment, and residential off-street parking requirements were instituted in 1950.[ 30] These are now proposed to be cast aside. The proposed amendments also reverse, in whole or in part, some of the residential downzonings of 1961 and subsequent years. NYC zoning has long been responsive to the perceived needs of homeowners and the well-off. Now, these same entrenched interests are, in effect, being told that in the name of equity, the needs of renters, as well as households at a broad range of incomes that are currently shut out of the city's housing market, will take precedence. It's a breathtaking political gamble by the mayor.

The proposal can be characterized as: (1) changes that affect medium- and high-density districts; (2) changes that affect low-density districts; and (3) changes with citywide effect. These categories are discussed below.

Medium- and High-Density Districts

These zoning districts[ 31] encompass most of the city's apartment buildings of four stories or more, ranging up to the high-rises found in Manhattan, downtown Brooklyn, Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Long Island City, and Mott Haven in the Bronx. Because of the sheer size of the new buildings permitted, and the close relationship between where medium- and high-density districts are mapped and the subway system, these districts have historically accounted for most of the city's new housing production. It is not likely that Zoning for Housing Opportunity will have its greatest housing production effect in these districts, for two reasons.

First, housing is inherently cheaper to construct in low-density districts, where many new housing units would be at ground level or walkups, so, elevators would be unnecessary. That creates the potential for a larger range of incomes to be served, without needing to tap the city's limited subsidy resources. Second, small residential buildings of 10 units or fewer are favorably treated in the property-tax system. Rental buildings of more than 10 units are unfavorably taxed. Changing that requires action of the state legislature, which is unlikely because the tax burden would need to be shifted to homeowners, the very constituency that has dominated local politics for decades.[ 32] Because the tax problem seems permanent, new housing construction in medium- and high-density districts has become very dependent on a property tax-exemption program, known as Section 421a, that lapsed in June 2022.

This dependence became even more marked after 2016, when the city instituted Mandatory Inclusionary Housing (MIH), a policy of requiring new residential buildings to include specified, large percentages of well-below-market "affordable" units after a rezoning.[ 33] MIH imposed such a sizable exaction on new housing, that it was economically feasible (without additional public subsidies such as federal low-income housing tax credits or city capital budget funding) only in areas with very high market rents-and even then, only if those buildings were eligible for Section 421a tax benefits.[ 34] While condominiums are under a more favorable underlying property tax regime, they generally did not qualify for the 421a benefit, which made such buildings infeasible in any rezoned area subject to MIH. Because 421a has lapsed, MIH is generally not feasible for privately financed mixed-income housing in any neighborhood.

The mayoral administration of Michael Bloomberg (2002-13) instituted another zoning device to encourage inclusion of below-market-rent units in new housing. That device, called the Inclusionary Housing Program (later known as Voluntary Inclusionary Housing, or VIH) provided increased floor area for developers that voluntarily provided "affordable" units. It worked well where it was effectively coordinated with Section 421a benefits, in the form that existed during much of Bloomberg's tenure. That version of 421a, which lapsed in 2015, created a Geographic Exclusion Area where no tax benefits were available without the provision of units at below-market rents. While the VIH mechanism continued to exist after 2015, it was less effective because tax benefits were no longer as well coordinated with the geography in which the program operated.[ 35]

That background is important in understanding the city's proposal in medium- and high-density districts. The city's flagship change is to create a floor area increment, citywide, for buildings that are wholly or partially affordable or supportive housing.[ 36] In an R6A district, for example, which allows new apartment buildings of about six or seven stories, the floor area increment would be 30%-a floor area ratio (FAR)[ 37] of 3.0 to FAR of 3.9-adding roughly two more stories.

The floor area increments would vary by zoning district, based on similar increments for senior housing, created in 2016.[ 38] Districts that did not then have floor area increments for senior housing would now have them, and the new citywide incentive would replace the Bloomberg-era VIH floor area bonuses, which applied only in designated areas.

Because of fair housing law, senior housing is developed only in buildings entirely dedicated to that use.[ 39] The 2016 zoning amendment has been effective in allowing the city to expand the city's stock of affordable senior housing, using tax-exempt bonds, federal low-income housing tax credits, and other subsidy sources.[ 40] The rationale for the floor area increment enacted in 2016 was first, that affordable senior housing was in high demand, with the aging of the population and the large numbers of New Yorkers living in walkups and other types of housing unsuitable for frail seniors; and second, that senior housing has fewer land-use impacts than family housing, since low-income seniors generally do not own cars or place other demands on public infrastructure, such as schools or transit. Thus, larger buildings would house more seniors and not create any adverse land-use impacts.

The new amendment would extend this logic to other types of affordable housing. These are equally in high demand, given the supply constraints that push up the rents or sales prices of the few available units. While low-income residents own few cars, they do use public infrastructure. Here, the new amendment's argument is that by concentrating new affordable housing in the city's most transit-served neighborhoods, the city can take advantage of transit capacity that was freed up by pandemic-induced ridership declines and school capacity freed up by enrollment declines.[ 41] Unlike senior housing, however, family affordable housing can be in mixed-income buildings. For example, in the R6A example above, up to 3.0 FAR of floor area can be used for market-rate housing, and only the 0.9 FAR increment must be used for affordable housing.

As with the Bloomberg-era VIH, the production of affordable units depends on the reinstatement of 421a, or an equally effective tax incentive, drafted so that the tax exemption is available only to buildings that utilize the floor area increment. In the absence of such an incentive, the floor area increment will be used only for heavily subsidized, 100%-affordable buildings, which qualify for tax exemptions under other provisions of law that do not expire.

Another notable proposal would make changes to "tower-on-a-base" rules in the city's highest-density districts. These rules require a specific design configuration in which a "base," covering most of the lot, sits below a "tower," the narrower, high-rise building structure on the base. In 2022, I noted that in Community District 8, Manhattan (Upper East Side), "tower-on-a-base" was one of the devices that the city had adopted over time to suppress new housing construction, because it limits the size of new residential buildings. I recommended repealing these rules.[ 42] While the city's proposal does not go as far as I would, it does achieve a small liberalization, which might result in construction of a few more new housing units in one of the city's most affluent neighborhoods.[ 43]

Low-Density Districts

Zoning for Housing Opportunity aggressively seeks to increase the amount of housing produced in low-density zoning districts.[ 44] These areas, which are characterized by small homes and low-scale apartment buildings, have been continuously downzoned for decades, and today produce very little new housing.

The city's newfound aggressiveness has two causes. First, the Adams administration has set a goal of spreading housing growth to every community district, including those that have little or no medium- and high-density zoning. Second, the uncertainty about the reinstatement of the Section 421a tax exemption causes the city to emphasize opportunities in low-density areas where new buildings would be characteristically small. Rental buildings of 10 units or fewer are taxed at a much lower percentage of market value than larger rentals.
Floor Area Increases
The city's proposal would increase the permitted FAR in most low-density districts by about 10, to as much as 50%.[ 45] Combined with changes to other restrictive provisions such as height, lot coverage, lot size, and required yards, this would increase the amount of housing that can be built and make teardowns of older housing more likely.

We can see the effects via an example of a 4,000 square foot, 40' x 100' lot in an R3-1 district. This district permits detached and semidetached (i.e., attached to another house on only one side) one- and two-unit homes.[ 46] Current zoning permits 0.6 FAR, or 2,400 square feet of floor area. This floor area would likely be developed in a detached two-story, two-family home, with one unit above the other. Figure 3 shows an example of such a house, located in an R3-1 district in Mill Basin, Brooklyn.

Side-by-side homes would be allowed, but because eight-foot side yards are required, the homes could be only 12 feet wide each, resulting in cramped interior spaces.

The city now proposes to increase the FAR to 0.75, or 3,000 square feet, a 25% increase. Side yards are reduced to five feet, meaning that two side-by-side homes could each be 15 feet wide, permitting a better interior layout. Moreover, with each side-by-side home having 1,500 square feet of floor area, each could have two units, one above the other. Thus, two units potentially become four. That might make tearing down an existing home more worthwhile to a developer.
Qualifying Sites
In the Greater Transit-Oriented Development Area, a subset of low-density districts that are relatively well served by transit (either subway or commuter rail),[ 47] the Adams administration's proposals go further, making teardowns more likely. Floor area increases would be larger for "qualifying sites" of over 5,000 square feet.[ 48]

The city's explanatory document describes these changes as introducing "missing middle housing," a term much in vogue in U.S. planning circles these days. Missing middle housing is seen as a way to introduce moderate density increases in neighborhoods that were previously zoned exclusively, or primarily, for single-family homes.

Take a different R3-1 district example, where two semi-detached single-family homes sit side by side on two lots, each 25' x 100', or 2,500 square feet each, which together meet the threshold. Figure 4 shows a typical pair of houses in Bayside, Queens, built in the 1950s. The current homes have FAR just below 0.5, and 0.6 is permitted.

The FAR would be increased to 1.0, a 67% increase in the permitted maximum. Two new houses could be 2,500 square feet each, a doubling in size. Moreover, the two-unit cap on each lot would be lifted. Two side-by-side houses could each have three units. Thus, the two units at present could become six.
Low-Density Commercial Districts
In low-density commercial districts,[ 49] even larger floor area increments would be permitted, ranging from 1.5 to 2.5 FAR, including ground-floor commercial space.[ 50] This change would produce large numbers of mixed-use buildings (apartments over ground-floor commercial), likely ranging from three to five stories on lots that currently are occupied by low-rise commercial buildings.[ 51]

New housing in low-density commercial districts is likely to generate somewhat lower car ownership per household, compared with both the low-density sites affected by the proposed new base FARs and the "qualifying sites" with enhanced FARs. This is because many services will be within walking distance, and low-density commercial streets often have frequent bus service or, more rarely, are close to subways or commuter rail. Moreover, many of these areas already have apartment buildings, usually predating the 1961 zoning, so introducing new ones does not represent as dramatic a change in neighborhood character as such buildings would create on side streets characterized by small homes.
Lot Area and Lot Width
In NYC zoning, minimum lot area and minimum lot width provisions determine whether a given lot can be subdivided. Lot subdivisions are a way to increase housing-unit density without changing the permitted types of residential buildings. In a zoning district permitting only single-family homes, changing the rules to allow lot subdivisions would allow one house to be demolished, and replaced by two. The new proposal[ 52] would reduce minimum lot area and lot width in many districts but would have its greatest effect in districts currently permitting only single-family detached homes.[ 53] In the widely mapped R2 district, minimum lot width, and lot size, currently 40 feet and 3,800 square feet, respectively, would change to 30 feet and 2,850 square feet. A 60-foot-wide, 6,000-square-foot lot is not currently subdividable; with this change, it would be.

In other low-density districts, semi-detached and attached houses are allowed with a small minimum lot size that already facilitates lot subdivisions. Single-family detached neighborhoods are among the city's most affluent, and homeowners with large lots, in some cases, can subdivide under current zoning but choose not to do so. The proposed change would increase the number of lots where a home for sale could be acquired by a developer that intends to subdivide.
Accessory Dwelling Units
The proposal would allow an additional dwelling unit, defined as an "Accessory Dwelling Unit" (ADU), on lots that have single- and two-family residences.[ 54] Combined with the lot area and lot width changes just described, this change could transform a lot that is now allowed to have only a single-family residence into as many as four units.

ADUs could be within the same building as other dwelling units on the lot, attached to that building, or located separately in the rear yard. The city will seek legislation exempting ADUs located in the same building as two existing units from triggering the requirements of the state MDL. The ADU provision, with the accompanying state legislation, would permit the legalization of existing apartments that have been carved out of basement garages and recreation rooms.

ADU liberalization is widely viewed by U.S. state and local governments as a means of boosting housing production while respecting the built context of low-density neighborhoods. In Los Angeles, for example, ADUs permitted by state law have become an important source of housing production.[ 55] ADU construction allows homeowners an income-producing rental property investment. Since market rents will be relatively high in high-income, single-family-home neighborhoods, this can be attractive, provided local governments do not attach undue restrictions. NYC would limit the size of an ADU to 800 square feet, but is not proposing other potentially problematic restrictions, such as owner-occupancy, required off-street parking, or discretionary review.[ 56]

Citywide Changes
Eliminate or Liberalize Unit-Density Controls
The new proposal also addresses unit-density controls, which are regulations that generally control the number of dwelling units in a building by requiring a specified average floor area per dwelling unit (also called the "dwelling unit factor").[ 57] The proposal eliminates unit-density controls over a large area of the city defined as the "Inner Transit-Oriented Development Area," which generally encompasses the areas of the city with good subway access.[ 58] Unit-density controls would also be eliminated for zoning districts permitting only one- or two-unit homes, allowing a two-family home to divide the permitted floor area with units of any size, provided that the maximum floor area for the lot is not exceeded. In other areas, the controls are relaxed.

This change would allow for more units in a new building relative to floor area, with a smaller average size. This enables developers to be more responsive to market demand for smaller units, reflecting the needs of an aging or unmarried population, where more people are living alone, or with just one other person.[ 59]

In a brief earlier this year, I discussed how unit-density controls reflected zoning's tendency to impose excessive controls on development, overestimating planners' capacity to engineer specific sociodemographic outcomes-in this case, the promotion of neighborhoods characterized by families, rather than singles.[ 60] This proposed change is a helpful deregulation that increases the availability of small housing units.
Shared Housing
The city also proposes to eliminate zoning restrictions on shared housing units-units without full kitchens and baths.[ 61] Zoning, interacting with other laws, currently restricts new shared units to community facilities-dormitories and nonprofit institutions with sleeping accommodations. New private, for-profit shared housing is currently prohibited by the city's Housing Maintenance Code (unless it is built with substantial city assistance). Zoning changes combined with changes to that law, which would need to be approved by the city council, could lead to the construction of for-profit shared housing for working adults resembling college dormitories, with lockable bedrooms and shared kitchens and baths.[ 62]
Conversions of Nonresidential Buildings
The proposal would allow nonresidential buildings in zoning districts that allow residences to be converted to housing, even if such buildings do not comply with zoning rules such as maximum FAR and the required dimensions of yards and courts. Such buildings could be converted if they existed in 1990, a cutoff intended to preserve relatively recently constructed buildings for business or institutional uses. Currently, conversions of "noncomplying" (as to restrictions on size and massing) buildings are limited to specified parts of the city.[ 63]

Residential conversions of non-residential buildings are currently governed by NYC zoning or the state MDL, whichever is more restrictive. Some changes that the city wants to make won't become effective without corresponding state legislation. The special, more permissive state law provisions for conversions apply only to buildings that existed on January 1, 1977.[ 64] Buildings that were built after that date, in the absence of state legislation, will need to comply with the underlying provisions of MDL, including a cap on residential FAR of 12.

