One Columbus Place, a rental building built in the 1990’s on 9th Avenue between 58th and 59th Streets, has opened a waiting list for apartments targeted at people making 130% of the area median income.
The rents and income limits are higher than they are for many other developments. A four-person household making as much as 124,020, for instance, could still qualify for one of the rentals. See the income limits below and find out how to apply here.
Click to enlarge.
Photo via Brodsky Organization.
Oh boy! This entire lottery system is a farce.
How do 2-4 people making $93,703 afford an apartment for $2,733? These income brackets are always out of whack.
Affordable to who?? certainly not middle class New Yorkers. For half that “affordable rent” you can get a mortgage for a co-op in Brooklyn or Queens
There is a simple solution to the affordable housing issue – raise income and property taxes on the affluent and use the money to subsidize affordable housing. Some people who do not want to pay their fare share may leave, but that will increase the supply of housing, helping lower prices.
Property taxes are already High!
The only rational solution to the housing affordability crisis is to end rent regulation laws, end the costly and inefficient 421-a tax cut for developers and to end these ridiculous housing lotteries.
Besides, if the UWS is too expensive there’s plenty of cheap apartments in The Bronx.
Why are you so eager for your neighbors to leave the neighborhood?
Yeah, Sherman, that worked SUPER well for Boston/Cambridge, which in the twenty years since rent control was abolished (against the will of the local residents, I might add) has become a haven of affordable housing, where the middle class can live comfortably on one parent’s salary. I don’t know why we haven’t emulated their wisdom.
You have zero idea what you’re talking about but if this nonsense makes you happy then OK.
Great idea! See how well Detroit fared when The Affluent left? It became so affordable that you could buy a house for $1 if it hadn’t been burned down yet.
I don’t think the government should be involved in these types of affordable housing schemes. Able bodied/minded individuals should be responsible for finding housing that they can afford.
There seems to be little transparency in terms of how much these types of programs cost the taxpayer. This prevents any sort of cost/benefit analysis. The developer gets tax breaks, which means that other taxpayers must make up the difference one way or another to fund essential government services. But how much these 421a-type programs cost is unclear and open to interpretation.
Sniff sniff. And what about the free money the developers received to build these properties & keep all of the profits. Who gets free money to do anything. Funny how things only go one way-you never hear complaints about that set up.
DeBlasio lives in a nice house that is supported by hard working taxpayers and he boasts that he is a champion of affordable housing. Someone is drinking and smoking some strange stuff if they believe these rents to be affordable for those who earn the median NYC household income of approximately 51,000. When is City Hall going to stop playing New Yorkers for fools?
DeBlasio also owns a house in Brooklyn he’s renting out in which he charges a market based rent.
Since DeBlasio is so intent on lecturing landlords about how “greedy” they are perhaps he should put his money where his mouth is and charge a below market rent to his tenants.
Agree completely! Maybe it takes a Grumpy Old Man to tell it like it is. The affordable housing circus in NY generally (perhaps not in this case) uproots and displaces lower and middle income tenants by demolishing or renovating their homes and removing them with a dangling carrot of affordable housing somewhere else in some fantasy world. It’s beneficiary is the developer. And then when they may be making $25,000 a year they are afforded a chance at an apartment where they need a minimum salary of $40,000. That’s when they discover the fraud they’ve been somehow sold. It’s called take a bus to Pennsylvania with your belongings or onto the streets of NY.
This type of housing should be reserved for police, fire fighters, public school teachers and other city workers. Instead of a lottery it should be based on tenure and service.
it is interesting that the income standard is higher in the this building vs. the West 100s. Above West 100 Street ‘affordable’ housing advocates continually push for massive developments that consist of an entire block with income restrictions that are so low that a short order cook or a home attendant would be not be eligible because they would be making too much money. This demonstrates a socio-econimc disparity between uptown and downtown of the Upper West Side. It is unfortunate that our local politician representatives including our Manhattan Borough President do not see Manhattan Valley as the ‘poor door’ of the Upper West Side, yet they are somewhat responsible for creating a ‘poor door’ community. The West 50s idea of affordable housing opportunities are apartments that are integrated within a single luxury building, however across West 100 Street individual buildings or entire blocs are constructed exclusively for low and supportive housing. Manhattan Valley is an impoverished community with little opportunities however advocates and politicians continualy reinforce an already segregated community with little thought for a community with limited services and a diverse housing stock.
Unless my math is off the asking rents are actually below the federal standard (one third of monthly income going towards rent), so yes, they are “affordable”.
Keep in mind that these are *rent stabilized* units as well (one assumes), so unlike market rate the increases are decided by the city, not landlord. That and once in you are there for life unless *you* decide to move.
Though am guessing units are freeing or freed up because once you start paying almost three grand in rent (for a two bedroom), condo or house seems like a much better investment.
Well if you had been around in 1997 when One Columbus Place went up, you could have nabbed a one bedroom for $1900k per month.
https://www.nytimes.com/1997/11/06/nyregion/touch-college-life-but-1900-month-34-graduates-one-business-school-wind-up.html?mcubz=1
Obviously no such luck today.
It is amazing how much the UWS real estate has changed in just those ten years.
1997 was twenty years ago.
Yes, sorry; saw the error after hitting “enter”, but since you cannot edit posts….
Getting down to the nitty-gritty.
Apparently “wait listed” will be just that; as there aren’t any affordable units available.
Landlord wished to extend the tax abatement for another fifteen years and city forced them to create a waitlist for any vacancies that *may* occur in the affordable units.
“Once its capped at 7,500 applicants, the waitlist will only last two years before HPD holds another round of applications to refresh it.”
https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20170915/lincoln-square/huge-waitlist-affordable-apartment-upper-west-side-studios