Housing Starts: Rents Outpace Inflation I de Blasio Urges Funding for NYCHA I Illegal Hotel to Close

Image Credit: Chang W. Lee/The New York Times

1. New York Rents Outpaced Inflation Over 3 Years, Census Data Says New York City rents rose faster than inflation over the past three years, continuing a housing squeeze that has been particularly felt by lower-income tenants and shows no signs of abating, new figures from the Census Bureau show. The results of the bureau’s Housing and Vacancy Survey, a snapshot of the city’s housing market taken every three years, comes as city and state officials are deciding housing budgets for the city’s new fiscal year that begins July 1 and are about to negotiate rent laws. The findings also lend urgency to Mayor Bill de Blasio’s plan to build and preserve more affordable housing. [NY Times – 02/24/15]
2. In Albany, de Blasio Focuses On Housing As part of his administration’s second-year focus on housing issues, Mayor Bill de Blasio this morning called on the state to vastly increase its funding to the New York City Housing Authority and asked legislators to reject an “ill-considered” proposal from Governor Andrew Cuomo that would cut homeless services funding. In his most ambitious request to the Joint Fiscal Committees to the State Legislature, de Blasio asked the state to increase its funding to the NYCHA by $300 million, which he vowed the city would match with its own funding. [Capital New York – 02/25/15]
3. State Closes An Illegal Hotel in Manhattan That Was Hiding In Plain Sight The tall, slim tower on East 34th Street in Midtown Manhattan looked like dozens of other moderately priced hotels that have sprung up in New York City over the past decade. Except this one was illegal. The owners of the 36-story building, between Madison and Park Avenues, had turned what was supposed to be a condominium into a hotel while taking millions of dollars in tax breaks meant to spur the construction of affordable apartments.” [NY Times – 02/25/15]
4. Real Estate Lobby to Press Agenda in Albany Today The real estate lobby will press its agenda in Albany today, calling for the renewal of a major development subsidy program, warning lawmakers not to strengthen rent-control laws and arguing for the renewal of an initiative meant to spur cleanup of contaminant sites. The Real Estate Board of New York will be joined by its affordable housing counterpart, the state’s Association for Affordable Housing, for the mini-lobby day. The group will also press for a renewal of that development subsidy, the controversial 421-a program, but will also call on legislators and the Cuomo administration to direct bank settlement proceeds toward housing for the poor and homeless. [Capital New York – 02/25/15]
5. New York to Complete First Prefabricated ‘Micro-Apartments’ This Year With floor areas clocking in at as little as 260 square feet, My Micro NY housing units by nARCHITECTS are the latest singles-oriented housing option to enter the New York rental market. The modular units will be stacked at the Brooklyn Navy Yard this spring, and are projected to welcome their first inhabitants by the end of 2015. Current New York city zoning and density rules set a minimum apartment floor area of 400 square feet, yet this regulation was waived for My Micro NY in the interests of creating more affordable housing. [Arch Daily – 02/24/15]
6. De Blasio Team Gradually Beefing Up Its Parking Reform Proposals New York is one step closer to overhauling a discredited policy that drives up the cost of housing and makes traffic congestion worse, but the scope of the reforms the de Blasio administration is pursuing remains limited. Last week, the Department of City Planning came out with the broad strokes of a major update to the city’s zoning code, including the elimination of parking mandates for affordable housing near transit. It’s the first time City Hall has proposed completely doing away with mandatory parking minimums for any type of housing in such a large area outside the Manhattan core. [Streets Blog NYC – 02/24/15]
7. Real Estate Investors Continue to Bet On the Future of Gowanus Commercial real estate investors continued to bet on the future of the Gowanus section of Brooklyn in 2014, buying 38 development/industrial/garage properties valued at $168.86 million, a 123 percent increase in dollar volume from the year before, according to research compiled for Ariel Property Advisors’ Brooklyn 2014 Year-End Sales Report. Prices in Gowanus rose year-over-year with the average price per square foot for industrial/garage properties increasing 89 percent to $504. Residential development sites are consistently seeing values above $250 per buildable square foot. [Brooklyn Daily Eagle – 02/26/15]
8. Crown Heights Rezoning Stalled Again As Board Tables Debate A proposal to change land use rules in Crown Heights hit yet another roadblock Tuesday as the local community board sent a key document to start the rezoning process back to the drawing board. At a full Community Board 9 meeting Tuesday night at Medgar Evers College, the board voted to send its year-old resolution letter to the Department of City Planning back to CB9’s land use committee again for further consideration. [DNAinfo – 02/25/15]
9. De Blasio, Cuomo, Schneiderman Team Up To Tackle Tenant Harassment With housing remaining one of the “it” issues of the early 21st century, three elected officials have connected to combat landlord harassment of tenants. Last week, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the launch of a new joint enforcement task force to investigate and bring action against landlords who harass tenants. [Amsterdam News – 02/26/15]
10. From Shanties to Micro Units, NYC’s History of Living Small New Yorkers have always scrambled for space. They’ve crammed into cellars, rookeries, and wooden shacks; hung rows of hammocks in seven-cent lodging houses; and huddled under low attic roofs. Now, with micro-apartments rising on East 27th Street, it seems like people are as desperate as ever for a foothold. Like many apartments in the city, the new units may be derided as closet-sized. Starting at 250 square feet, the studios are indeed smaller than the zoning code usually allows. [NY Curbed – 02/25/15]