New York City faces a housing crisis that demands solutions that protect tenants but acknowledge the economic reality.
Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s campaign platform included freezing rent on rent-stabilized units and allowing the city to conduct repairs at landlords’ expense. The city would seize buildings from landlords unable to pay these bills. While this approach treats all landlords equally, the truth is far more complicated.
Small family landlords operate under fundamentally different circumstances than corporate landlords.
According to amNewYork, small property owners with 10 or fewer units account for an estimated 30% to 50% of the city’s rental market. Housing data shows that 28% of the city’s rental units were owned by landlords with between one and five buildings shortly before the pandemic.
Policies that fail to account for this distinction will accelerate corporate consolidation of rental housing. Small landlords facing a rent freeze cannot cover rising costs, forcing them to sell or walk away. Corporate landlords and banks will buy distressed properties at reduced prices.
According to New York Post, the 2019 Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act eliminated vacancy bonuses and major capital improvement rent increases that previously allowed landlords to recoup costs for bringing units up to code.
Repairs and upgrades can easily cost upwards of $100,000. Before 2019, building owners could increase rent to finance necessary work, but the law removed that option.
In addition, approximately 50,000 rent-regulated apartments are now empty because renovation costs exceed recoverable amounts through rent. The city’s Housing Preservation and Development department launched an “Unlocking Doors” program offering $25,000 initially, then $50,000 per unit for improvements. Only one owner signed up because the assistance remained too limited compared to actual renovation costs.
One Bronx landlord wrote in the magazine City Limits that annual rent increases for regulated units averaged only 1% between 2014 and 2021 while operating costs climbed steadily.
Data from the 2025 Rent Guidelines Board showed that net operating income for Bronx landlords increased just 0.8%, well below citywide averages. Small landlords cannot recover costs for mandated building improvements when rent increases fail to match rising expenses.
A rent freeze will push more buildings into vacancy as small landlords cannot operate at a loss indefinitely. State and city policies increasingly deny landlords enough revenue to cover break-even costs for building maintenance, fuel, water bills, taxes and mortgages.
A rent freeze will push many smaller landlords toward bankruptcy and force others to let their buildings decay.
Mamdani’s supporters envision that financial distress will allow the city to assume ownership of apartments and make them available to those in need.
However, the city already owns 180,000 units of public housing through the NYC Housing Authority, which faces tens of billions in overdue maintenance needs. Adding hundreds of thousands of apartments to that fast-decaying inventory would deepen the housing crisis.
Marisol Owen’s experience illustrates the challenges small landlords face. She and her husband rented out a three-family house in the Bronx where one tenant stopped paying rent in June 2021 after failing to renew his city-funded rental subsidies. By the end of 2022, the tenant owed over $31,000.
Owen contacted every organization, elected official and city agency she could find, but no one could help beyond advising her to start eviction proceedings, according to amNewYork.
NYC housing courts handle over 150,000 new cases each year. Owners can wait years without knowing whether they will recover lost rent. The city’s right to counsel program guarantees legal representation in eviction proceedings for tenants, but small landlords who are also financially strapped have no parallel support.
Small landlords are crucial to the housing market. Many rent out properties passed down through generations and usually charge modest rents. Since small landlords often find renters through word of mouth, they help form immigrant enclaves and strong communities.
When small landlords sell to corporate buyers, buildings become assets managed by distant companies focused solely on maximizing returns.
Tenant quality of life often declines as maintenance becomes reactive rather than proactive.
Corporate landlords will survive a rent freeze and property takeover threats, but small family landlords will not.
The choice NYC is facing is whether housing will be owned by community-based landlords or large corporations. Current policy momentum points toward corporate consolidation.
Mamdani can pursue a different path that protects tenants while supporting responsible small landlords by acknowledging that not all landlords are equal and designing a policy that distinguishes between them.