The main effect of the proposed change will be to facilitate the residential conversion of large office buildings in midtown Manhattan and downtown Brooklyn, constructed between 1961 and 1977 (the 1977 date already applies in lower Manhattan). Allowing more conversions could mitigate some of the spreading financial distress among Manhattan office properties.[ 65] Importantly, the proposal does not require that affordable units be included in residentially converted buildings, absent state legislative approval of new tax incentives (and office-to-residential conversions are quite costly to begin with). With a state MDL change, this zoning proposal would facilitate the conversion of large office buildings in all the city's major business districts built between 1977 and 1990, which would have a big impact.

The city's zoning proposal would also enable conversion of commercial or institutional buildings outside the city's major business areas that are not currently eligible for the special conversion rules. Some of these buildings may be partly or wholly vacant above a retail ground floor because of lack of demand for the space. Because many of these buildings are small, the housing production impact would be modest.
Off-Street Parking
The new proposal would eliminate required off-street parking for new housing citywide.[ 66] Currently, no off-street parking is required in the Manhattan core (Community Districts 1-8) and Long Island City[ 67] and under some conditions in other areas. As I discussed in January of this year, the case against off-street parking requirements is straightforward; the only reason to have them is to make parking cheaper than it would be if provided only in response to market demand. Thus, such requirements encourage car ownership and use.[ 68] That unduly privileges the relatively affluent households that own cars and runs counter to the city's environmental objectives, which seek to encourage transit use, walking, and bicycling.

To avoid making political opponents of car owners who currently enjoy low-priced parking, existing required off-street parking for residences would remain required. However, such requirements could be waived by discretionary action.

In addition to eliminating off-street parking requirements for residences, requirements would be eliminated or reduced for commercial portions of mixed-use buildings. In the Manhattan core and Long Island City and certain other zoning districts, no off-street parking is currently required for commercial uses; in some other areas, it is waived under specific conditions. Under the proposal, regardless of the underlying commercial zoning district, no parking would be required for commercial space in new mixed-use buildings in the Inner Transit-Oriented Development Area. The same would be true of lots of up to 10,000 square feet in the Outer Transit-Oriented Development Area and lots of up to 5,000 square feet in the portions of the city outside the two transit-oriented development areas.

The elimination of off-street parking requirements for new residential and mixed-use buildings will have its greatest effect in areas where apartment buildings with ground-floor commercial space are allowed but infeasible because of the amount of required off-street parking. One such area is Queens Boulevard in Rego Park and Forest Hills, Queens, which I wrote about in 2022.[ 69] The elimination of all parking requirements should lead to the construction of new mixed-use apartment buildings on sites currently occupied by one- or two-story commercial buildings.
Railroad Rights-of-Way
MTA and Amtrak control substantial railroad rights-of-way and yards within NYC that could feasibly be covered by platforms, providing sites for new housing and bringing revenue into cash-strapped transportation agencies. In most parts of the city, such developments are regulated by a costly discretionary review process, intended to ensure that any platform allows continued railroad operations and does not unduly scoop up large amounts of floor area from a large or irregularly shaped right-of-way segment, resulting in a much larger building than can typically be built in the applicable zoning district. Zoning for Housing Opportunity recognizes that these issues can be addressed by less cumbersome and costly controls.[ 70] While NYC Planning's published document is vague about how this would work, the proposal creates a basis for a fruitful collaborative effort with the transportation agencies.

An example is a 60-foot-wide Long Island Rail Road right-of-way between 149th Place and 149th Street (a distance of 254 feet) in Flushing, Queens, immediately west of the Murray Hill station ( Figure 5). The site, zoned R5 in a commercial district, would be allowed, under the proposal, four residential stories above ground-floor commercial space on a platform at each street frontage. Since MTA would be the land seller, it could presumably set suitable conditions to ensure continued rail operations. There are no land-use issues requiring further discretionary review by the city.

Landmark Transfers
NYC DCP is using Zoning for Housing Opportunity as a vehicle to advance a long-studied proposal to enhance transfers of development rights from designated landmarks. Historic preservation laws have always faced concerns that imposing a preservation obligation upon a private property owner who otherwise could take full advantage of zoning is unfair, and perhaps unlawful. NYC tried to compensate owners of designated landmarks with a mechanism to permit unused development rights to be transferred to development on a nearby lot, either adjacent or across a street. The transfers, which provided no relief to property owners in historic districts, required a costly discretionary review process and were relatively rare.

The current proposal would increase the radius within which development rights could be transferred, make buildings in historic districts and buildings in lower-density zoning districts eligible, and simplify the transfer process for many applications.[ 71] All such applications require a plan to preserve the landmarked building. While these changes are not likely to have a large impact on housing production, they will make landmark designation less of a burden for private property owners and free up some "stranded" development rights.

Evaluating the Proposed Changes

Many of the proposed changes are sound and should be approved by the City Planning Commission and the city council. Some raise issues, which are discussed below.

Medium- and High-Density Districts

The proposed floor area increments for affordable housing raise issues. First is how the affordable housing within the proposed floor area increment will be financed. Below-market-rent housing units do not pay for their own construction costs, but real-estate developers still demand a competitive return on their investment. If there is no external source of financing, new buildings will not utilize the floor area increase.

The city has historically tried to reconcile its desire for mixed-income housing with the realities of development economics by making tax exemptions available to the entire building through the Section 421a program. The developer evaluates whether the net present value of the tax savings provides an acceptable return on the investment in affordable housing. If it does, the zoning change will be successful in encouraging mixed-income construction. However, the 421a program has lapsed. Without reinstatement of a workable tax incentive by the state legislature, this proposed floor area increment will be used only for deeply subsidized, 100% affordable housing, a much smaller stream of new affordable units than a revived 421a incentive can produce.

Second, the relationship of this proposal to the de Blasio MIH needs to be clarified. MIH worked economically (with tax exemptions but not additional subsidies) only in a relatively small area of the city with very high market rents, which could cross-subsidize the required percentage of affordable units and make the property-tax exemption more valuable. In middle-income neighborhoods in other parts of the city, new apartment buildings were routinely constructed under zoning in effect prior to 2014, when de Blasio took office.[ 72] However, land rezoned at medium and high densities with MIH were infeasible to develop without additional public subsidies. Many potential private applicants for zoning-district map changes were deterred because there was no viable option to profit from a rezoning.

The new proposal offers real estate developers two options if 421a is renewed: they can build condominium units at the "base" FAR (in our R6A example, 3.0); or they can build a rental building at the "incremental" FAR with 421a benefits and the required number of affordable units. In comparison with the economics of MIH, these two options greatly increase the area of the city where new medium- and high-density apartment buildings might be built without additional public subsidies (beyond the potential 421a replacement), provided such opportunities are made available.

It is unclear, however, whether DCP will allow private property owners to apply for a zoning map change under the new option, rather than requiring that they apply for a change with the economically less attractive MIH restrictions instead.[ 73]

Furthermore, the City Planning Commission and city council would need to be willing to approve such private applications. If the new proposal is insufficiently flexible, it creates a seemingly arbitrary category of grandfathered-in land that had medium- and high-density zoning prior to de Blasio's inauguration in 2014 (this is the cutoff year because subsequent zoning map changes have had MIH restrictions attached). These grandfathered lots can be developed more profitably and will be sold at a premium, offsetting some of the benefits of any revived tax exemption.

On the other hand, if the city is willing to entertain rezoning applications under these new rules, other issues arise. A significant number of residentially rezoned sites now exist in MIH limbo-not buildable unless the 421a tax exemption is renewed, and, in some cases, not even then, unless additional public subsidy is provided. Moreover, the city is proceeding with areawide MIH rezonings, in the face of uncertainty about whether these rezonings can feasibly produce new housing.[ 74]

The city should acknowledge-not sotto voce, as in the present proposal but frankly, that all affordable housing is subsidy-dependent. MIH is not, and has never been, some sort of free lunch. If the backdoor subsidy through the tax system is attractive enough, developers will build mixed-income housing. If it is not, they should be allowed to build market-rate condos, albeit at a lower FAR, no matter when the site was rezoned. The city should discontinue MIH affordability mandates and allow the proposed floor area increment, with voluntary provision of affordable housing in exchange for tax incentives, to apply citywide in medium- and high-density districts. That would help get rezoned sites in less strong market locations out of limbo and partially mitigate the effects of a continued legislative standoff over 421a reinstatement. It would also help ensure housing construction continues, even if new legislation continues the practice of "sunsetting" tax benefits after a brief period of eligibility.

Low-Density Districts

The proposed floor area increases in purely residential areas would allow more unit density, particularly on "qualifying sites," but also on the great majority of small-home lots subject to the underlying zoning rules. This raises several issues. Because the existing zoning districts were generally mapped based on substantial compliance for existing homes, allowing much more floor area and many more units would result in widespread teardowns. Whether one thinks this is good or bad, of course, depends on one's perspective. It's likely that many people who live in affected neighborhoods bought into them expecting that they were protected from change. On the other hand, as discussed above, uncertainty about the future course of Section 421a benefits makes low-density areas important to a citywide housing solution. Moreover, homeowners potentially benefit economically as their lots become more valuable, and many residents will understand the need to make housing more available and affordable, so that their children or aging parents can also find homes in the neighborhood.

NYC Planning's 2009 Residential Parking Study found that in the "outer ring" neighborhoods, where many affected low-density districts are located, average car ownership per household for new one- and two-family homes was 1.45; for three- and four-family homes, 0.89; and for larger multifamily buildings, 0.53.[ 75] Households select neighborhoods based, in part, on their lifestyle and expectations about the availability of on-street or off-street parking. Such expectations can be upended by rapid growth in the housing stock, particularly since off-street parking is often monopolized by the owner of a two- or three-unit home and renters rely on the street. Moreover, the new mixed-use buildings on commercial streets would likely not provide any parking but would still generate car ownership.

NYC DCP needs to consider urban design provisions that can alleviate the effects of higher density on the streetscape. In addition, planners need to determine whether the geographic range of the proposed FAR changes is optimal. Perhaps fewer community impacts are possible if more density is concentrated closer to neighborhood commercial streets, and this is combined with aggressive efforts to improve neighborhood services and increase the speed and frequency of transit service. Moreover, pumping up growth in low-density districts should not be seen as a way of evading the shortcomings of MIH and the implications of the uncertain future of the Section 421a tax exemption. Because MIH does not apply to low-density districts, facilitating new five-story condominiums in R5 commercial districts may seem somehow more acceptable than allowing seven-story condominiums on rezoned sites in R6A districts. This makes little sense, particularly because the medium- and high-density districts are mostly much better served by transit and exhibit much lower car ownership. In fact, a sensible option under this proposal for hapless property owners in an MIH area would be to downzone their property to R5 with a commercial overlay. At least then, they would have a viable development option. Each of these issues is addressed below.
Urban Design and Streetscape
The proposed FAR changes alter the look and feel of neighborhoods in ways that other changes, such as allowing backyard ADUs, do not. Moreover, the changes create the potential for genuine land-use impacts, particularly the problem of overutilizing land to store motor vehicles. The proposed underlying rules would result in less off-street parking overall in new buildings, since none would be required. Additionally, the proposal would result in less on-street parking because the revised zoning would lift restrictions on front-yard garages, leading to potential curb cuts in locations that eliminate curbside spaces. Front-yard driveways reduce or eliminate landscaping and, in general, create an unattractive streetscape.

NYC's lower-density neighborhoods are by and large pleasant places to live, and city planners should want to keep it that way. Increased density and good urban design should be partners. An important resource for advocates of missing middle housing is Daniel Parolek's book, with Arthur C. Nelson, Missing Middle Housing: Thinking Big and Building Small to Respond to Today's Housing Crisis.[ 76] Parolek's firm, Opticos Design, maintains a "Missing Middle Housing" information website.[ 77]

Parolek's prototypes are largely drawn from pre-World War II-era building types. He writes:

Missing Middle Housing is about house-scale buildings that happen to have more than one unit within them. House scale has a maximum width, depth, and height. ...

When communicating about Missing Middle Housing ... it is important to emphasize the form and scale parameters of these housing types because it can help build support from community members to allow more housing, but doing so without introducing large buildings into sensitive contexts. It is also this middle scale that allows the buildings to be built more cost efficiently to deliver attainability by design.[ 78]

Parolek's missing middle prototypes[ 79] are notable for a few reasons, in relation to the city's proposal. First, either the buildings have no off-street parking, or the parking is shifted to the rear of the house, away from the street, and accessed (where no through-block alleys exist, as in most of NYC) from a side-yard driveway. That makes front-yard planting more likely and preserves on-street spaces.

A second characteristic of these prototypes is the limitation on building width, or, at least, the width of the portion of a building accessed from a single entryway. These missing middle types do not have long corridors providing entry to many apartments. That helps maintain the low-density scale and perception, despite the introduction of many more housing units.

The missing middle housing prototypes cited by Parolek are uncommon in NYC, but, in such a diverse city, they can be found. For example, two fourplexes dating from the early 20th century stand at 27 and 31 Franklin Avenue in the New Brighton section of Staten Island ( Figure 6). Each sits on a lot of about 5,000 square feet and has a FAR of about 1.2.

