Property Tax Policy Is Housing Policy, and the Stakes for New York City Are Real

In his first budget, Mayor Zohran Mamdani is facing a significant challenge: the need to confront New York City’s affordability crisis while maintaining essential public services. At a moment of great economic uncertainty, striking that balance matters.

Many elements of the preliminary budget — such as investments in tenant protections, homelessness prevention, and housing stability — deserve recognition and support. However, his proposal to raise property taxes on multifamily rental housing threatens to undermine not only these worthy policy proposals but the mayor’s entire affordability agenda, writ large.

Mayor Mamdani has said he changed his mind about the role of the private sector in solving the housing crisis and now believes it must be involved in the process. That recognition was an important and necessary evolution. The reality is that New York’s housing system — especially its affordable and rent-regulated stock — depends on a complex partnership between the public and private sectors. Policy choices that weaken that partnership put housing stability at risk.

Multifamily buildings are facing sharp inflationary pressures — particularly from skyrocketing insurance premiums, as well as rising energy and labor costs — while still contending with rent arrears and constrained revenue growth. These pressures are most acute in regulated and affordable housing, where owners have limited ability to offset rising expenses.

An increase in property taxes, should that be included in the final budget, would only heap additional strain onto an already fragile operating environment. In a city where multifamily housing is the backbone of the rental market, property tax policy is housing policy.

The financial distress is not anecdotal. Data from Enterprise Community Partners and the National Equity Fund suggests that since 2017, operating expenses for affordable housing have increased by approximately 40 percent.

Meanwhile, older multifamily buildings are uniquely vulnerable to financial stress. An industry analysis by the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard found aging properties face disproportionately higher maintenance and capital costs, leaving little room to absorb new financial pressures. When operating margins tighten, these buildings are more likely to experience deferred repairs and physical deterioration, which hurts both tenants and the surrounding community. 

Increasing property taxes would further restrict the resources necessary for basic building operations and long-term preservation. When operating dollars are redirected to rising tax bills, the consequences are predictable: postponed maintenance, delayed energy efficiency investments, and increased difficulty refinancing existing debt.

To be clear, this should not be framed as opposition for opposition’s sake. The city faces legitimate fiscal challenges, and the affordable housing community shares the mayor’s objective of stabilizing neighborhoods, preventing displacement, and ensuring New Yorkers can access the safe, stable housing they require.

There is a workable middle ground.

Rather than increasing property taxes on multifamily housing, the city should focus on reforms that align revenue needs with housing preservation. That includes addressing long-standing inequities in the property tax system, advancing concrete strategies to rein in insurance and utility cost escalation, and partnering with the state to deploy tools that improve building economics without shifting costs onto tenants or accelerating disinvestment.

Turning these commitments into clear, actionable policies — with timelines and measurable outcomes — would go far in restoring confidence across the affordable housing industry and protecting the city’s housing stock. 

These approaches acknowledge both the city’s need for sustainable revenue and the fundamental reality that stable, well-maintained housing requires predictable financial footing. Mayor Mamdani has set forth an ambitious agenda for affordability and equity, but that will be undermined if the property tax hike he has laid out is allowed to proceed. 

It is critical that the City Council reject any property tax increase and work to find middle ground with the mayor in a way that preserves the backbone of the rental market — because disinvestment in multifamily housing is a cost we simply cannot afford.

Carlina Rivera is president and CEO of the New York State Association for Affordable Housing and a former member of the New York City Council from Manhattan.