‘Rent, Forever’: The Price of Living in New York City (Published 2022) (2024)

New York City is a renter’s town.

For many residents, to love this sprawling metropolis is to never have your name on a deed.

About 66 percent of the households around the United States own their homes. In New York City, that number falls dramatically to half that. In the Bronx, only one out of five households owns their homes.

It’s a horrible price to pay, and yet, people keep coming, keep pouring their souls into making a life here. The renter is the constant in a city that continuously morphs into a newer, shinier version of itself. The renters are the turbines of this city, thrusting it further with their labor and giving New York its flair, drawing more people who long to be part of the crowds filling sidewalks and craning their necks at the skyscrapers where many luxury apartments, worth millions of dollars, sit empty.

The city’s population continues to expand at a sharp beat, despite very little new housing being built in recent decades. Between 2000 and 2020, the city grew by more than 800,000 residents, according to the Census Bureau. In that same time period, only 438,088 apartments and single-family homes were built.

And it doesn’t look like there is relief on the horizon. On Tuesday, the Rent Guidelines Board, which regulates rents in New York City, voted 5 to 4 to raise rents by 3.25 percent on rent-stabilized apartments. In May, the median rent in Manhattan reached $4,000, the highest ever reported by Douglas Elliman, a brokerage firm.

That leaves little for savings, nothing for a down payment. Some New Yorkers often forgo medical and dental care, to be able to pay for their apartment. They are left with no other alternative but to rent, forever. And while moving out of the city might be an option for some, that also requires a sum of money upfront.