Parolek's concepts should influence the city's zoning proposal. More effort needs to be put into thinking about how simple building-form controls can improve the streetscape as older homes get redeveloped.

"Missing middle housing," Parolek writes, is intended to "generate average densities ... needed to create a supportive environment for public transportation and also much desired neighborhood serving main streets that provide services and amenities that more and more buyers and renters are looking for within walking distance of their homes."[ 80] This quote highlights that the city's plan needs more than zoning reforms. There should also be components addressing walkable access to services and improving transit, particularly in those areas that do not have subway service. These components help reduce low-density neighborhood residents' perception that they need to own and park cars.
Walkable Access to Services
Many neighborhood commercial streets in low-density areas have extremely high off-street parking requirements, making the redevelopment of sites that currently have parking difficult, even where there is increased population nearby and more demand for services from customers who are walking from nearby homes. This proposal would eliminate off-street parking requirements for ground-floor commercial space in new mixed-use buildings, but retain them for freestanding commercial space. That means, for example, that a business with a parking lot could not redevelop that site with an expanded commercial building, if parking is required.[ 81]

Figure 7 shows a bank building in Forest Hills, Queens, built in 2004.[ 82] Under the proposal, the owner could redevelop the parking lot as mixed-income housing at 1.5 FAR, with no parking. However, the owner cannot build more commercial space on the parking lot because, in that case,

parking continues to be required. The city should consider waiving required off-street parking for commercial buildings in low-density commercial districts for all but the largest sites that are obviously drawing customers from a wide geographic area.

In a separate proposed zoning text amendment, Zoning for Economic Opportunity, NYC DCP is proposing to allow corner stores in residential areas with approval of the City Planning Commission. City council approval would not be needed. Such stores would be limited to 2,500 square feet.[ 83] That is quite small for a neighborhood store, and it's unlikely that there would be many applicants. Nonetheless, the proposal is reportedly controversial and may not survive the public review process. The travails of the corner-store proposal highlight the need to be more permissive on neighborhood commercial streets.
Improved Transit
The low-density neighborhoods affected by this proposal largely comprise portions of the city subway construction never reached. NYC DCP's proposed Outer Transit-Oriented Development Area includes neighborhoods in eastern Queens served by the Long Island Rail Road. This service, however, is expensive and infrequent during the non-rush hours. These same areas are served by limited-stop bus routes to the subway stations in Jamaica and Flushing. These routes are hindered by traffic conflicts, although the city has tried to alleviate them by creating busways during prime commuting hours near some subway stops.[ 84]

The Outer Transit-Oriented Development Area also includes areas served by MTA Staten Island Railway. That service is oriented to Manhattan ferry commuters, and Staten Islanders trying to move around the island without cars depend on buses that move slowly in traffic. In the peripheral areas where the new, denser underlying zoning rules would apply, public transit users are also reliant on buses.

The city's zoning plan should be complemented with a collaborative effort between the city and MTA to upgrade transit serving the city's lower-density neighborhoods. In the fall of 2022, MTA released its 20-year capital needs assessment for the 2025-44 period, a good starting point for the discussion.[ 85]

The report notes:

With the region projected to grow by nearly 1 million jobs over the next two decades, some of the fastest growing industries, such as health care, accommodation, and food services, require travel at all times of day and an in-person workforce. New Yorkers are increasingly taking subways and buses during off-peak hours for health care, shopping, social gatherings, and recreational trips. ... It is more important than ever to ... provide the services that our riders need, when they need it, to keep the region on its path toward growth.[ 86]

Furthermore, the report promises to support regional sustainability goals:

We look forward to partnerships with local ... governments that bolster transit ridership by supporting new construction around transit stops ... and improving adjacent properties and roadways for sustainable transportation, including exceptional bus service.

The city should seize the opportunity to work with MTA to facilitate dispersed public transit use, both geographically and temporally. Some of the impediments are well known. Commuter rail can't run frequent daytime service because of its high operating costs, and those costs can't be brought down without staffing reforms that are resisted by labor unions.[ 87] MTA has failed to implement all-door boarding, which would speed up buses.[ 88] Adams, for his part, has opposed taking street priority away from cars, and giving it to buses instead.[ 89]

All this needs to change. Adams has recognized the inequity of a legacy zoning framework designed to favor affluent homeowners, and courageously proposed far-reaching changes. But the transit services that new residents need are impeded by long-standing favors to well-off insiders. Commuter rail in the city should not be run as a premium service for suburban commuters, even if this supports jobs that technology has made unnecessary. Street management should prioritize people (in buses) over cars, just as zoning should. Bus operations should use technology to improve service. The apparent inability to improve transit to achieve global best practices feeds the public's suspicions that housing growth will just make their lives worse.
Reconsidering the Potential of Commercial Districts
Upgrading transit also provides an opportunity to review the proposed changes for low-density commercial districts. In May 2023, I wrote about the housing opportunities represented by commercial frontages on Northern Boulevard in Flushing, Queens, east of 150th Place.[ 90] As evidenced by new apartment buildings built in the more permissively zoned portion of the boulevard to the west, the neighborhood has a strong market for new condominium units. Zoning for Housing Opportunity would allow five-story apartment buildings with ground-floor commercial space. This is a big improvement over the current zoning but is still less dense than the western area, and less dense than the six-story apartment buildings built under the zoning in effect prior to 1961. Once these sites are redeveloped, that housing will continue to exist for decades. The land's potential should be maximized. With upgraded transit, housing densities at least comparable with those existing buildings should be possible in this and other low-density commercial segments in the Inner and Outer Transit-Oriented Development Areas.

The proposals for low-density commercial districts omit C4-1 districts, which are mostly mapped over large regional shopping centers with outdoor parking lots. However, housing is also allowed, and the applicable residence district, R5, would get 2.5 FAR and five stories in a mixed-use building, were it in a commercial overlay district. In May 2022, I pointed out the housing potential of the open parking lot at the Staten Island Mall, zoned C4-1 ( Figure 8).[ 91] As a regional facility, the mall needs parking, but not necessarily in an open lot. Shopping malls are job centers and often well accessed by public transit. Zoning for Housing Opportunity should allow them to take advantage of their mixed-use potential.

Zoning for Housing Opportunity is a generally strong proposal that can be improved, as outlined in this report. I have been critical of past housing initiatives, like MIH, that are marketed with progressive, equity-focused rhetoric but effectively suppress housing construction, harming the low-income population they purport to help. In contrast, this proposal would genuinely stimulate housing production and help address the city's chronic housing shortage. Combined with a good replacement at the state legislature for the Section 421a tax exemption, it could facilitate construction of mixed-income housing while reducing pressure on rents in older housing from higher-income households frozen out of the neighborhoods that they really want to live in by static zoning.

Whether the New York City Council will adopt this proposal remains to be seen. The proposal is practically a catalog of third-rail zoning issues previously thought intractable: increasing building height, tearing down small houses, taking away required parking. However, democratic politics often seem intractable, until suddenly change becomes possible.

For example, for decades, NYC had a Cabaret Law, which required a city license for any establishment that allowed dancing. Because the law made opening nightclubs difficult, getting rid of it seemed impossible, much as local officials wanted to let people dance where they wished. Then, one year, the city council was convinced that the law's origins predominantly related to the desire to clamp down on African American entertainers. That understanding sealed the law's fate.[ 92]

Adams may be able to make a similar case to the council and argue that this zoning amendment sets right the past wrongs founded on racial and ethnic exclusion. Understanding zoning laws in this light and passing legislation that would finally address the housing shortage would restore New York City to its rightful place as a leader, not a laggard, in a nationwide movement of zoning reform.

Eric Kober is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. He retired in 2017 as director of housing, economic and infrastructure planning at the New York City Department of City Planning. He was Visiting Scholar at NYU Wagner School of Public Service and senior research scholar at the Rudin Center for Transportation Policy and Management at the Wagner School from January 2018 through August 2019. He has master's degrees in business administration from the Stern School of Business at NYU and in public and international affairs from the School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University.
Please see Endnotes in PDF
Photo: cmart7327/iStock

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NYC's Mayor Adams Finally Faces Housing Crisis with Major Reforms

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In September 2023, New York City Mayor Eric Adams proposed "Zoning for Housing Opportunity," an ambitious set of changes to the city's Zoning Resolution, intended to facilitate increased housing production. The proposal, which incorporates zoning liberalizations widely adopted by other U.S. state legislatures and local governments, aims to distribute moderate housing growth widely in every [...]

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READ THE REPORT

As New York City begins to envision its recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and the movement for racial justice captures our national attention, the need for safe, healthy, and affordable housing for all New Yorkers has never been more dire. Yet over the last seven years, Mayor de Blasio's siloed approach to housing planning, with separate and unequal treatment of private housing, public housing, and homelessness, has failed to reduce racial and economic disparities and serve the needs of the lowest-income New Yorkers. This year, we will elect new local leadership. The challenges of this moment require bold leaders who will shake up the systems that have failed us and implement creative programs and priorities that acknowledge housing as a human right. This document provides guidance on how the next administration can ensure the right to a roof for all by rejecting austerity, ending homelessness, promoting racial equity, and prioritizing housing opportunities for those who need them most.

Priority 1

Create an Integrated Housing Plan to End Homelessness and Promote Racial Equity The next administration must create and implement an Integrated Housing Plan that brings together all the agencies involved in housing, building, and planning to create one coordinated strategy focused on ending homelessness and promoting racial equity. In order to accomplish this, they must create a new position of Deputy Mayor for Homelessness, Housing and Planning, and shift responsibility for oversight of and coordination between all relevant agencies, as well as creation of the plan, to this new Deputy Mayor.

Priority 2

Prioritize Need Over Numbers The Integrated Housing Plan must focus on providing permanent, deeply affordable housing for those who need it most and preserving public housing without privatization.

Priority 3

Improve Access to Affordable and Supportive Housing The north star of the Integrated Housing Plan must be ending homelessness. It must prioritize an interagency approach that streamlines the process for finding and securing affordable and supportive housing options, as well as promoting fair housing.

Priority 4

End Real Estate Speculation by Supporting Community Ownership The Integrated Housing Plan must stabilize neighborhoods by creating and preserving 100% permanent, affordable housing that is community built and community owned, and working to keep existing residents in their homes.

Priority 5

Ensure All New Yorkers Have Safe and Healthy Housing The Integrated Housing Plan must ensure that no one is permanently displaced due to poor housing conditions or harassment, secure our communities by ensuring the long-term viability of the city's affordable housing stock, and guarantee that every New Yorker has a safe, healthy, and stable home.

Priority 6

Support Planning that Centers Local Knowledge Within a True Citywide Framework Planning must be a key part of the Integrated Housing Plan to ensure that residents' voices are meaningfully incorporated, and to create an equitable approach that centers fair housing and neighborhood priorities so that no single community can stand in the way of critical citywide needs, such as affordable housing development and homeless housing.

As New York City begins to envision its recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and the movement for racial justice captures our national attention, the need for safe, healthy, and affordable housing for all New Yorkers has never been more dire. Yet over the last seven years, Mayor de Blasio's siloed approach to housing planning, with separate and unequal treatment of private housing, public housing, and homelessness, has failed to reduce racial and economic disparities and serve the needs of the lowest-income New Yorkers. This year, we will elect new local leadership. The challenges of this moment require bold leaders who will shake up the systems that have failed us and implement creative programs and priorities that acknowledge housing as a human right. This document provides guidance on how the next administration can ensure the right to a roof for all by rejecting austerity, ending homelessness, promoting racial equity, and prioritizing housing opportunities for those who need them most.

Priority 1

Create an Integrated Housing Plan to End Homelessness and Promote Racial Equity The next administration must create and implement an Integrated Housing Plan that brings together all the agencies involved in housing, building, and planning to create one coordinated strategy focused on ending homelessness and promoting racial equity. In order to accomplish this, they must create a new position of Deputy Mayor for Homelessness, Housing and Planning, and shift responsibility for oversight of and coordination between all relevant agencies, as well as creation of the plan, to this new Deputy Mayor.

Priority 2

Prioritize Need Over Numbers The Integrated Housing Plan must focus on providing permanent, deeply affordable housing for those who need it most and preserving public housing without privatization.

Priority 3

Improve Access to Affordable and Supportive Housing The north star of the Integrated Housing Plan must be ending homelessness. It must prioritize an interagency approach that streamlines the process for finding and securing affordable and supportive housing options, as well as promoting fair housing.

Priority 4

End Real Estate Speculation by Supporting Community Ownership The Integrated Housing Plan must stabilize neighborhoods by creating and preserving 100% permanent, affordable housing that is community built and community owned, and working to keep existing residents in their homes.

Priority 5

Ensure All New Yorkers Have Safe and Healthy Housing The Integrated Housing Plan must ensure that no one is permanently displaced due to poor housing conditions or harassment, secure our communities by ensuring the long-term viability of the city's affordable housing stock, and guarantee that every New Yorker has a safe, healthy, and stable home.

Priority 6

Support Planning that Centers Local Knowledge Within a True Citywide Framework Planning must be a key part of the Integrated Housing Plan to ensure that residents' voices are meaningfully incorporated, and to create an equitable approach that centers fair housing and neighborhood priorities so that no single community can stand in the way of critical citywide needs, such as affordable housing development and homeless housing.

Acknowledgments
Thank you to the following coalition members who contributed to this report:
ANHD: Barika Williams, Emily Goldstein

Center for New York City Neighborhoods: Christie Peale, Leo Goldberg, Julian Clayton

Community Service Society: Samuel Stein, Victor Bach

Make the Road New York: Jose Lopez, Javier Valdes, Jennie Stephens-Romero, Daniel Altschuler

Community Voices Heard: Afua Atta-Mensah, Juanita Lewis

MHANY Management: Ismene Speliotis, Celeste Hornbach, Arunabha Chakravarty

New York Communities for Change: Jonathan Westin, Cynthia Norris

RiseBoro Community Partnership: Scott Short, Emily Kurtz

VOCAL-NY: Paulette Soltani

Project Consultant/Report Writing: Lacey Tauber

Design by Partner & Partners

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Demands for an Integrated Housing Plan to End Homelessness and Promote Racial Equity

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Lines out the door to view a studio with a bathtub in the kitchen. Millions of applications to the affordable housing lottery. Tenants spending their entire lives in the rent-controlled apartments they grew up in. Penthouses listing for nine figures. Basements divvied up into dorm rooms.

