An Op-ed on the affordable housing shortage in New York City today. Interesting that it's written by Roland Lewis (the executive director of Habitat for Humanity-New York City) but it doesn't mention the phasing out of rent control as an option. On the face of it, rent control would seem to help the cause of affordable housing. By holding the rents of some, but not all, of the apartments in the city artificially below market price it would seem that plenty of affordable housing would remain available. However, New York has some other resident laws that allow even the worst of tenants to stay on almost indefinitely. The result is that apartments that should rent for well over $1000 instead go for $300 a month. Under rent control, the price of those apartments cannot rise unless the tenant moves out. Who would leave a $300 one bedroom in the heart of the village? I'd stay there as long as possible. Most benefactors of rent control do just that. The result is the explosion of rents in the unregulated market. An in-depth study of how rent control affects the market can be found here.

I rent my new place for $1950. The previous tenant had resided there for a long, long time. At least that's my speculation. I believe so for two reasons. First, the woman across the hall has told me she's been in her place for more than 20 years and the woman who had my apartment was there longer. Second, the previous tenant didn't live in my apartment. She lived in the one directly below it and used mine as a writing studio. There had never been a phone line installed in my apartment. Hands up everyone who can afford two floor-through one bedroom apartments in New York. Repealing rent control will not be pretty and it will displace a lot of people who have lived in their apartments for a very long time. Many of those will be elderly and face considerable hardship in being forced out. However, it simply isn't fair or economical to keep these apartments off the market and artificially low-priced any more. Moreover, provisions can be made for the worst off of renters to aid them in their departure and give them extra time to find suitable housing. I am not advocating a mass eviction campaign. No one should be summarily dumped out of their apartment. That said, these apartments need to be put on the open market in order to stabilize the spiralling cost of living in the city that is already the most expensive in the world.
- posted by levinson @ 7/20/2001 08:27:00 AM