Bloody real estate myths are hard to dissipate. Consider the propaganda that housing evictions are skyrocketing in the Big Apple.
This false argument was cited at length in support of so-called “just cause evictions” (which would make it nearly impossible to get stuck tenants up) and subsequently passed by state legislatures. The watered-down version that did was cited to whine otherwise. Almost goes far enough.
The New York Times’s enthusiastic coverage made it seem like renters were being left on the street.
“Evictions are surging across New York City, with monthly rates of legal lockouts beginning to reflect pre-pandemic numbers in late 2023,” Gothamist wrote in January.
Patch exclaimed that evictions have increased “nearly 200 percent.”
But the truth is 100% the opposite. Eviction numbers increased for most of 2022 and 2023, as a COVID-19-era eviction moratorium that was in place until mid-January 2022 remained in effect across the state.
A meaningful recent comparison of evictions is with 2020 and earlier.
The number of evictions of apartment tenants in 2023 was 12,139, a decrease of 28.6% from 2019.
Additionally, the number of evictions in 2023 was only half the average of the past 20 years (again, excluding moratorium periods). For example, in 2015 alone he had over 25,000 evictions.
These statistics do not come from a real estate lobby group, but from a source that could hardly be considered a landlord tool: the New York City Rent Guidelines Commission, a fact made clear in the report. There is. 2024 Income and Affordability Study. You can find out on page 31.