To live in New York City is to spend your time searching for - or holding for dear life onto - the place that feels like home. This search unites New Yorkers across demographic divides, even if the stakes vary: A middle class family may strive desperately to find a decent three-bedroom in their child's school district, while a low-income couple tries to secure a safe apartment within the city limits.

Since last summer, the tension around housing has nearly reached a fever pitch, with rents climbing into the stratosphere even as the rate of new housing construction slows. Each day, it seems, there is dismaying news on the housing beat: A tax break meant to spur affordable housing creation expired earlier this year without a replacement program. Public housing infrastructure continues to degrade. Efforts to rezone and add units to the city's most sparsely populated districts stall.

Yet the deepening housing crisis has given rise to a new urgency to solve the underlying problems. Activists are making the argument for more housing, while elected officials are proposing laws that would make it easier to construct more housing faster. Everyone is aware that the city is in need of a housing renaissance, as soon as possible.

In this series, you'll learn how we got here, and how affordable housing works - and doesn't. We have stories of families trying to stay in their borough, win the housing lottery and get off the streets. And we report on a question that looms in the background of the housing crisis: How to prepare the housing stock for climate change.

As the city faces a housing emergency, join us to examine how New Yorkers find a home in the city.

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Home in the City | Spectrum News NY1 | New York City

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Visit an open HRA Benefits Access Center to apply. It will help if you bring proof of your identity, where you live, who lives with you, and your income. A worker will tell you which of these things you must prove.

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This free and easy program will ask you questions and make a New York City residential roommate holdover Notice of Termination or Notice of Petition and Petition that you can print, serve and file in the courthouse. You will also get instructions that will tell you what to do. There is a fee to file the Notice of Petition and Petition at the courthouse.

You can use this program if:

1. Your roommate is supposed to pay you rent to live with you

2. Your roommate rents from you not the landlord

3. Your roommate shares some rooms with you, such as a kitchen, bathroom or livingroom.

You will need to know the following information to finish the program:

1. If the premises is a multiple dwelling, you need the name and address of the registered managing agent and the multiple dwelling registration number. You can find this information at the NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development.

2. You need to know the date your agreement to rent to your roommate started.

Go to the Roommate Holdover Program

If this program is not for you, learn more about starting a roommate holdover or visit one of the Civil Court's Help Centers and speak to a Help Center attorney free of charge.

Who Can Use These Programs?
You can use DIY Forms if:

you're a court user and you don't have a lawyer;

you're a legal services provider;

you're a pro bono lawyer. Pro bono lawyers filing a DIY Form must submit thispro bono affirmation.

you're from a low-bono (reduced fee) program recognized and authorized to use the DIY Form programs by the NYS Courts Access to Justice Program. You must submit this low-bono affirmation with the filing.

Commercial use is prohibited and no one may charge for using these programs. When you begin the program, you will be asked to accept these terms of use.

Computer Requirements
In order to use DIY Form programs, make sure you have the following:

Help Using DIY Forms
See Frequently Asked Questions for help using DIY Form programs.

Please Note: It is always better to talk to a lawyer, if possible.

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The official home page of the New York State Unified Court System. We hear more than three million cases a year involving almost every type of endeavor. We hear family matters, personal injury claims, commercial disputes, trust and estates issues, criminal cases, and landlord-tenant cases.

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English | Español

These computer programs ask you questions. The program then uses your answers to make a form for your case or to make an information sheet to help you in court. These programs are not e-fileable. Your paper must be printed, then filed at the Court.

Available DIY Forms

NYS DIY Forms are only for court users who don't have a lawyer and legal services and pro bono attorneys and staff helping clients who cannot afford lawyers. Commercial use is prohibited and no one may charge for using these programs. When you begin the program, you will be asked to accept these terms of use.

See Frequently Asked Questions for help using DIY Form programs.

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The official home page of the New York State Unified Court System. We hear more than three million cases a year involving almost every type of endeavor. We hear family matters, personal injury claims, commercial disputes, trust and estates issues, criminal cases, and landlord-tenant cases.

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Smoke-free housing should not be an unattainable luxury. Every New Yorker, including families living in public or affordable housing, deserves to breathe smoke-free air. NYC Smoke-Free is working to expand the availability of smoke-free affordable housing to ensure that no family or child is exposed to harmful secondhand smoke in their homes.

While luxury condos, co-ops, and rentals are increasingly going smoke-free, this positive trend has been slow to reach New Yorkers living in affordable, public, or rent-regulated housing.

Over the last 10 years, NYC Smoke-Free has worked with building owners, landlords, and property managers to implement smoke-free protections for over 19,000 apartment units, impacting over 50,000 residents. In 2018, the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) implemented the HUD-mandated Smoke-Free Policy, positively impacting over 400,000 New Yorkers living in NYCHA developments. While significant progress has been made in increasing smoke-free protections for New York City residents, many neighborhoods still lack access to smoke-free housing options.

New Yorkers who struggle in the city's competitive housing market or are rent-burdened have few options but to stay where they are, even when their children and families are subjected to dangerous secondhand smoke pollution in their homes. NYC Smoke-Free can help you go smoke-free today - contact your local borough office for guidance, technical assistance and help with signage.

What is Smoke-Free Housing?

Smoke-free housing has strong public support and saves money for landlords and property owners. There are two types of 100% smoke-free buildings: those where smoking is prohibited anywhere on the premises, including individual apartments and common indoor areas, and those where smoking is restricted to a limited outdoor area.

What is secondhand smoke?

Secondhand smoke is toxic. It is a mixture of the smoke from burning any tobacco product and the smoke exhaled by a smoker. There is no safe level of exposure to secondhand smoke, and even minimal exposure has been shown to be harmful.

How does secondhand smoke affect me if I don't smoke in my home?

Secondhand smoke in multi-unit dwellings cannot be contained. Cleaning the air and ventilating buildings cannot eliminate the health hazard of secondhand smoke. Air movement between units in multi-unit dwellings is significant, with up to 65% of air shared between units in some cases. Exposure to secondhand smoke is dangerous to the health of all residents, especially children and seniors.

What are the benefits of smoke-free housing?

Residents can enjoy a healthier home and breathe cleaner, smoke-free air in their apartment and throughout the building.

Owners can reduce property damage and turnover costs by implementing smoke-free policies. They may also be able to save money on insurance by decreasing the chance of fire, as smoking is the leading cause of home fire deaths.

How much does it cost to rehabilitate a residential unit of a smoker once the smoker moves out?

On average, it costs six times more for a landlord to rehabilitate a residential unit of a smoker than a non-smoker. Rehabilitating a smoker's apartment would cost $3,515 on average, compared to $560 for a non-smoker's apartment.

Is it legal to go smoke-free?

There are no federal, state, or local laws that prevent apartment owners and managers from adopting smoke-free policies. Such policies do not discriminate against smokers; they simply require people to smoke outdoors, where their secondhand smoke will not drift into neighboring units. The experience of landlords across the country suggests that smoke-free policies are easy to implement and are largely self-enforcing.

What is Smoking Disclosure?

New York City has joined several other major cities in requiring landlords to disclose their smoking policies to current and potential tenants. Smoking disclosure policies provide current tenants with information about where they live and help potential tenants make informed decisions about where they want to live. Here is more information on smoking disclosure.

Are there buildings in New York City that are smoke-free?

The first residential buildings in New York to voluntarily go 100% smoke-free have opened their doors, and many more residences are considering going smoke-free. A recent poll found that nearly 60% of New York City voters want to live in a building that is smoke-free. Smoke-Free Housing NY lists housing that is smoke-free.

How can I help my building go smoke-free?

If you are a tenant, please refer to the New York Tenants Guide to Smoke-Free Housing.

The Smoke-Free Housing Kit for Landlords and Managing Agents outlines the benefits of going smoke-free and provides steps for developing and implementing a smoke-free policy for your building. It also suggests ways to educate residents and achieve compliance.

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Smoke-free housing should not be an unattainable luxury. Every New Yorker, including families living in public or affordable housing, deserves to breathe smoke-free air. NYC Smoke-Free is working to expand the availability of smoke-free affordable housing to ensure that no family or child is exposed to harmful secondhand smoke in their homes.

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After a more than year-long push from lawyers with the New York Legal Assistance Group (NYLAG), the housing authority is publishing all of its regulations in one document, which will be publicly available for the first time—and tenants and stakeholders have until next month to weigh in on the rules.

“[It’s] a huge step forward in terms of having a more participatory, transparent housing authority,” said Anna Luft, project director at NYLAG’s Public Housing Justice Project, where she represents tenants before NYCHA’s Office of Impartial Hearings, where termination of tenancy cases—the first step in the eviction process—are adjudicated.

For years, Luft said, the lack of a publicly available Admissions and Continued Occupancy Policy (ACOP) made it more difficult for her and other attorneys to defend NYCHA tenants facing potential termination, since it was hard to determine what the specific rules were.

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Admissions and Continued Occupancy Policy

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Note: This material is based upon work supported by funding under an award with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The substance and findings of the work are dedicated to the public. Neither the United States Government, nor any of its employees, makes any warranty, express or imp…

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Report Housing Discrimination – Main Page

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Home / FHEO Home / Report Housing Discrimination – Main Page

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Your Apartment, Our Guaranty

Finding the perfect apartment is every city-dwellers dream, but only becomes a reality if you can meet strict financial and high credit requirements imposed by landlords. If your annual income isn't more than 40 times the monthly rent, if your U.S. credit score is only 630 rather than above 700, or if you are foreign with no US credit, or if you aren't currently employed, or a US or international student, you can find yourself without many options. This is where Insurent® steps in to make getting approval a whole lot easier.

By acting as your lease guarantor, Insurent® takes the stress away and get your your dream apartment. Our program eliminates the hassle of finding a suitable co-signer.
Best of all, you can get approved in 30 minutes at the lowest guaranty prices, and the Guaranty is normally issued within 24 hours.
FAQs
View the Financial Guide to Renting
View the Tenant Participation Agreement

Our Benefits

Greater Access

Our lease guaranty is accepted by over 725,000 apartments representing over 7,000 buildings in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, Virginia, Maryland, Nevada, Washington, D.C., California and Florida.

More Approvals

We provide US and international students, recent graduates, retirees, international employed, the self-employed, relocating persons, and persons with significant cash liquid assets with more approval opportunities.

A Faster Process

Our Lease Guaranty is fully secured by the financial strength of Argonaut Insurance Company, an A- rated (Excellent) insurance company by A.M. Best, giving landlords and property owners peace of mind, and getting you approved faster.

Approval Process

Renter's FAQs

What is the Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program?

The Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program is the first and leading provider of institutional guarantees on residential leases accepted in over 775,000 apartments representing over 8,000 buildings in the markets of New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, Maryland, Virginia, Washington DC, Nevada, California and Florida. The Insurent® Lease Guarantor Service fulfills the need for a guarantor/co-signer when a landlord requires that a tenant have a guarantor or requires significant additional security or prepaid rent by the tenant in order to obtain an apartment.

How can I benefit from the Insurent® Lease Guaranty program?

The Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program will help you rent your chosen apartment without having to find an individual co-signer or lease guarantor acceptable to the landlord. It will also eliminate the need for significant additional security or prepaid rent to the landlord, and will quicken the approval process and shorten the time needed to obtain the apartment.

The Insurent® Lease Guaranty may be used in any instance where a landlord will require the renter to have a co-signer or guarantor.

Who are the various types of renters for who you issue guarantees?

We issue guarantees for graduating college and professional school students entering the workforce; non U.S. employed persons relocating to the U.S.; U.S. and international students with Responsible Parties; self-employed persons; relocating persons; non-employed U.S. and non U.S. persons with significant cash liquid assets; retired creditworthy individuals; and U.S. Corporations.

How much is the Guaranty fee under the Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program?

On average, the guaranty fee for U.S. parties will approximate 70% - 90% of a month's rent for the one year lease guaranty. Average guaranty fees for non U.S. parties without U.S. based credit history will approximate 98% - 110% of a month's rent for the one year lease guaranty. The guaranty fee is per lease, not per person. The renter pays the one-time fee prior to the execution of the lease agreement with the landlord. Guaranty fees for two year leases are approximately 85% higher than a one year lease guaranty, 18 month leases are approximately 39% higher, and 16 month leases are approximately 23% higher than a one year lease guaranty.

How long does it take to process the application for the Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

The online application takes approximately five minutes per person and the application is normally processed within 30 minutes with the Guaranty being issued within 24 hours. Applications with co-tenants must be completed by all renters for the application to be processed.

What are the basic requirements for a renter to qualify for the Insurent® Lease Guaranty ?

If US, a minimum annual income of 27.5x the monthly rent OR cash liquid assets/publicly held securities of a minimum of 50x the monthly rent, and decent to good credit.

If non-US, a minimum annual income of 27.5x the monthly rent OR cash liquid assets/publicly held securities of a minimum of 50x the monthly rent, and no US credit history required.

If an international student, a Responsible Party (normally a father or mother overseas) who has a minimum annual income of 50x the monthly rent in their home country OR cash liquid assets/publicly held securities of a minimum of 80x the monthly rent in their home country or elsewhere.

If a US student or US person with income less than 27.5x the monthly rent, the renter must have decent to good credit and a Responsible Party (normally a father or mother) who has a minimum annual income of 50x the monthly rent OR cash liquid assets/publicly held securities of a minimum of 80x the monthly rent. The Responsible Party is just a signatory on our Agreement and have nothing to do with the lease.

