Empty Buildings

On the corner of 22nd and 7th Avenue sat a bustling coffee shop, and then one morning it stood closed. I know because we lived on the block of 22nd between 7th and 8th Avenue for a few years. The ground floor, including the apartments above, sat empty for almost the past 20 years.

Then this past week, the building went up in flames. Almost 200 firefighters and EMS personnel showed up to control the fire. Buildings next door had to be evacuated. Now, of course, there will be an investigation, and the eyesore will stand for god knows how long. This should not happen.

There needs to be a law that fines owners who leave their buildings vacant for more than twelve months. There are countless empty storefronts throughout NY that sit idle because landlords don’t care that the market-bearing price doesn’t meet their expectations. There are two across the street from Gotham in Chelsea that have sat empty for some time, which says to me that the price is too high.

I am a fan of the new annual pied-a-terre tax that Mamdani and Hochul are working on. They are proposing that if you own a home valued at more than $5m that is your secondary residence, you should have to pay taxes on it. This counters the 180-day rule used by many secondary homeowners in Florida to avoid paying NYS taxes, while spending the other six months of the year enjoying all that the city or other areas in NYS offer.

I recently spoke with someone who owns several buildings that serve low- and middle-income renters through RAD/PACT (Rental Assistance Demonstration/Permanent Affordability Commitment Together), which allows private management of public housing. There are countless buildings with empty apartments because it takes the city eighteen months to process the applications for each unit. Eighteen months! Why don’t they build an agent that can process applications immediately and place people quickly, knowing which spots are vacant?

It is time for major shifts in the real estate world of NY with the inclusion of embracing technology to help navigate the pieds-a-terre, empty buildings, and the reality of the market.