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At last night's wild meeting in Cooper Union's Great Hall, the Rent Guidelines Board decided to raise rent stabilized rents 4.5% for one-year leases and 8% for two-year leases. These are the biggest rent hikes in recent years: Last year, rents hikes were approved for 3% on 1-year leases and 5.75% on 2-year leases (in 2006, the hikes were 4.25% and 7.25%). The last time there were higher hikes was in 1989.
The meeting was filled with landlords and building owners fighting for higher increases, citing their higher expenses (especially in this oil crisis), and tenants who believe the working class are being pushed out of the already expensive city. The smart attendees were wearing earplugs--the noise was deafening and board members could not be heard over the high-pitched whistles and shouting (brief video above). The NY Times reports in spite of a ban on noisemakers, some tenants' groups "sneaked about 300 earplugs and 360 plastic whistles past the metal detectors at the Great Hall."
Landlords can also charge a rent increase of $45/month for one-year leases and $85/month for two-year leases for those who have occupied their apartment for six years or more. One woman told the Daily News, "I don't make enough money to pay the increase, and I haven't had a [pay] raise in five years." But a landlord explained to the Post, "It really does justice for small-property owners. With everything that goes up, these increases help absorb some of these costs."
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn admitted to the News that she lives in a rent-stabilized apartment, "I'll be fine, but my building has changed...We will lose the last homes of the middle class in our great city." And here was a typical exchange, as reported by the Sun: "'You guys are leeches,' a landlord shouted as he left the meeting, prompting a tenant to shout in response: 'No. You are.'"
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its great that we find out more and more of our 6 figure salaried politicians have rent stabilized apartments while people who could actually use them cannot get them. Also, on this increase, 4.5% wont even pay for just the increase in property tax and water/sewer that these politicians themselves levied on the buildings let alone the tripling of the cost of fuel. it's a shame we cannot get rid of these regulations and get these apartments on the market.
last month the woman next door who pays 1/3 my monthly for her rent controlled apartment (which by the way is 3 bedrooms which she has to herself, compared to my studio) had a nice 65" plasma screen delivered... i know because they rang my bell by accident. the whole system is a scam and we all pay for it. it started with good intentions, but in reality people should live where they can afford and not expect others to subsidize their lifestyle.
If you can't afford to live there, move out! Anything stabilization/controlled is just plain retarded. Just because you paid $XXX 20 years ago doesn't mean you should still pay the same - do you still pay the same for gas?
Kissel: Sounds like sour-grapes to me. It seems that you wouldn't be complaining too much if you had a controlled three bedroom to yourself. Those who are not benefiting always get on some "what the market will bear" high horse. Of course the gov't shouldn't interfere with the residential real estate markets, because they'd NEVER interfere with the commercial real estate markets with things like property tax graces and other measures designed to keep corporations fat and happy.
Do you really think anyone would benefit from having the rent control and stabilization laws removed? It's like gas prices...rents will NEVER go down..there's too much money to be made. BUT...those who are middle class and have stabilized places would get fucked and shoved out of the city. I'm sure that would be great, though, right? Get rid of all those unseemly non-whites, those with mere five or low six figure incomes. Finally make New York into Dubai. A place where the super rich occasionally go out slumming with the merely rich.
Thats higher than I expected, but I can understand where the landlords are coming from. Heating, power, and sometimes gas is included with their rent. How the hell do they expect rents to freeze when expenses for the landlords are skyrocketing. It would be foolish to expect landlords to accept a loss on their property to save their tenants money. The cost must be passed on to them.
However, I still do fully stand by rent stabilization controls. They are essential for keeping people from being price out of their neighborhoods every 3 years.
Only in New York. No wonder the politicians would never contemplate MEANS-TESTING the rent laws, never mind getting rid of them all together. The Governor, the Council Speaker, innumerable lawyers, bankers and other folks who make six figures benefit from these ridiculous laws and are subsidized by the rest of us. Why do we tolerate this?