Who is the Insurer of the Insurent Lease Guaranty Program?

The Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program is underwritten and issued by Argonaut Insurance Company, a property and casualty insurance company rated A (Excellent) by A.M. Best and licensed in New York and 48 other states. Argonaut Insurance Company is located at 225 West Washington, 6th Floor, Chicago, IL 60606, and is a subsidiary of Argo Group International Holdings, Ltd., a publicly held multi-billion insurance company.

Can I use the Insurent® Lease Guaranty for any apartment?

The Insurent® Lease Guaranty will only apply to apartments located in Insurent certified buildings or buildings that will accept the Insurent® Lease Guaranty. You can search the Insurent® database of certified buildings. Presently over 775,000 apartments representing over 8,000 buildings accept the Insurent® Lease Guaranty. Insurent is continuously expanding its base of certified buildings. In the event that a building you are interested in is not currently in our database, please notify Insurent® by email to landlord-info@insurent.com, and we will contact the building owner to attempt to signup the building. Signup normally takes one hour if the landlord wants to signup their building.

Can I get pre-approved and fully approved for the Insurent® Lease Guaranty before I find an apartment?

Absolutely.

Sole Applicants or Applications with 2-4 Renters: Yes, you can apply for the Insurent® Lease Guaranty with no application fee and be initially qualified and receive will an Insurent® Qualification Certificate normally within 30 minutes. You can then forward all your documents to be fully approved and you can show the Insurent® Qualification Certificate to brokers and landlords in any of the 3,500 Insurent participating buildings to expedite the lease approval process. There is no application fee. Once you find your apartment, Insurent will just need the building address, monthly rent and lease dates to email you an Agreement and payment instructions before issuing a lease guaranty to the landlord.

What do I do if the apartment I choose is not an Insurent certified building?

If you want to rent an apartment in a building that has not yet been certified by Insurent®, the estimated time for certification of a building is one hour provided the owner/landlord wants to sign up their building. The Insurent® Lease Guaranty is presently available for market-rate and rent-stabilized apartments only, and it cannot be utilized for rent-controlled apartments.

Do all landlords in the NYC metropolitan area accept the Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

Hundreds of landlords owning/managing over 8,000 buildings representing over 775,000 apartments accept the Insurent® Lease Guaranty. New landlords and their respective buildings are being added on an ongoing basis. The NYC lease guarantor service began in New York but has expanded rapidly to other major markets including New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, Maryland, Virginia, Washington DC, Nevada, California and Florida.

Who pays for the Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

The renter(s) pays for the Insurent® Lease Guaranty. If there are roommates, you would normally divide the guaranty fee equally, but you can divide the guaranty fee any way you like.

Are there any additional fees or charges under the Insurent® Lease Guaranty, other than the guaranty fee?

No. The Insurent® Lease Guaranty does not require you to pay any additional fees.

Can the Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program assist me if I am an international student or US student?

Yes. We qualify an international student or U.S. student based on their father (or mother or some relative overseas or here) being a Responsible Party solely on our Agreement. Their father (or some relative overseas or here) would not be a signatory on the apartment lease. The father (or mother or some relative overseas or here) will just need to have a minimum annual income of 50x the monthly rent in their home country or a minimum of cash liquid assets/marketable securities held by them in their home country of 80x the monthly rent. We can also combine parents to meet the above tests. In the event that you fall into that category, please email us at renter-app@insurent.com so we can guide you through the application process.

The website states that the annual income or collective annual income must equal a minimum of 27.5x the monthly rent. Can the Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program still assist me if my income is less than 27.5x the monthly rent?

Yes. The Insurent Program can still assist you if you have a Responsible Party. A Responsible Party would be a person (normally a father, mother or relative) here or overseas (if you are relocating from outside the U.S.) who meets either of the following tests: (i) such person(s) has a minimum annual income (in their home country) of a minimum of 50x the monthly rent you are seeking or (ii) such person has cash liquid assets or marketable securities (in their home country) equal to a minimum of 80x the monthly rent that you are seeking. In the event that you are relocating from outside the U.S., the Responsible Party would be in your home country and the tests above relate to their income or cash liquid assets in their home country or elsewhere. In the event that you fall into that category, please email us at renter-app@insurent.com so we can guide you through the application process.

Can the Insurent Program help me if I just have significant cash liquid assets or marketable securities?

Yes. The Insurent Program issues guarantees for non employed U.S. and non U.S. persons with significant cash liquid assets or marketable securities (here or abroad). In such event, such liquid assets would need to be a minimum of 50x the monthly rent that you are seeking. In the event that you fall into that category, please email us at renter-app@insurent.com so we can guide you through the application process.

Can the Insurent Program help me if I have terrible credit?

Unfortunately not. The renter(s) must have decent to good credit to be issued an Insurent Guaranty for their lease.

Can the Insurent Program help me if I have no U.S. based credit history?

Yes. The Insurent Program issues guarantees for non U.S. persons with no U.S. based credit history. The Insurent Program can also issue guarantees for U.S. persons with no U.S. based credit history.

When is the Insurent® Lease Guaranty issued to the Landlord?

The Insurent® Lease Guaranty is issued to the landlord when you have executed the Tenant Participation Agreement and paid the guaranty fee. The landlord will not countersign the lease until the Insurent® Lease Guaranty has been issued to the landlord.

What is the duration of the Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

The Insurent® Lease Guaranty Policy covers one year leases (including one year leases plus a partial month), two year leases, 13 month - 15 month leases, 16 month leases and 18 month leases.

Is the Insurent® Lease Guaranty offered for rent-stabilized apartments?

Yes, the Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program is available for market-rate and rent-stabilized apartments, and not for rent-controlled apartments.

Do my rights under my lease with a landlord change if I have an Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

No. Your rights and obligations remain exactly the same, including your obligation to pay rent as required by your lease. In fact, you will be subject to legal action for the full recovery of any payments that the insurer makes to the landlord on your behalf.

Does the use of the Insurent® Lease Guaranty mean that I cannot be evicted if I stop paying my rent or breach any other provision of the lease?

In the event that you stop paying your rent or breach any other provision of the lease, the landlord will still take legal action that includes the commencement of an eviction proceeding against you. In the event that the insurer is required to make any payments to the landlord on your behalf, you will be subject to legal action for the full recovery of any such payments and your credit report will be negatively affected.

What is my maximum liability under the Insurent® Lease Guaranty, in the event that I breach any of my lease obligations?

You will be liable for any amounts paid on your behalf plus any legal fees incurred to collect those amounts from you.

What happens if I have a co-tenant or roommate?

If two or more roommates will sign a lease (i.e., act as signatories), and if one of the signatories intends to apply for an Insurent® Lease Guaranty, then all signatories must apply for a lease guaranty.

Once Insurent receives all applications that are required from signatories, each application goes through the evaluation and approval process. Insurent® requires separate applications from signatories because all signatories are bound to the rights and obligations under the lease.

A roommate who is not a signatory does not need to submit an application to Insurent.

If I have a roommate who will also be signing the lease, do we both have to apply for a lease guaranty, and pay fees?

Yes, you will both be individually responsible for payment of the Insurent® Guaranty fee. How you divide the fee payment for the Lease Guaranty between yourselves is at your discretion.

If my spouse or roommate has bad credit, but mine is good, will we still qualify for the Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

If your spouse or roommate is signing the lease, he or she must also complete an Insurent® application. Similar to when you apply for an apartment lease, if you file such a co-application, both of your applications will be reviewed. In any circumstance under which there is more than one signatory on a lease, credit problems for any of the applicants could affect the approval decision. In such cases, it is still possible to qualify with only the person having good credit being the signatory on the lease and the other person being solely an occupant. We may decide to put the occupant as a signatory on the Insurent Tenant Participation Agreement wherein both of you will be joint and severally liable.

I will be applying with my roommate(s) for the Insurent Guaranty. Do you look at the combined annual income of all of us or do we each need to meet the minimum 27.5x the monthly rent level?

We look at the combined annual income.

Can I pay the Insurent® Lease Guaranty fee in installments like car insurance and life insurance, and when do I pay the Insurent Guaranty fee?

No. The Guaranty fee is paid in full prior to the execution of the apartment lease. Payment must be made by cashier's check or bank check or money order. Cash is also acceptable.

I am a non-U.S. person with no U.S. credit history. Can I still qualify for an Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

Yes. Non-U.S. persons qualify for an Insurent® Lease Guaranty. Non-US persons qualify as long as they have a minimum annual income of 27.5x the monthly rent OR have a minimum of 50x the monthly rent in the bank/publicly held securities here or abroad.

We also qualify international students with Responsible Parties. A Responsible Party would be a person in your home country (normally a father, mother or relative) who meets either of the following tests: (i) has a minimum annual income of approximately 50x the monthly rent you are seeking or (ii) has cash liquid assets or marketable securities equal to a minimum of approximately 80x the monthly rent that you are seeking. In the event that you are an international student or fall below the minimum 27.5x the monthly rent, please email us at renter-app@insurent.com so we can guide you through the application process.

I am a college or professional school graduate with a job acceptance letter. However, I don't start my job for sixty days. Can I still qualify for an Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

Yes. The job acceptance letter is sufficient verification of your annual income for you to be eligible to qualify for an Insurent® Lease Guaranty.

I am self-employed and my earnings vary significantly from year to year. Can I qualify for the Insurent® Lease Guaranty?

Yes. Self-employed people are eligible to qualify for an Insurent® Lease Guaranty.

I expect to receive a bonus in addition to my base salary. Will the prospective bonus be included in the consideration of my application by Insurent®?

Total income including guaranteed bonuses are included in annual income. Expected bonuses are reviewed and may be given different weights, depending on your historical receipt of such bonuses, and the certainty of receiving such bonus.

What markets are covered by the Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program?

Currently, the Insurent® Lease Guaranty is applicable to apartments located in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, Maryland, Virginia, Washington DC, Nevada, California and Florida. We plan to expand the program to other major U.S. markets in the near future.

What are Insurent®'s hours of operation?

Insurent®'s hours of operation are Monday-Friday from 9:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. (EST), and Saturday and Sunday from 12noon to 5:00 p.m. (EST) excluding holidays. We also process applications in the evening and on holidays and issue Qualification Certificates at those times.

If I pay the guaranty fee and do not receive the apartment, do I receive a refund?

Yes. You receive a full refund of the guaranty fee in one business day.

About Insurent

Insurent® simplifies and eases the rental process for renters, brokers and landlords/property owners. See how we've become the industry leader over the past 8 years.

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Rental Guarantor Service | Renter Information

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Insurent's lease guarantor service makes it easy to get approved, even if you don't meet strict financial requirements. Accepted in NYC, NJ, DC, and more.

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The American Red Cross Greater New York Region Home Fire Campaign helps save lives by installing free smoke alarms, home fire safety education. Learn more.

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https://www.nysenate.gov/committees/housing-construction-and-community-development

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Housing, Construction and Community Development | NYSenate.gov

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Development and preservation of safe, decent, affordable housing; improvement of communities; rent regulation and tenant protection; enforcement of housing, building, and fire safety codes.

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https://www.nyhistory.org/citizenship-project/study-materials#study-materials

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https://eiic.org/
EIIC Queens Office

59-26 Woodside Ave.
Woodside, NY 11377
Phone: (718) 478-5502
Fax: (718) 446-3727

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The time may be coming to renew your health insurance! If you are currently enrolled in Medicaid, Child Health Plus, or the Essential Plan, make sure your contact information is up to date so NY State of Health can reach you when it's time to renew and ensure you avoid a gap in coverage.

Here are some things you can do now to get ready:
1) Sign up for text alerts
Sign up to receive SMS/MMS Text alerts from NY State of Health so you don't miss important health insurance updates, including when it's time to renew your coverage.

To subscribe, text START to 1-866-988-0327.
2) Make sure your address is up to date
Make sure NY State of Health has your current mailing address, phone number and email address so they can contact you about your health insurance. To update your information:

Call NY State of Health at 1-855-355-5777 (TTY: 1-800-662-1220)

Log into your account at nystateofhealth.ny.gov, or

Contact us at: 718-478-5502, ext. 103 or at 914-348-1175

3) Take Action
When it is time to renew your health insurance, you will receive a letter from NY State of Health or a renewal packet if you enrolled through your county's Local Department of Social Services or the New York City Human Resource's Administration. This letter/packet will let you know what you need to do to renew your coverage and how much time you have to respond. Follow the instructions right away.

For more information, visit:
https://info.nystateofhealth.ny.gov/frequently-asked-questions-about-renewals?utm_campaign=HomePage&utm_medium=organic&utm_source=socialmedia

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The time may be coming to renew your health insurance! If you are currently enrolled in Medicaid, Child Health Plus, or the Essential Plan, make sure your contact information is up to date so NY State of Health can reach you when it's time to renew and ensure you avoid a gap in coverage.

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https://streeteasy.com/blog/renting/

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StreetEasy shares everything you need to know about renting in New York City, from the most affordable neighborhoods to how to apply for an apartment.

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https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/nyscef/HomePage

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NYSCEF is a program that permits the filing of legal papers by electronic means with the County Clerk or appropriate court and offers electronic service of papers in those cases. Before filing,
view theauthorized courts and case types for NYSCEF.

To e-file without an attorney, visit our Unrepresented Litigants website.

1. NEW LIVE CHAT
ASK A QUESTION ABOUT E-FILING

2. SEND A DOCUMENT USING EDDSParties may utilize the Unified Court System
Electronic Document Delivery System to send a document to many courts where e-filing is not yet authorized, or where authorized*, to send a Stipulation of Consent or Letter Application to Convert a matter to E-Filing. For more information, see Sending Documents to the Court Using EDDS.

*Note: If you are filing a Stipulation & Consent to E-Filing in Bronx, New York, Orleans or Queens Supreme Court, please log into NYSCEF.

For emergency applications ONLY - in Supreme Court civil cases outside of regular court hours, call (800) 430-8457 or email emergency@nycourts.gov.

