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Q&A
NYCHA's rent arrears and collection trends
0:30:36
·
162 sec
Chair Chris Banks inquires about NYCHA's progress with rental arrears, collection trends, and financial projections related to rental revenue.
- As of February 28, 2025, NYCHA's rent arrears stood at $545 million, after applying $150 million of state ERAP funds.
- The average household in arrears owes around $8,116.
- Rent collection rate is around 63% through February 28, 2025.
- Despite similar collection rates, NYCHA is collecting more dollars year-over-year.
- Two programs are being implemented to address arrears:
- COVID rental arrears program through the state ($35 million)
- Home ARP program (estimated $125 million)
- After these programs, rent arrears are expected to drop to around $360 million.
Chris Banks
0:30:36
Okay.
0:30:38
When it comes to rent arrears, the rent obviously is a critical resource of revenue for NYCHA And the disruption in the rental payments as a result of COVID of the COVID pandemic has been a challenge for the authority.
0:30:55
Can you update the committee on the progress you're making with rental res?
0:31:01
What trends are you seeing with with with and and what concerns you may have?
0:31:10
And is NYCHA's financial plan, which plan reflects the rental revenue of over a billion in 2025, but approximately only, like, 920,000,000 in 2026.
0:31:22
Can you explain the drop, and does it have anything to do with the ERAP funding?
Annika Lescott-Martinez
0:31:27
Sure.
0:31:27
Thank you so much for that question Councilmember Banks.
0:31:30
So as of 02/28/2025, our rent arrears stood at $545,000,000.
0:31:37
This is after we applied a hundred and $50,000,000 of the state ERAP funds.
0:31:42
On average, the households that are in arrears owe around $8,116 which is a considerable sum for low income residents.
0:31:54
You know our rent collection rate is around 63% through 02/28/2025.
0:32:02
The percentage is more or less the same or slightly lower than what we've seen in 2423 but what's really important is that we're actually collecting more dollars.
0:32:12
So for example in 2024 at a 65% rate we collected $993,000,000.
0:32:19
In '23 at 65% rate we collected $962,000,000.
0:32:24
So there is some progress that's being made.
0:32:27
What's drowning out the collection rate is the arrears balance.
0:32:31
It is large, it is difficult for residents to manage.
0:32:34
The good news is we do have two programs we'll be implementing this year.
0:32:39
The first is the COVID rental arrears program through the state, that's around $35,000,000.
0:32:44
We are already submitting a payment file to the state, we've started to receive some funds and we'll be applying those to tenant accounts.
0:32:52
We also have a home art program of a hundred, it's a total of a 50, we conservatively estimate a hundred and $25,000,000 and we're working with our HPD, City Hall and OMB partners on that program.
0:33:05
So we expect that after those two programs our rent arrears should drop to around $360,000,000 Again, large, some certainly but much progress as to where we are today.