Report: Amid shortage, NYC on pace to just meet 20% of housing goal

New York City is on pace this year to meet just 20% of its housing goal — reflecting an “ongoing decline in housing production” — amid a worsening shortage, according to a new report by the city's real estate industry.

Builders filed permits for just under 10,000 new units during the first eight months of 2023; at that rate, 10,000 will be filed for the whole year, according to the report by the Real Estate Board of New York.

During the 2000s and 2010s, there were about 20,000 units built per year.

The board called the current permitting levels “alarmingly low," a deficit also seen in Nassau, Suffolk and throughout the region.

Mayor Eric Adams in December called for at least 500,000 new units of housing over the next decade — about 50,000 every year.

Housing stock has increased 4% since 2010, which isn’t enough to keep pace with the 22% rise in jobs, said a report this year from the Pew Charitable Trusts.

The report is based on foundation permits for multifamily buildings submitted to the city’s Department of Buildings.

Andrew Fine, the policy director for the organization Open New York, which favors the construction of more housing in the region, said the report covers permits for housing that is expected to be finished in about two or three years, and “the future is looking tough.”

“We need dramatic state action to fix the housing market, and we need it both in New York City, and we need it in Westchester and we need it on Long Island in particular, which is growing housing at the slowest rate in the country."

Among the 100 largest counties in the nation, Nassau and Suffolk permitted less new housing on a per capita basis from 2013 to 2022 than all but one county in Ohio, according to Bloomberg News.

Fine said there should be “more flexible zoning” in the region to allow for more types of housing.

“Our land-use policies are some of the most restrictive in the country, and that means we don’t get housing built. It’s pretty simple,” he said.

The latest vacancy rate for rentals is about 1.7%.

The city has long had a housing shortage, and it's been worsened by rising prices, a lack of new housing and a decades-old homelessness problem exacerbated by an influx of tens of thousands of foreign migrants who are stressing the shelter system.

Yet in 2017, the city permitted 13 homes for every 1,000 residents, according to the Pew report. Boston permitted 28, Washington, D.C., 43, and Seattle, 67. 

By Matthew Chayes

matthew.chayes@newsday.comchayesmatthew

Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.