FIne, keep the rent laws, but add a MEANS-TEST.
yes, i do believe costs would come down. everyone in a building with rent stabilized residents pays more every month. the building still has to pay its taxes, maintenance, salaries, etc. guess what it comes out of everyone else. i would love to live in 15 cpw, but i dont expect someone else to pay for what I cant afford. if you look the housing stock of nyc, i can assure you most of it would not suite a hedgefund manager, if the million or so of these apartments went market rate, prices would have to adjust or they would be vacant.
Kissel--rent controlled leases and rent stabilized leases are two different things.
both cause major dislocations in the housing market. someone else on another board had it right:
"Tenants complain that they can't afford their places and there landlord doesn't take care of their apartments.
Landlords complain that they can't make money with the huge increases in their expenses.
Has it ever occurred to anyone that both groups are right? The rent stabilization system is flawed. It doesn't work.
The 1st and easiest change should be called the Governor Patterson Rule - a law needs to be passed that allows landlords to decontrol units if tenants make more than $175k (eliminate the $2,000 legal rent clause) and if someone has another property (rental or owned) elsewhere (the goal of RS was to provide housing for everyone and clearly one person having two residences totally defeats the purpose of providing housing for everyone)."
How many of you are members of the RSA? Seriously, are landlords the only people who post in the comments section.
I think we should have universal rent stabilization. That end the jealousy of non-stabilized tenants, and it would do the most good for the most people.
Rent stabilization will be difficult to remove from the city. There are roughly 3 million apartments in NYC -- 1 million owner occupied, 1 million rent stabalized, 1 million market rent (and approx 50,000 controlled). So, 2 million households benefit from rent control (i.e. the existing owner occupied and stabalized tenants). Market rent tenants pay the price for this. So in this battle, your allegience should really fall along those lines.
That being said, the best way to remove the system is through steady increases like the 4.5% this year. As units "age-out" of the system, developers can tear them down to build larger unit buildings. In Boston, they banned stabailization in one swoop, before additional housing stock was built to support the displaced tenants. So, you really had quite a bit of hardship for those displaced.
On balance, market rents will come down (even as stabailized rents go up). Just think about it -- how will landlords raise their rents when the number of available apartments doubles (stabalized + market)? For a comparison, look what happens to airfares when a 2nd carrier enters a city and offers competition.
The rent control laws should have ended years ago. It was put in place during WWII to protect the working class voters from losing their homes as the depression was ending and people were making more money and the competition for apartments became a fact.
It however, is an abused unfair system. Stabilization was added later and was more flexible. The single occupant of a
3BR apt paying 1/3 the rent of a neighbor in a studio is a prime example, but she is legal. Politicians with guts are needed to end this mess. A time cap should be put in place to do it, say 15 years and its over. The elderly should be protected. It should not be allowed to affect anyone over 65 Years of age. They can stay till they want to move or for the rest of their lives. Heirs should not be protected. There are cases where an adult child of the lease holder moves in (real or unreal) a few years before the parent moves to Florida or a nursing home and then becomes the tenant in fact, and the injustice continues.
Nowhere in the US Constitution or the bible does it say that anyone who wants to can live in Manhattan with cheap rent.
Give me a break. I can't believe the crap I read on here. Most of you have to be transplants.
These building owners and management companies MAKE MONEY otherwise they would sell, pack up and move. There's one building owner who owns half of the buildings on West 86st between Amsterdam and Central Park West, he's a billionaire now. Most of these buildings were bought and paid for decades ago.
Are you people kidding me?
The majority of people in rent stabilized apartments are not people like Quinn who bring in 6-figure salaries. Many of them receive some form of public assistance, either through Section 8 or other government program. Those programs will only cover so much -- end rent stabilization and they will have to increase the amount of assistance they provide to lower income NYers. Where do you think that money will come from? Our tax dollars. Homelessness will increase. Where do you think the money comes to keep the shelter system running? Our tax dollars.
As for the elderly, their rents remain stable through SCRIE.
