Tens of thousands of rent-stabilized apartments remain vacant in New York City as landlords cite rising costs and limited ability to recoup renovations, even as the city advances a major $607 million NYCHA renovation project.
State data based on landlord filings show roughly 57,000 rent-stabilized units vacant as of April 2025, representing about a 5.6% vacancy rate among the city’s nearly one million stabilized apartments. That is up from 3.7% in 2016, with rates rising in most boroughs outside core Manhattan. The figures capture a snapshot and do not specify causes; they can include ordinary turnover, units under repair, or newly built apartments not yet leased. Earlier analyses, including a 2024 city comptroller report drawing on Census Housing and Vacancy Survey data, identified far fewer units (on the order of a few thousand) as vacant specifically because owners could not afford needed repairs. Housing advocates have argued that “warehousing” is overstated and that many vacancies stem from other factors.
Landlords and industry groups point to a combination of elevated expenses and regulatory constraints as the main barriers to returning many units to the market. Operating costs for rent-stabilized buildings have risen faster than allowed rent increases in recent years. Rent Guidelines Board data have shown recent increases in fuel (around 11%), insurance (around 10.5%), and maintenance, with longer-term surges in insurance (sometimes cited as high as 150% since 2019 in older, heavily stabilized buildings) and other expenses. The 2019 Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act restricted vacancy-related rent increases and capped Individual Apartment Improvement (IAI) recoveries, limiting how much owners can raise rents after renovating a vacant unit.
Owners describe concrete examples. Jose Tur, with buildings in Washington Heights, has said some units have sat empty more than two years because work to make them livable can run $30,000–$60,000, which does not pencil out against regulated rents. Matthew Engel of Langsam Property Services has reported 25–30 apartments offline in his portfolio (some for up to four years), including units with legal rents as low as about $600 a month that could need $80,000–$100,000 in work. At those levels, annual rental income may not support the capital outlay or financing, particularly in fully or largely stabilized older buildings in outer boroughs where net operating income is under greater pressure. A recent Rent Guidelines Board decision to freeze rents at 0% for both one- and two-year leases beginning October 1, 2026, has added to concerns, as it comes amid continued cost growth. Close to 10% of rent-stabilized buildings have been described as having operating costs exceeding revenues in some analyses, with distress more concentrated outside high-rent areas.
In parallel, the city is moving forward with substantial public investment in public housing. In late September 2026, NYCHA, the Public Housing Preservation Trust, and related partners closed on $607 million in financing for a comprehensive modernization of Nostrand Houses in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn—the first such project to reach financial closing through the Trust. The funds will renovate all 1,148 apartments across 16 buildings (home to roughly 2,000 residents), including new kitchens and bathrooms down to the structure, upgraded heating and cooling (including window heat pumps), new elevators, electrical and plumbing systems, lead and mold remediation, accessibility improvements, security upgrades, and other capital work. Construction is expected to begin in fall 2026 and proceed in phases over about five years, with most temporary relocations handled on site. NYCHA faces far larger overall capital needs, estimated in the tens of billions over the coming decades.
The vacant stabilized units and the NYCHA investment highlight different sides of the city’s housing challenges: regulated private stock where owners say the economics of renovation and operation have broken down for lower-rent units, versus public housing receiving targeted large-scale capital through a new financing vehicle. Whether policy adjustments expand the usable supply of the former remains a point of ongoing debate between landlord groups seeking greater cost recovery and tenant advocates focused on affordability protections.
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