Search for cases as a public user. You do not have to login to search.

NOTE: NYSCEF has both a Live system and a Training system. Each system requires you to register and obtain a distinct user name and password.Create an Account

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NYSCEF is a program that permits the filing of legal papers by electronic means with the County Clerk or appropriate court and offers electronic service of papers in those cases. Before filing,view theauthorized courts and case types for NYSCEF. To e-file without an attorney, visit our Unrepresented Litigants website.

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https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/webcivil/ecourtsMain

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eCourts

Using our free case information services you can find future appearance dates for cases in Criminal and Family Courts. You may also view information on both active and disposed cases in Civil Supreme and Local Civil Courts, and by signing up for our eTrack case tracking service you can receive email updates and appearance reminders for Civil Supreme and Local Civil Court cases.

WebCivil Local

WebCivil Local contains cases from all the local Civil Courts in New York State (61 City Courts, the District Courts in Nassau and Suffolk Counties, and the New York City Civil Courts). You may search for cases by Index Number, Party Name, Attorney/Firm Name or Judge, and produce calendars for a specific Attorney/Firm or by Judge or Part. For a complete list of all the courts click here.

WebCivil Local

WebCivil Supreme

WebCivil Supreme contains information on both Active and Disposed Civil Supreme Court cases in all 62 counties of New York State. You may search for cases by Index Number, Party Name, Attorney/Firm Name or Justice, and produce calendars for a specific Attorney/Firm or by Justice or Part. Sign up for our eTrack case tracking service and receive email updates and appearance reminders for cases you wish to follow.

WebCriminal

WebCriminal provides information on pending criminal cases with future appearance dates for selected New York State Courts of criminal jurisdiction. You may search for cases by Case Number or Party Name and produce calendars by Court and Part or Judge.
For a list of available Courts please refer to the WebCriminal FAQ.

* All available WebCriminal information will now be publicly available at:

WebFamily

WebFamily provides information on active Family Court cases in all 62 counties of New York State and Integrated Domestic Violence (IDV) Court cases in those counties with IDV Courts. You may search for cases by File or Docket Number, generate a list of all pending cases for an Attorney or Firm or produce calendars by County and Judge.

WebFamily

eTrack

eTrack is a case tracking service which automatically sends you an email notification when activity occurs in cases which you have chosen to add to your Case Notification list. You can also schedule appearance reminders 1, 7, 15 or 30 days before each appearance. eTrack enables you to track active Civil Supreme Court cases from all 62 counties of New York State, cases from all currently-available Local Civil Courts ( click here for a list of courts) and Criminal cases in Local and Superior Courts in 13 counties.

eTrack

Copyright © New York State Unified Court System. All rights reserved. Revised April 18, 2007

UCS "eCourts" is not affiliated with Sustain Technologies, Inc. or with eCourt®, which is a registered trademark of Sustain Technologies, Inc.

Links to this site by permission only.

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eTrack users are able to track specific cases online and can choose to be automatically notified of any change in a case they are tracking. Each user also has access to a calendar of the cases they are tracking, and can view decisions online for many cases.

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https://www.nyc.gov/site/hpd/services-and-information/section-8-housing-search-resources.page

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Click a topic, or press the enter key on a topic, to reveal its answer.

1. Know your HPD Section 8 voucher/program

When you received your HPD Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher, you received an in-depth Voucher Briefing that informed you of your rights and responsibilities as a voucher recipient. We encourage you to keep the material provided at the briefing available for reference and revisit it as you need. You can also find it online at nyc.gov/hpd/dtr.

Knowing how your voucher works and understanding the process can help property owners view you as a knowledgeable resource, an asset to have as a tenant, and will help you more easily navigate the process from housing search to leasing up and moving in. Below are some key points to remember.

In most cases, HPD will provide subsidy up to the payment standard. The payment standard is the maximum amount HPD will pay for a unit, and the value varies by bedroom size. In most cases that do not involve mixed immigration status, your voucher allows you to pay approximately 30% of your monthly income towards your rent and HPD will pay the difference up to the payment standard.

In some zip codes, HPD uses Exception Payment Standards (EPS). EPS allows for subsidy levels that more closely match the local market. EPS is intended to expand housing opportunities in zip codes that have lower rates of poverty, lower rates of crime and/or have well-resourced schools. Please note that EPS applies only to HPD Section 8 voucher holders who are searching within New York City. To learn more visit the EPS webpage where you can see these areas highlighted on the map and find the corresponding payment standard based on the bedroom size and location of each unit.

Utility Allowances
When calculating how much subsidy HPD will provide, it is also important to know which utilities will be your responsibility. Each unit and building are different in what they require the tenant to pay. For example, in one unit you might be responsible for electric and gas, but in another unit, you might be responsible for gas, heat, and hot water. On the HPD payment standard website, you will find a table that breaks down how much utility allowances will be subtracted from your payment standard.

This means that if you have a 2-bedroom voucher, for which the normal payment standard is $2,107, and you find a 2-bedroom unit where you are responsible for gas and electric, according to the table the utility allowance is $121. If you subtract $121 from $2,107 the total is $1.986 ($2,107 - $121 = $1,986). Therefore, when you look for an apartment in a non-EPS area, you should look for a 2-bedroom that costs approximately $1,986.

Landlord Package
When you receive your voucher, you will also receive a Landlord Package. After you begin your housing search and a property owner accepts you for a unit, they will need to complete and submit the Landlord Package to HPD. You can submit the package on their behalf, but they can also submit it by mail or by using the DTR Document Upload Portal, which can be found at www.nyc.gov/hpd/dtr-forms. There are multiple steps that must be completed before move-in is approved, it's important for you to know them:

1. The owner and the property must be registered with the City of New York.

2. HPD has to determine that the rent is reasonable in comparison to similar units in the neighborhood.

3. The unit must pass a Housing Quality Standard (HQS) inspection.

4. You must receive a Notice of Approval to move in, which includes the preliminary determination of your tenant share of rent and HPD's share of rent.

5. You must sign a lease, and pay your move-in fees (including a security deposit).

6. The property owner will receive a Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) Contract to be signed and returned to HPD. Your signed and executed lease should accompany the HAP Contract.

7. You will receive a Rent Breakdown letter formalizing your move into the unit. The letter will let you know your share of rent and HPD's share of rent.

8. You must retrieve your keys from the property owner and begin moving into the unit.

For more information about the leasing process, visit the Section 8/Rental Subsidy Programs webpage.

2. Know your financial needs

Before you begin searching for a home, it is very important to have a clear idea of your financial picture, and to know how much you might have to spend on various costs associated with finding an apartment. Going into your search with an idea of normal costs and fees will help you budget while also helping you steer clear of scams and illegal fees.

Property owners can require up to one month of rent as a security deposit, paid up front when you move in. For example, if your total rent is $2,000, your property owner may request a $2,000 security deposit even if your tenant share of rent will be less than $2,000. Under current law, property owners may hold onto this money while you live in the unit, and when you move out, they may use a portion or all of the deposit to pay for non-payment of rent, damage caused by the tenant beyond normal wear and tear, non-payment of utility charges payable directly to the property owner under the terms of the lease or tenancy, and moving and storage of the tenant's belongings. Otherwise, they must return the deposit in full to you when the lease ends, within 14 days of the end of tenancy. To read more about security deposits, visit the Mayor's Office to Protect Tenants website.

Takeaway: Be prepared to pay another month worth of rent as a security deposit. See Section 5 for financial resources.

Utility Deposit
Once you've signed your lease, you should start applying for your water, electricity and/or gas service. Depending on the service, you can apply online or in-person.

If you're a new customer to a utility company and you're not transferring an account, the utility company may require you to put down a utility deposit or a letter of guarantee as a safeguard in the case of non-payment. Please, inquire at the time of your application, so that you can factor this cost into your total move-in expenses. Remember you will need to know which utilities you are responsible for so that you may calculate the utility allowance. (Link to Section 1)

Your credit score is a number between 300 and 850, which comes from a specific calculation related to your debt amounts, the length of your credit history, types of credit, and amounts of new credit. To view your credit score you either need access through your banking institution or need to pay a company to view the score.

If you want to see what housing history comes along with your credit profile, you can request a residential and tenant screening report from several credit bureaus. This residential consumer request gives you an idea of what owners will see as they screen you for the unit. You are encouraged to research and find a service that works best for you.

Broker's Fee
Brokers work to connect people looking for apartments with available units on the market. They are an excellent resource for identifying units in communities, including units that may not be listed online. However, many of them require a fee for their services. Broker's fees are usually around 12-15% of the annualized rent of the unit. [For a 12% broker's fee: if the rent is $2,000, multiply times 12 = $24,000. 12% of $24,000 = a broker's fee of $2,880.] Please note that it is possible for these fees to be higher.

The Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act of 2019 includes sweeping changes that can impact how broker's fees are assessed in the rental market. There is currently pending litigation that could make changes to how and when broker's fees may be applied. Please be mindful of how this could impact your housing search process. We will continue to provide updates as litigation progresses. For more guidance on the Tenant Protection Act as it relates to real estate professionals, please visit NY Department of State's Division of Licensing Service website.

Application and Credit Check Fees
Application fees for an apartment are now limited to fees for background checks and credit checks and cannot exceed $20 per unit. This fee can be nonrefundable for each unit you apply for.

Pet Security Deposit
If you have pets that you want to move with you, make sure to inquire with the property owner if pets are allowed. However, housing providers are required to reasonably accommodate persons with disabilities who rely on service animals or emotional support animals by providing exceptions to "no pet" or "no dog" policies. Property owners are also not allowed to require a separate security deposit specific to pets - they are limited to the one month of rent total for the entire security deposit, and they may not require a separate side deal or lease.

See NYC Commission on Human Rights for more information on service animals.

What Fees You Shouldn't Pay
Search fees - do not pay for websites or brokers that charge you money before you're able to see available units. Brokers are paid for their services only after you are fully leased up in a unit. Reputable websites do not charge fees to view units.

Apartment hold fees - do not pay brokers, property owners, or property management companies to hold a unit for you while they submit your application.

3. Know how to conduct a successful housing search

Source of income discrimination can happen when a broker or property owner discourages or refuses to rent you an apartment because you receive government assistance to pay rent. SOI discrimination can also happen when a property owner or broker requires someone with a rental subsidy to pay additional fees that they would not charge a person who does receive a rental subsidy. The source of income discrimination law protects you during your apartment search. To learn more about SOI in the City of New York, check out the Source of Income FAQ for tenants.

A property owner cannot refuse to rent you an apartment and a broker cannot refuse to work with you because you are paying your rent with government assistance. Brokers and property owners cannot use your government assistance as a reason for denial or unequal treatment during your housing search. Some may say explicitly that they don't take Section 8; this is illegal and can be reported to the NYC Commission on Human Rights. (See Section 5 for more information).

Watch out for brokers and property owners who:

Insist on cash for a security deposit or someone other than HPD to guarantee the rent

Insist on a minimum income or proof of employment if the voucher covers the full rental amount

Won't show you any apartments or fail to show all available units

Won't provide an application or insist on higher application fees than legally allowed ($20 per application)

Insist on a particular credit score when the voucher covers the full rental amount

Require cash or a credit check in order to view or hold the apartment

How to Search for an Apartment with a Rental Assistance Voucher
The internet is the most common place to search for a unit, and it often provides the most up-to-date information on apartment availability. The New York City housing market moves very fast and desirable apartments will likely have several interested people all applying at the same time. The following guidance will help you know what to look for, and what to avoid.

Do not be distracted by the rental requirements listed in ads, especially if your voucher will cover the rent in full each month. You should calculate how much utility allowance your unit requires (Link to Section 1) and then check to see if the rent is higher than the payment standard or EPS for the zip code with utility allowance.

Example: You have a one-bedroom voucher. You are looking for a unit in zip code 11378, which means your Exception Payment Standard is $1,944. You are responsible for gas heat and hot water, for which the utility allowance is $72. $1,944 - $72 = $1,872, so you should be looking for one-bedroom apartments in that zip code that are around $1,872.

Consider the following advertisement language:

"Tenant screening fee:" the only fee allowable is the $20 application/credit check fee.

"Stable employment required": this is considered source of income discrimination. A property owner must accept any lawful sources of income whether it comes from a wage, child support, rental subsidy, trust fund, or the like. The property owner cannot require the tenant to be working or to maintain a certain type of employment. If you have rental assistance, you may apply even if you are unemployed.

"Income 40x the rent": You cannot be denied an application or an apartment based solely on a minimum income requirement, your voucher will cover rent up to the payment standard.

"Decent credit (640+)": Property owners may not require a minimum credit score. Credit must be considered on a case by case basis.

"No evictions or judgements allowed": Property owners can only consider housing court history on a case by case basis. You cannot be denied an apartment or application based solely on your rental history.

Getting Off to a Good Start with a Broker and Property Owner
Below are a few tips for starting a good working relationship with an owner and broker:

When you go to view an apartment, limit the number of people you bring. For example, you may want to consider another adult who will also be on the lease or a trusted person who can advocate for you.
*If the apartment is not doing in person viewings due to COVID-19, make sure to request a video tour.

Come prepared! Make sure you have updated documentation (a sample application with information, proof of income, voucher, property owner package, copies of ID). Have an organized folder with all your key documents.

Be on time, proactive, engaged, and responsive!

How to Search for an Apartment Online
There are multiple apartment search sites. HPD does not endorse any one, but examples of some of the most commonly used sites include AffordableHousing.com, www.streeteasy.com and www.apartments.com. Choose a website that shares apartment listings. Most apartment search sites will allow you to enter information to filter your search including rent price, number of bedrooms, neighborhood, etc.

Some sites will list "fee" or "no fee" on the units. "Fee" means that the apartment is connected with a broker that will collect a broker's fee from you if you lease up in that unit. "No fee" means that there is no broker's fee associated with that unit.
Know the Maximum Rent You Can Afford

Remember that your rent must be within the payment standard for the unit size on your voucher and the zip code of the apartment, including utility allowances.

