RELOCATION & RENT CONTROL
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      I’m planning on moving from PA to Brooklyn in 4/5 years. In discussing my plans a few of you mentioned “rent control”. What is that and how do I go about obtaining it? Is it something you need to be on a waiting list for or must residency already be established? For those of you familiar with PA, is it something like our section 8?

      12 Replies

      1. You really could learn a lot more about housing costs and neighborhoods in NY by using google than you can by posting on forums like this. I truly don’t understand why someone would post rather than do some basic google research.

        Like many, I find these posts so naive as to wonder if they can actually be real. Not to say you aren’t, but it is hard to move to NY, find a job, or find housing without some basic information gathering skills.

      2. Oh yeah! The Harlem low-income places — you often need a big down payment and (relatively) low income. It’s very possible you would qualify. And the apartments I’ve seen (online) have been lovely old places.

      3. You’re planning early, so there’s alot you can do online to get the lay of the land. I know you said Brooklyn, but if you want to buy something affordable, I’d suggest looking toward Harlem. There are quite a few HDFC financed co-ops in pre-war buildings that come up for sale for fairly reasonable prices. There are income caps on purchasers and sometimes sales caps. Some definite floor plan porn in Harlem….

        As far as renting goes, the Jersey City suggestion is good. Also, I think you can also keep abreast of lists opening up for moderaate income apartments through NYC HPD’s website. Your timing might be helpful in that it often takes years for one to move up the list to the point of being offered an apartment.

        I think differest programs have different requirements, so I’d do alot of online research.

      4. If the market rate on that 1BR is $800 more than the legal regulated rent, then 20k is a great investment with a payback period of about 2 years. Some perverse incentives get created in the system. There was a nyt story not long ago about people getting paid to leave their RS apartments to owners looking to deregulate.

      5. I don’t know – it seems to me like paying points to get a lower mortgage rate. Do the math, figure out the answer. And if we accept the OP as being sincere, what “profit” is it in being rude to her?

      6. 🙂 slopeEva

        If if were that easy everyone would be doing it. Oh NYC, the land where your rent never goes up… SIGH

        I once knew a guy that paid a broker about 20k to get him a rent stable 800 sq ft 1 bd on the UES for 1k per month. Not sure how legal that transaction was but I found it strange to put up that much money to have low rent.

      7. A huge part of the apartment stock in NY is rent stabilized. As a previous poster said, the occupants of those apartments tend to stay in them forever. That keeps the overall apartment vacancy rate low.
        So good luck.

      8. Thanks Adam, I was sitting here shaking my head looking for the right words, well said. I’d add, stay in PA.

      9. Good points re rent control not applying for new residents in the city, only possibly rent stabilization. Rent control and rent stabilization protections are specific to the apartment, not the tenant. Also, it is tricky to ascertain what the new rent will be for existing units, because the landlords get both an de-occupancy bump and also get to include a portion of the cost of “improvements” to the apartment (amortized into 40 or 60 months, I think).

        As for wait lists, although it’s not in Brooklyn, I thought I read somewhere that Stuyvesant Town had re-opened its waiting list for rent stabilized units. Those are nice size studio, 1BR and 2BR apartments in Manhattan, so you might want to investigate that.

      10. you can’t get rent control, unless you have a time machine back to the 60’s. As to section 8, I think there is over 100,000 people on the waiting list.

      12. Lot’s of questions …You can read here
        http://www.dhcr.state.ny.us/Rent/
        You won’t get rent control – it applies to a small # of tenants who have lived in their apartments since 1971. There are many rent stabilized apartments (about a million) and many of these in the most desirable neighborhoods are difficult to get because the regulated rents are less than market rents and tenants tend to keep them forever (even owning property outside of NY as someone mentioned in one of the replies to your previous post).

        Also, NYCHA is not giving out new section 8 vouchers.