And there's a world of difference between rent control and rent stabilized apartments. There are very few rent controlled apartments in the city, inhabited by long term residents (usually 30+ years). Once a rent controlled tenant moves or dies, the apartment decontrols. Rent goes up by 7 1/2% annually, plus a fuel cost adjustment for rent controlled apartments. There are many more rent stabilized apartments in NY. When a rent stabilized tenant moves out, the apartment remains stabilized -- the landlord is entitled to raise the rent between tenants, but there are a number of factors that determine how much it can be raised.
@MisterTissue - They would come down (on average across the city..) and it's already been proven.. Rent control / stabilization was phased out in Boston a few years back. And in buildings where the average of highs and lows may have been 2000 a month, ended up with an average of 1800 a month 5 years later.. much of this was attributed to reduction in overhead/regulation.
So instead of having 2/3 of the apartments at 1k a month, and 1/3 of them at 3k a month, the whole building can go for 1666..
The other thing they found was that waste drastically decreased. Elderly folks in 3br apts by themselves ended up moving to apts that were more appropriately sized.
@bornbrednewyorker - just because the building is paid for, doesn't mean the apartments there should be free? Expenses rise, a building is an investment, and that investment should be afforded the opportunity to make competitive returns.
And you're wrong, the building can't be sold as easily as you put it.. because even if it is, those residents have the right to stay under the current law.. So the sales price includes that hiccup.
bornbrednewyorker said:Give me a break. I can't believe the crap I read on here. Most of you have to be transplants.
I totally agree. The people complaining are the people from Ohio who pay $1800 a month for a one bedroom in Prospect Heights because P.H. is now cool but is mad because the girl next door $1000 because she was there when it was still Crown Heights and definetly not cool.
Seriously, get over yourselves. If you don't like it, then leave.
Since when did transplant become a bad word? And are you seriously saying that the heir system is fair?
Rent control is exceptionally flawed. For what SHOULD be done I suggest you take a look at what the new Avalon building on Cathedral Parkway has done, giving 40% of the available apartments to low income residents, instead of that obnoxious, nasally 50's something Manhattanite (yes...I have a neighbor like that) bitching about how their rent went from $650 to $680 and change.
I'll continue supporting rent control and stabilization until I see the market "correct" itself by responding to the overwhelming demand for affordable housing. Anyone who has moved in the past couple of years knows that its very easy to claim that people can find apartments that are within their means and its another thing to actually get one. Where is someone on a fixed income supposed to move to? The low income housing that Ratner promised to put into the Atlantic Yards project?
people should move where they can afford to, like they do in the rest of the country. that alone would free up a million units and bring prices down for everyone. Plenty of people who do have $$ commute into the city. There is no reason to subsidize people to live in the most expensive part of the nation when there are other options.
bornbrednewyorker, and femiredwood: as an ohio native and "transplant," here's my response: if you don't like us, too f*cking bad. Seriously, stop your whining and deal with the fact there isn't a big fence around the city keeping the rest of the country out of your little playground. And in the meantime, myself and the rest of my transplant friends will continue to price the rest of you "natives" out of the good apartments and locations in this city until the only chance you have to even sniff manhattan or brooklyn will be from some crap rent controlled POS apartment. Oh wait, that's already happened. HA.
eagles455's attitude is just what has turned an amazing, vibrant and creative city into a mall. Do you move from town to town with the express purpose of ruining your new home and forcing out the people who have built up the community? How do you sleep at night?
Means test these rent stabilized tennants annually and watch the fun as cheapskate millionaires devise ever cleverer schemes to hide their wealth so they can keep paying $1200 for their classic six. Then pop 'em and send them to prison for a year. Truly indigent tennants deserve to be left alone while they get their shit together. everyone else is a fucking fraud and rent stabilization is aiding and abetting them.
eagles455...seriously? wow. how do i say it politely? you sound like an ignorant d*ck. you just sound utterly ridiculous. but you gave me a laugh for the night. thanks!