Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s newly unveiled push to strip properties from bad landlords and bestow them onto “responsible” owners has been happening for years in New York City — and has repeatedly proven to be a failure, The Post has learned.
The socialist mayor, as he announced his sprawling housing plan Wednesday, vowed to use city resources to help “remove negligent owners” and transfer buildings that have “suffered chronic neglect” into the hands of “responsible stewards.”
But the administration’s initiative, dubbed “Fix the City,” aims to make use of already existing bureaucratic and agency programs that date back to at least the 1970s — and have repeatedly needed the government to swoop in with bailouts, a Post review found.
“The city has long tried to help tenants become owners of buildings, but tenants aren’t necessarily equipped to run the building,” one former insider at the city Department of Housing Preservation and Development said.
“You need someone to be a good bookkeeper and to collect rent from the neighbors,” the source said, adding, “It’s really hard to do and hard to do well.”
Mamdani’s main mechanism, which he touted to hold landlords accountable, would be for the city to drag alleged bad actors to court in an attempt to implement a little-known program, named 7A, in which a housing court judge would appoint a non-profit to take over the management of a building.
Another pillar of the mayor’s plan calls for City Hall to ramp up the number of buildings that are collectively owned and operated by the people who live there — framing it as a revolutionary path to increasing homeownership in a city where roughly 70% of residents are renters.
Under the Housing Development Fund Corporation program, the cooperatives are run by the “shareholders” and subject to strict regulations, such as limits on income for residents and subletting and resale rates.
There are roughly 1,100 such affordable co-ops currently across the Big Apple — though an investigation by state Attorney General Letitia James announced last year found that nearly all of them were considered “high risk” and needed help.
The AG’s office, along with then-Mayor Eric Adams, rolled out a $750,000 bailout for the buildings, which were found to have fallen behind on rental collection, stopped making tax payments, run up high levels of debt or racked up a staggering number of code violations.
The buildings, which are granted a slew of tax breaks and financial help from the city, are overseen by the HPD agency, but each has a board of directors that is “legally” required to act in the co-op’s best interest.
Mamdani also pushed for the passing of the controversial Community Opportunity to Purchase Act (COPA), giving non-profits the first shot at buying distressed buildings. The legislation was approved by the City Council last year but vetoed by Adams.
Housing non-profits, however, are already at a “breaking point,” according to a recent alarming report that called for a massive government bailout of the industry.
The February report from the Association of Neighborhood Housing and Development found that 290,000 of the city’s already-existing subsidized, non-profit-run buildings were financially underwater.
“Rising cost, stagnant revenues and unpredictable federal support have created conditions where even mission-driven nonprofits — those that rebuilt neighborhoods when the private market walked away — can no longer sustain their portfolios without intervention,” the report warned, calling for a bailout and reforms.
City Hall described the buildings that would be subject to the effort as “chronically negligent,” but couldn’t define that term when pressed by The Post.
Kenny Burgos, CEO of the New York Apartment Association, panned the mayor as merely disguising a push for government subsidy hikes as a housing plan — with “flailing solutions that don’t meet the moment.”
“We can’t afford it today and we won’t be able to afford that tomorrow,” he said.
“Nonprofits and affordable co-ops are screaming from their crumbling rooftops that the rents don’t cover costs,” Burgos said. “The city should crack down on bad actors but changing ownership simply moves the financial burden to taxpayers, permanently.”
Humberto Lopes, a 61-year-old building owner who recently formed the Gotham Housing Alliance to represent the interests of small and large building owners, railed that the mayor should focus on the city’s beleaguered public housing system instead.
“Why don’t you start with them first,” he said of NYCHA, railing, “When did this become a communist country where a dictator could come in and take my building and give it to the f–ing peasant?”
The AG’s office did not say how the funds announced in September 2025 for the cooperatives were doled out, referring The Post to HPD, which did not respond to questions.
Mamdani also announced he plans to use a public-private trust for NYCHA – which he opposed as a state lawmaker – to help fix existing public housing buildings.
“When necessary, we will take aggressive legal action to remove negligent owners and property managers,” he crowed at Wednesday’s news conference.
“And for buildings that have suffered chronic neglect, we will work to transfer ownership to responsible stewards. Stewards that include community land trusts, nonprofits or even the tenants themselves,” he said — to roaring cheers from pro-tenant advocates in attendance.
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