To determine the applicable payment standards for each zip-code and utility allowances by bedroom size, visit the Subsidy and Payment Standards webpage.

On that webpage, we have a Payment Standard Lookup Tool. On that tool, you can insert the zip code of the unit to find out the correct payment standard.

For example: in zip code 11222, a two-bedroom apartment can cost up to $2,635, and usually, HPD does not want to exceed that amount in order to reduce future rent burden assumed by the tenant.
However, it's possible that you can rent a unit with rent slightly above the payment standard. In that case, you must pay more than 30% of your income toward rent to cover the portion of the rent that is above the payment standard. If that amount is greater than 10% of your monthly income, HPD cannot approve the unit.

On the webpage is also a utility allowance table by bedroom size.

If the payment standard in that zip code is $2,635, and you are responsible for gas and electric, the allowance is $121. So, $2,635 - $121 = $2,514. You should be looking for 2-bedroom units in that zip code for around $2,514.

Some sites will only allow you to enter a round number, so in this case you would enter $2,500 as your maximum rent price.

Remember - side deals are prohibited, which means that brokers and property owners cannot ask or require you to pay extra money upfront or monthly.

Number of Bedrooms
You voucher size is based on the number of household members in your family- two per sleeping room. You may rent an apartment with more or fewer rooms than your voucher size, but it still must be affordable based on the payment standard for your issued voucher.

Apartment Features
Most websites allow you to select from many different features for your desired apartment such as laundry, etc. The more features you select, the fewer apartments you'll be able to see. Often features in the unit are also not listed for the search. Compromising and deciding between "must-haves," like an elevator for someone with mobility limitations, and "nice-to-haves," like a dishwasher, are part of the unique NYC housing search experience. Be aware, some buildings may offer extra amenities for a monthly, yearly, or per-use fee, like parking, laundry, rooftop access, etc., if you choose to take advantage. Make sure to inquire when you request more information about the unit.
Key Takeaways and General Housing Search Advice

Stress the benefit of having a Section 8 or any other rental subsidy tenant. Your rental subsidy guarantees rental payment if there is loss of income due to unforeseen circumstances, such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keep a log of all unit inquiries. Document which unit you inquired about, where you found the listing, whether you applied, whether you were accepted or denied, the reasons for the denial, and your entire interaction with the property owner or broker. This documentation can help you identify discrimination and support you in case you decide to act.

Make sure you understand how your voucher works. Rental subsidy can be a complicated process for brokers and owners. Helping them navigate this process will help make the lease-up and move-in process easier. · Be aware of how you'll pay the month's rent security deposit and other related fees, as well as transportation costs to view units in person and any fees to move personal belongings, such as a rental moving truck. See Section 5 for financial resources.

If you think you may have experienced discrimination due to your source of income, file a discrimination complaint with the New York City Commission on Human Rights, or call 311 or 212-416-0197.

4. Know your responsibilities under the voucher, the lease, and move-in responsibilities

Your voucher lays out many of your important rights and responsibilities under the Section 8 program. Please keep it as a reference for the future. The HAP agreement lays out many of all the rights and responsibilities of the Owner under the Section 8 Program. Your lease lays out all your responsibilities in the tenancy with the property owner. Make sure you keep a copy of your briefing book, your voucher and your lease for reference for your tenancy.
Quick Housing Assistance Payment Agreement Overview

What is your tenant share of rent (the amount that you have to pay each month)?

What date is your rent due each month? Are there late fees for not paying rent on time?

How does your property owner prefer to be paid? Some prefer checks, some prefer that it is mailed, some have online payment systems set up. It is a good idea to keep a record of payment each month in case you need to refer to it later on.
Some online payment systems allow automatic deductions each month from your bank account. This can be a useful way to make sure rent is paid on time each month to avoid late fees while also keeping an automatic record of payment.

What date does your lease start and end?

Are you responsible for setting up an account with the unit's utility company? Does the bill come in the mail or online?

This Tenant Fact Sheet can help you keep track of your rent and utilities, information related to your landlord including how they would prefer to be paid, and other information helpful to your new unit and your new neighborhood. You can either fill it out on your phone or computer, or print it out, to keep track of this important information.

Know Your Responsibilities as a Tenant

Your Lease Responsibilities
Your rent breakdown letter lets you know your share of rent and how much your property owner will receive from HPD. As you move in, it's helpful to have a conversation with the property owner or manager about how they prefer to be paid your portion of the rent. Property owners can be paid by cash, check, money order, online payment, etc. It is a good practice to get some form of receipt every time you make a rent payment to your property owner. You should also find out if you need to set up an account to pay the utility company each month, depending on whether your lease includes gas, electricity, etc.

Unit Maintenance and Repairs
It is your responsibility to comply with your lease terms and to maintain the standards of your unit. Regular cleaning and upkeep can help avoid money taken out of your deposit when you move out.

Familiarize yourself with repairs that are a tenant's responsibility versus repairs that are a property owner's responsibility, versus repairs a property owner must make but may charge a tenant for. It is crucial that you promptly notify and document to your property owner or property management company when an issue arises. To learn more about tenant and property owner HQS responsibilities, visit the Section 8 - Inspections webpage.

Recycling/Garbage
Know your building/unit's rules around recycling and garbage. Is there a dumpster? How does your building separate recycling, including food waste, oil, pet waste, glass, paper, plastic, cardboard, etc.? Are there rules about leaving garbage outside of the designated area? Do you need to take your garbage to the curb on certain days of the week?

Know Your Property Owner's Responsibility to You

When your owner entered into a Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) contract with HPD, they agreed to abide by a set of responsibilities to you as a tenant and to HPD. Some of those responsibilities include: enforcing the terms of their lease, screening their applicants in a non-discriminatory manner, giving 24 hours' notice to tenant before entering unit in a non-emergency situation, addressing life-threatening HQS failures within 24 hours, and having rent increases approved by HPD before implementing.

Know Your Responsibility to Your PHA as Section 8 Participant

Annual Recertifications
You will receive an annual recertification package to fill out every year so that your subsidy may continue uninterrupted. Make sure to accurately fill out the information and submit the package back to HPD. Please, respond for any additional information requests timely. Failure to submit or submitting false information on an annual recertification package will jeopardize your subsidy.

Interim Certifications
Your household may experience changes in between annual certifications. You must report within 30 days any changes to your household composition. Though you are not required to report increases in your income, we encourage you to contact HPD right away if your income decreases. HPD will process changes after you submit documentation to make sure that your share of rent accurately reflects your household. This process is called an "interim certification." In order to do an interim certification to make these changes for your household, you must report them to HPD by filling out this Declaration of Change in Household Composition and Income Form ( Spanish), which includes instructions for sending back to HPD.

Biennial HQS inspections
In order to ensure that you are living in a healthy, safe environment, HPD will inspect your unit every two years. They will help identify any failures that either you or your property owner need to fix. Failure to repair tenant-caused failures or provide access to the unit will jeopardize your subsidy. HPD may inspect your unit earlier than two years if given just cause. You may also request an inspection at any time.

Subsequent Move Requests
Once you have moved into your new unit, you must stay in that unit for at least one year before you can request a move voucher to find a new unit unless you have an emergency. Leaving an assisted unit prior to HPD approval will jeopardize your subsidy.

If you are in an emergency situation, you may request to move at any time. This includes individuals who are victims of sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, or stalking as well as individuals who believe they may experience a threat of imminent harm by remaining in the unit. To make a request for an emergency move, please email: Portability@hpd.nyc.gov. If you are in immediate danger, please call 911. You may also reach the City's 24-hour Domestic Violence Hotline: 800-621-HOPE (4673) for immediate safety planning, shelter assistance, and other resources.

5. Know the resources available in New York City

View a list of email communication or more information on HPD Section 8 Accommodations.

Human Resources Administration (HRA)
ACCESS NYC provides a single online location for New Yorkers to screen for benefit and program eligibility, learn how to apply, gather required documents, and find local help. Visit https://access.nyc.gov/ to see what benefits and assistance you are eligible for.

DCWP also partners with a number of City agencies, such as NYC HPD's Ready to Rent program, to help New Yorkers prepare to apply for affordable housing and the Mayor's Office for People with Disabilities with EmpoweredNYC to bring specialized and confidential one-on-one financial counseling to New Yorkers with disabilities.

HPD's Housing Ambassadors can help you prepare and apply for Housing Connect's lotteries. See their website to find an Ambassador near you at www.nyc.gov/housing-ambassadors.

Source of Income Discrimination
If you believe you or your household are victims of unlawful discrimination by your property owner or property owner, please consider reaching out to an agency who can help you.

New York City Commission on Human Rights
The New York City Commission on Human Rights is charged with the enforcement of the Human Rights Law, Title 8 of the Administrative Code of the City of New York, and with educating the public and encouraging positive community relations. The Commission is divided into two major bureaus -- Law Enforcement and Community Relations:

The Law Enforcement Bureau is responsible for the intake, investigation, and prosecution of complaints alleging violations of the Law. Learn more about the Law Enforcement Bureau.

The Community Relations Bureau provides public education about the Human Rights Law and helps cultivate understanding and respect among the City's many diverse communities through its borough-based Community Service Centers and numerous educational and outreach programs. Learn more about the Community Relations Bureau.

The New York City Human Rights Law is one of the most comprehensive civil rights laws in the nation. The Law prohibits discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodations based on race, color, religion/creed, age, national origin, alienage or citizenship status, gender (including sexual harassment), gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, pregnancy, marital status, and partnership status.

In addition, the Law affords protection against discrimination in employment based on unemployment status; arrest or conviction record; credit history; caregiver status; status as a victim of domestic violence, stalking, and sex offenses; and sexual and reproductive health decisions.

The Law affords additional protections in housing based on lawful occupation, family status, any lawful source of income, and status as a victim of domestic violence, stalking, and sex offenses.

The City Human Rights Law also prohibits retaliation, discriminatory harassment, and bias-based profiling by law enforcement.

To file a discrimination complaint with the New York City Commission on Human Rights, please call 311 or 212-416-0197.

At any NYC FJC, survivors and their children can get connected to organizations that provide case management, economic empowerment, counseling, civil legal, and criminal legal assistance. All are welcome regardless of language, income, gender identity, or immigration status. Interpretation services are available on site at every FJC, and locations are wheelchair accessible. Call ahead to request other accommodations.

Domestic Violence Hotline
If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic or gender-based violence, call the City's 24-hour Domestic Violence Hotline: 800-621-HOPE (4673) for immediate safety planning, shelter assistance, and other resources. TTY: 800-810-7444. In an emergency, call 911.

Advocates for Children offers a wide range of services for families with New York City students, including fact sheets, guides, workshops, and trainings to help families stand up for their children's educational rights. See their website for more information on what specific help they can provide.

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Section 8 Housing Search Resources - HPD

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You have received your HPD Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher -- what now?Finding a new home and moving into a new neighborhood in New York City is challenging for most families. However, in a competitive housing market, your voucher is incredibly valuable and can be a great resource to help your hous…

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Opinion: The Rent Guidelines Board Sucks. It Could be Great—Here’s How

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“If the Rent Guidelines Board is meant to protect tenants, its record is mixed at best. But the alternative, a city of free market rentals, would be much worse.”

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https://rentguidelinesboard.cityofnewyork.us/resources/rent-stabilized-building-lists/

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On this page, you will find general guidelines for identifying if your apartment may be rent stabilized as well as downloadable listings of buildings in New York City that contain rent stabilized apartments. The lists do not indicate which apartments in these buildings are rent stabilized, but rather, only those buildings that contain at least one rent stabilized unit.
Note: The NYC Rent Guidelines Board does not have any information concerning whether any particular apartment is rent stabilized.
In addition, a searchable database of buildings that that are registered as containing rent stabilized units is available from NYS Homes and Community Renewal (HCR) below.

Find out if your Apartment is Rent Stabilized

If you want to find out if your apartment is rent stabilized, you may do so by filling out an online form offered by NYS Homes and Community Renewal (HCR), the agency that regulated rent stabilized apartments. You may also obtain the rental history of the apartment using the same online form.

How to Tell If a Building Is Rent Stabilized

In general, rent stabilized buildings:

Contain 6 or more units;

Were built before 1974;

Are not co-ops or condos;

However, not all apartments in these buildings may be rent stabilized. For an apartment to be stabilized it should:

Have had a rent of less than $2,000, if a tenant initially moved into the apartment between 1993 and June 23, 2011.

Have had a rent of less than $2,500, if a tenant initially moved into the apartment between June 24, 2011 and June 14, 2015.

Have had a rent of less than $2,700, if a tenant initially moved into the apartment between June 15, 2015 and December 31, 2017.

Have had a rent of less than $2,733.75, if a tenant initially moved into the apartment between January 1, 2018 and December 31, 2018.

Have had a rent of less than $2,774.76, if a tenant initially moved into the apartment between January 1, 2019 and June 13, 2019.

With passage of the Rent Laws of 2019, effective June 14, 2019, the high-rent vacancy deregulation provision, ending rent regulation for an apartment when the rent for that apartment crossed a set threshold and the unit became vacant, was repealed.

There are many exceptions to these rules. For instance, if you moved into the apartment before the building was converted to a co-op, the apartment may be stabilized. Also, newly constructed buildings that receive 421-a or J-51 tax exemptions may be rent stabilized, even if the rent exceeds the above rent thresholds.

Our rent stabilized building lists only include buildings whose owners registered with the NY State Homes and Community Renewal (HCR). If an owner filed after the lists were compiled or not at all, a building will not be on our lists but may still contain rent stabilized apartments.

The only way to know if your apartment is rent stabilized is to contact NYS Homes and Community Renewal (HCR), the state agency which administers the rent laws. You can use the Ask HCR web portal to find out if your apartment is rent stabilized.

How to Use the Rent Stabilized Building Listings

1. Buildings are grouped by zip code. Within each zip code, buildings are sorted first by street name and then by building number.

