Zohran Mamdani’s NYC Housing Plan: Key Details and Impact

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Good afternoon, let’s get into a special edition of PolicyPro that digs into new initiatives and conflicts emerging out of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s sweeping housing plan unveiled Tuesday:

• The mayor positioned two City Council bills as key to his housing agenda.
• City Hall is pushing to expand project labor agreements in affordable housing, drawing skepticism from some in the industry who warn the move could drive up costs.
• The Mamdani administration plans to ramp up use of the city’s 7A program to wrest day-to-day control of troubled buildings from “bad actor” landlords.
• A new preservation program would allow distressed building owners to pool their properties’ reserves into a single flexible fund for capital and operating needs.
• The city is looking to help more tenants convert rental buildings into co-ops.

In this edition we mention: Council member Pierina Sanchez, Council member Sandy Nurse, Mayor for Housing and Planning Leila Bozorg, Deputy Mayor for Economic Justice Julie Su, REBNY President James Whelan, Small Property Owners of New York’s board president Ann Korchak and others

We Heard

• Bill booster: Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s housing plan positions two City Council bills as central to his social housing agenda: Council member Pierina Sanchez’s SAFER Homes Act and Council member Sandy Nurse’s Community Opportunity to Purchase Act, or COPA. Sanchez’s bill would revive and overhaul the city’s dormant Third Party Transfer program, which allows distressed properties to be transferred to qualified owners for rehabilitation. The legislation changes how buildings are selected, expands eligibility to vacant lots and empty buildings, creates new owner exemptions and allows owners to recoup proceeds above unpaid taxes and interest if their property is sold. The measure would also eliminate the program’s so-called block pickup provision, which allowed the city to seize non-distressed tax-delinquent properties tied to qualifying buildings on the same block. Meanwhile, Nurse’s revised COPA bill would give city-certified nonprofits and joint ventures the first shot at buying certain distressed multifamily properties. Nurse introduced a new version of the bill earlier this month that narrows the types of sales covered and shortens purchase timelines. The city’s housing plan frames the bills as a way for city officials to stabilize distressed properties and prevent “further declining conditions if their buildings were to be purchased by speculative buyers.” Both bills have secured the Council support needed for approval (at least 26 sponsors), and could pass by year’s end.
• Labor costs: City Hall is looking to expand project labor agreements on city-financed affordable housing development, as part of the city’s broader housing plan. The deals — between unions and contractors that lock in wages and job conditions before work begins — are intended to pair new apartments with higher-paying construction jobs. To advance the effort, the city is launching an interagency working group led by Deputy Mayor for Housing and Planning Leila Bozorg and Deputy Mayor for Economic Justice Julie Su to expand PLAs and similar models across city-backed affordable projects. The plan drew immediate pushback from REBNY President James Whelan, who warned such agreements could drive up costs and stall projects. “At a time when we need to build as much housing as possible, we question why the City would choose to make projects more expensive to build and finance through the addition of costly and inflexible Project Labor Agreements,” said Whelan in a statement. Notably, the agreements would not be required for city-financed affordable housing projects.

• Bad landlord blitz: Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s housing agenda pairs new development with tougher enforcement against what the administration calls a small group of “bad actor” landlords. Later this year, HPD plans to launch “Fix the City,” an initiative targeting buildings with chronic violations through roof-to-cellar inspections coordinated with tenants and expanded use of the city’s 7A program, which allows courts to strip owners and managers of day-to-day control. The effort will also coordinate with the Department of Buildings, the Law Department, the courts and lenders to pursue criminal charges, force compliance or initiate foreclosure proceedings where landlords fail to act. To start, housing officials plan to investigate at least 10 portfolios with longstanding violations, with the goal of transferring troubled properties to preservation buyers backed by tenants and the administration. The effort drew immediate criticism from the Small Property Owners of New York’s board president Ann Korchak who called it “all politics and no real substance,” adding that it ignores the hurdles landlords face accessing apartments for repairs and clearing violations. “This is a one-sided, pro-tenant plan that does absolutely nothing for thousands of distressed small rent-stabilized property owners,” said Korchak.
• New TOOLS: A notable new program HPD plans to roll out later this year is the Targeted Owner Options for Long-term Stability program, or TOOLS. The initiative would allow owners of distressed buildings to pool existing reserves into a single flexible fund for capital and operating needs — current rules prohibit transferring reserves across properties or leveraging them for lower-cost financing. If owners choose to use these reserves for capital improvements, HPD would expedite Housing Maintenance Code violation removal when issues are remedied. We’ll keep you posted as we learn more.
• Co-op conversions: Tenant takeovers aren’t new, but converting rental buildings into resident-controlled co-ops has long been a costly and cumbersome process. To scale those efforts, HPD plans to launch the “Our Home” program later this year, formalizing the city’s funding pipeline and providing $75 million in loans to help roughly 300 renters buy and convert their buildings into co-ops over the next two years. The initiative would build on the city’s existing Affordable Neighborhood Cooperative Program, or ANCP, which supports the conversion of city-owned rentals into affordable cooperatives.

Have a tip or feedback? Reach me at caroline.spivack@therealdeal.com. 

Bill Tracker

The Catch-Up

New York wants to make it easier to build granny flats, reports The Real Deal’s Lilah Burke.

Gov. Kathy Hochul seems to have gotten just about everything she wanted when it comes to rolling back part of the state’s landmark climate law, reports City & State.

The winning plan to rebuild Penn Station features renderings of a new train hall with a presidential seal featuring President Donald Trump’s name, reports Gothamist.

Critics say Kathy Hochul’s proposed NYC pied-à-terre tax could backfire by tanking luxury property values and dragging down the nest eggs of ordinary homeowners and retirees, reports the New York Post.

Higher prices for building materials are boosting construction costs and busting renovation budgets, reports The Wall Street Journal.

The Kicker

“The hard truth is that no housing plan can fully succeed while the Scaffold Law continues driving construction and maintenance costs 500 percent higher than every other state in the country,” said Elizabeth Crowley, president and CEO of the Building Trades Employers’ Association.

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Affordable housing

New York

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