2. Some buildings have multiple addresses. If a building has two addresses (e.g. 415 E. 52nd, also known as 404 E. 53rd), both addresses are in the list.

3. The lists also indicate some additional information about the building if it was available:

Co-op or condominium status: If the building is a co-op or condominium, renters who move in AFTER the conversion date are NOT protected by rent stabilization regulations.

421a or J-51: Buildings which are listed as "421-a" or "j-51" are stabilized because they took advantage of the 421-a or J-51 tax exemption program. These buildings remain rent stabilized for the length of the tax exemption, and thereafter may be deregulated if the buildings were not stabilized prior to the participation in the tax exemption program. For those buildings listed as having a status of 421-A (1-15) and 421-A (16), those terms are explained on HPD's 421-a webpage.

Multiple Dwelling Class: Hotel or Rooming House/Class B Multiple Dwelling status indicates a multiple dwelling which is generally occupied transiently. A Class A Multiple Dwelling generally is occupied as a permanent residence and are mostly apartment houses.

Type of Structure: hi-rise, garden complex, etc.

HCR provides a list of definitions of Rent Regulation and Building Status terms as well as a further explanation of buildings contained in these listings.

4. The lists do not include owner information. However, you can find owner information, as well as a wealth of other building-specific information, on these NYC.gov web sites:

NYC Rent Stabilized Building Listings

Listings are in pdf format. If you are unable to view the pdf, download the Adobe reader for free. If you are having trouble installing or using the Adobe reader, please see their troubleshooting page.

If you are looking up a particular building and are not sure of its zip code, you can find it on the U.S. Postal Service website.

HCR provides a list of definitions of Rent Regulation and Building Status terms as well as a further explanation of buildings contained in these listings. For those buildings listed as having a status of 421-A (1-15) and 421-A (16), those terms are explained on HPD's 421-a webpage.

Data Source: 2020 Building Registrations filed with NYS Homes and Community Renewal (HCR), as of October 2021.

Statewide Rent Regulated Building Search on HCR's Website

The buildings that will be listed on HCR's web site have filed records with the NYS Homes and Community Renewal at least one time from 1984 to the present year and may contain one or more regulated apartments. Inclusion on the list is not determinative of the building's current status. The list is searchable by either address and/or zip code and include both buildings within and outside of NYC. However, the list may not include all buildings that have rent regulated tenants:
HCR Registered Building Search

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On this page, you will find general guidelines for identifying if your apartment may be rent stabilized as well as downloadable listings of buildings in New York City that contain rent stabilized apartments. The lists do not indicate which apartments in these buildings are rent stabilized, but rather, only those buildings that contain at least one rent stabilized unit.

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https://www.jhimmigrantcenter.com/home

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Tenemos un grupo de WhatsApp donde compartimos mucha información sobre el proceso de asilo. Si desea unirse, haga clic en el botón de abajo.

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Read how to find an affordable rental home.

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https://hpdonline.nyc.gov/hpdonline/

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https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/pratt.center/viz/NYCBasementsandCellars/CouncilDistricts

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https://a810-bisweb.nyc.gov/bisweb/bispi00.jsp

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https://linktr.ee/aafeyouth

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aafeyouth | Instagram, Facebook | Linktree

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We value the leadership of low-income and immigrant youth of color.

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https://www.metcouncilonhousing.org/help-answers/

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Help & Answers Archive - Met Council on Housing

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https://www.cliffsnotes.com/study-guides/criminal-justice

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https://ag.ny.gov/file-complaint/housing-real-estate

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We Value Your Privacy
We use cookies to enhance your browsing experience, serve personalized content, and analyze our traffic. By using this website you consent to our use of cookies.

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We Value Your Privacy We use cookies to enhance your browsing experience, serve personalized content, and analyze our traffic. By using this website you consent to our use of cookies.

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https://www.ssa.gov/cgi-bin/benefit6.cgi

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https://www.marcus.com/us/en/savings

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At the moment, Marcus.com and our products are only available in the US. Depending on your current location, you may be able to access your accounts here if you’re a current customer. To inquire about opening new accounts or speak to an agent, call our Contact Center:

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https://access.nyc.gov/programs/?categories[]=162

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ACCESS NYC is maintained by the The Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity

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ACCESS NYC is an online public screening tool that you can use to determine the City, State, and Federal health and human service benefit programs for which you are potentially eligible to enroll.

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https://foodhelp.nyc.gov/locations

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https://furmancenter.org/thestoop/entry/policy-breakfast-the-new-york-housing-compact

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https://hcr.ny.gov/tenant-owner-forms

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https://www.hmgdjlaw.com/

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Himmelstein, McConnell, Gribben, Donoghue & Joseph LLP

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When your home or business is threatened, you need smart, experienced attorneys on your side. You need attorneys who truly care and who have extensive experience protecting people like you. At Himmelstein McConnell Gribben et al, you will find a law firm with a singular dedication to protecting tenants.

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Manhattan Tenant Rights & Representation Attorney | New York Real Estate Lawyers

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When your home or business is threatened, you need smart, experienced attorneys on your side. You need attorneys who truly care and who have extensive experience protecting people like you. At Himmelstein McConnell Gribben et al, you will find a law firm with a singular dedication to protecting tenants.

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https://amirentstabilized.com/info/resources.html

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Find out if your NYC apartment is rent stabilized!

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https://lawhelpinteractive.org/

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https://www.quiz-maker.com/

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Make Online Quizzes in Minutes - Quiz Maker

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https://otda.ny.gov/programs/heap/

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New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance

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Overview

The Home Energy Assistance Program (HEAP) helps low-income people pay the cost of heating their homes.

If you are eligible, you may receive one regular HEAP benefit per program year and could also be eligible for emergency HEAP benefits if you are in danger of running out of fuel or having your utility service shut off.

Questions regarding the HEAP program should be directed to your HEAP Local District Contact.
HEAP may be able to help you if you heat your home with:
You can apply for Home Energy Assistance Program benefits online, in person, or in writing.

Regular HEAP Benefit
The 2020-2021 Regular HEAP benefit opened November 2, 2020.
Find out if you may be eligible and apply for programs and services.

If you are eligible, you may receive one regular HEAP benefit per program year to help you pay for heating your home.

Eligibility and benefits are based on:

income,

household size,

the primary heating source, and

the presence of a household member who is under age 6, age 60 or older or permanently disabled.

Regular benefits for households that pay directly for heat based on actual usage are paid directly to the vendor that supplies the household's primary source of heat. The participating vendor list can be obtained by accessing the HEAP Participating vendor list. Select your county of residence, the fuel type you use to heat your home, and pressing "Go".

Your household may be eligible for a Regular benefit if:

You and your household members are United States Citizens or qualified aliens and

Your household's gross monthly income is at or below the current income guides for your household size as posted in the table below or

You receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits or

You receive Temporary Assistance or

You receive Code A Supplemental Security Income (SSI Living Alone)

Base Benefit Amount

Living Situation

$21

Eligible households that live in government subsidized housing or a group home setting with heat included in their rent.

$40 or $45

Eligible households who have heating costs included as part of their rent.

$675 + applicable add-ons

Eligible households whose primary heat is oil, kerosene, or propane and who make direct payments to the vendor for heating costs.

$525 + applicable add-ons

Eligible households whose primary heat is wood, wood pellets, coal, corn or other deliverable fuel and who make direct payments to the vendor for heating costs.

$350 + applicable add-ons

Eligible households whose primary heat is electricity or natural gas and who make direct payments based on their household's actual usage to the vendor.

Regular Benefit Add-Ons for Households Paying Directly for Heat

The amount of the base Regular benefit will be increased by $31 if the household's gross income is in the Tier 1 income range.

Tier I eligibility is based on gross income and household size, on the date of application the household's gross income must be at or below 130% of federal poverty level for the household size; or at least one adult household member must be in receipt of ongoing assistance through Temporary Assistance (TA), Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) or code A SSI.

The amount of the base Regular benefit will be increased by $35 if the household contains a vulnerable individual (household member who is age 60 or older, under age 6 or permanently disabled).

View HEAP Monthly Income Limits.

Emergency HEAP Benefit
The 2020-2021 Emergency benefit opened January 4, 2021.
If you are eligible, the Emergency HEAP Benefit can help you heat your home if you are in a heat or heat related emergency.

Emergency HEAP benefits and eligibility are based on:

income,

available resources, and

the type of emergency

If you have an emergency you must contact your HEAP Local District Contact for assistance. Assistance cannot be provided through this website.
You may be eligible for an emergency HEAP benefit if:

Your electricity is necessary for your heating system or thermostat to work and is either shut-off or scheduled to be shut off or

Your electric or natural gas heat is off or scheduled to be shut-off or

You are out of fuel, or you have less than one quarter tank of fuel oil, kerosene or propane or have less than a ten (10) day supply of wood, wood pellets, corn, or other deliverable heat source.

and

Your income is at or below the current income guidelines as posted in the table below or you receive Family Assistance, Safety Net Assistance, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance (SNAP) or Code A Supplemental Security Income.

The heating and/or electric bill is in your name and

Your household's available resources are:

less than $2,000 if no member of your household is age 60 or older; or

less than $3,000 if any member of your household is age 60 or older.

Type of Emergency

Amount

Heat Related Domestic (electric service required to operate heating equipment)

$140

Natural Gas Heat Only

$350

Natural Gas Combined with Heat Related Domestic

$490

Electric Heat Combined with Heat Related Domestic

$490

Non-utility heating fuel (oil, kerosene, and propane)

$675

Non-utility heating fuel (wood, pellets, coal, corn, etc.)

$525

View HEAP Monthly Income Limits.

Heating Equipment Repair or Replacement Benefit

If you have an emergency you must contact your HEAP Local District Contact for assistance. Assistance cannot be provided through this website.
The 2020-2021 Heating Equipment Repair and Replacement benefit opened October 1, 2020.
If you are a homeowner and eligible, the Heating Equipment Repair and Replacement benefit can help you repair or replace your furnace, boiler and other direct heating equipment necessary to keep your home's primary heating source working.

Benefit amounts are based on the actual cost incurred to repair or replace your furnace, boiler, and/or other essential heating equipment, $3,000 for a repair and $6,500 for a replacement.

You may call your HEAP Local District Contact to apply. The in-person interview and application requirement is temporarily suspended. Your local district contact will decide if you meet all the eligibility conditions, including the income and resource requirements. The district will provide more information on how to submit the application and required documentation.

Before work is started it must be approved and authorized by a HEAP Local District Contact. Payment is made directly to the vendor after all the work is completed. The participating Heating Equipment Repair vendor list can be obtained by accessing the HEAP Participating vendor list. Select your county of residence, "Furnace Repair" as the fuel type, and pressing "Go".

View HEAP Monthly Income Limits.

Clean and Tune Benefit
The 2020-2021 HEAP Clean and Tune benefit opened October 1, 2020.
Stay safe!
Learn more about the dangers of carbon monoxide. You may be eligible for a benefit if:
Eligible households can receive energy efficiency services, which includes the cleaning of primary heating equipment, but may also include chimney cleaning, minor repairs, installation of carbon monoxide detectors or programmable thermostats, if needed, to allow for the safe, proper and efficient operation of the heating equipment. Benefit amounts are based on the actual cost incurred to provide clean and tune services, up to a maximum of $400. No additional HEAP cash benefits are available.

You are the homeowner

Your household's gross monthly income is at or below the current income guidelines for your household size as posted on the following table

Your primary heating equipment is more than 12 months old

Your primary heating equipment or chimney has not been cleaned within the last 12 months

You do not have a service contract with your vendor that includes clean and tune services

Your household eligibility requirements include filing an application with your local department of social services, providing all necessary documentation, and the household must reside in an eligible living situation. The participating Clean and Tune vendor list can be obtained by accessing the HEAP Participating vendor list. Select your county of residence, "Clean and Tune" as the fuel type, and pressing "Go".

Where to apply

You may apply for the Clean and Tune benefit with your HEAP Local District Contact.

View HEAP Monthly Income Limits.

Cooling Assistance Benefit
The 2020-2021 Cooling Assistance benefit will open on May 3, 2021.
If you are eligible, you may receive one Cooling Assistance benefit per applicant household for the purchase and installation of an air conditioner or a fan to help your home stay cool.

In circumstances where an air conditioner cannot be safely installed, a fan will be provided.

Only one air conditioner or fan, not to exceed $800 with installation, will be provided per applicant household. No additional HEAP cash benefits are available.
You may be eligible for a Cooling Assistance HEAP benefit if:

Your household's gross monthly income is at or below the current income guidelines for your household size as posted in the following table, or

You receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, or

You receive Temporary Assistance (TA), or

You receive Code A Supplemental Security Income (SSI Living Alone), and

You and your household members are United States Citizens or qualified aliens, and

Includes an individual with a documented medical condition that is exacerbated by heat, and

You received a Regular benefit greater than $21 in the current program year or reside in government subsidized housing with heat included in your rent, and

You currently do not have a working air conditioner or the air conditioner you have is five years old or older, and

You did not receive a HEAP funded air conditioner within the past five years.

Your household eligibility requirements include filing an application with your local department of social services, providing all necessary documentation, and the household must reside in an eligible living situation.

Getting the air conditioner installed

The participating Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) vendor list can be obtained by accessing the HEAP Participating vendor list. Select your county of residence, "Cooling" as the fuel type, and pressing "Go". It will be your responsibility to maintain the air conditioner. This includes the responsibility to remove, cover, store, and/or reinstall the unit or the installation sleeve after vendor installation.

Where to apply

You may apply for the HEAP Cooling Assistance with your HEAP Local District Contact.

View HEAP Monthly Income Limits.

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New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Home Energy Assistance Program (HEAP) helps low-income people pay the cost of heating their homes. If you are eligible, you may receive one regular HEAP benefit per program year and could also be eligible for emergency HEAP benefits if you are in danger of running out of fuel or having your utility service shut off.