Residential Evictions
In 2018, tenants in over 19,000 apartments experienced an eviction from their homes. Residents who are evicted are first sued in Housing Court before being formally evicted.
Out of the 230,071 eviction petitions filed by building owners at New York City Housing Court in 2017, only 9% or 20,804 evictions were executed by the City Marshall. This large gap in the evictions filed and executed evictions highlights the importance for access to attorneys in Housing Court.
In August of 2017, the City passed the Universal Access law, which gives free legal help to low income tenants facing eviction. In the first year of its implementation, this law provided free legal services to more than 87,000 New Yorkers, and 21,955 New Yorkers threatened by eviction were able to stay in their homes.
For more information on the free legal services visit Eviction Free NYC and RTCNYC .
Residential Evictions 2018
19,970 Evictions
Tenant Harassment
In 2017, New York City had a vacancy rate of 3.63 %, which has led to a continuation of the decades-long declaration of a housing emergency in our City.
Unfortunately, there is concern that landlords may be bringing frivolous eviction lawsuits in order to create more vacant apartments.
This is particularly true where the tenant resides in a rent-regulated apartment and has actually paid rent or intentionally withheld rent because the landlord failed to make necessary repairs.
Landlords sometimes use construction to remove tenants by doing renovations in occupied buildings, creating hazards to make apartments uninhabitable, and forcing tenants to choose between protecting their health and staying in their homes. This practice, also known as “construction as harassment”.
Residential Evictions by Borough 2018
Bronx: 6,858 Evictions (34%)
Brooklyn: 5,701 Evictions (29%)
Queens: 4,043 Evictions (20%)
Manhattan: 2,709 Evictions (14%)
Staten Island: 659 Evictions (3%)
Total: 19,970 Evictions
Eviction Rate
Some boroughs have more residential units than others.
The Bronx has the highest rate of evictions.
Though Brooklyn experiences a lot of evictions, the borough also has a large number of residential units, so the rate of eviction is less.
Eviction Rate 2018
Bronx: 1 Eviction per 79 Units.
Brooklyn: 1 Eviction per 180 Units.
Queens: 1 Eviction per 209 Units.
Staten Island: 1 Eviction per 266 Units.
Manhattan: 1 Eviction per 345 Units.
Total: 19,970 Evictions
Residential Evictions Jan 2017 – Present
*Features that change are Total Evictions, Evictions by Year, Evictions by Zipcode, and Executed Date.
Residential Evictions Map User Guide
The Residential Evictions map displays eight layers.
Filter through the layers by using the legend on the left side of the map. We advise that you only view a single layer at a time, with the exception of viewing “Evictions” overlaid with any one of the other political district boundaries.
Utilizing the right hand side panel:
The right side panel is a scrolling panel that allows users to subset evictions by year, zip code, or various types of districts. Information show on the right side panel is information corresponding to only the subset of data shown in the current map view. To use the selection feature on the right hand panel, identify the layer (from the left side legend) that corresponds to the feature you are selecting. Click on a category, or multiple categories, and only those will appear in view. To clear category selections and view all categories, simply click “All” on the upper right hand side of the panel.
Utilizing the lower panel:
The lower panel shows the number of evictions executed since January 2017 in the current map view. The lower panel can be used to limit the evictions shown in the map view to a particular date range by clicking on the bar and adjusting the limits.
Tenant Protection
The Tenant Protection Act also allowed tenants to sue landlords in Housing Court under harassment claims. Previously, tenants could sue their landlords for specific violations that only related directly to the physical condition of the apartment.
At full implementation of the Universal Access law, funding for tenant legal services programs will total $155.5 million by Fiscal 2022, and will provide legal services to a projected 125,000 households each year. The initial zipcodes where income eligible New Yorkers can have access to free legal aid, where chosen based upon high volume of shelter entry, high volume of rent-regulated housing, and where there was no existing zip-code-based program
To combat construction as harassment, the City passed a law, which created a Certificate of No Harassment (CONH) pilot program. The program requires landlords obtain a CONH before starting construction in a pilot program building, which includes buildings in City-sponsored rezoning.
The City also passed a law creating the Speculation Watch List. The Watch List is a publicly available list of rent-regulated buildings where, based on several factors, tenants may be at risk of being displaced, and which may be prioritized for City preservation programs or initiatives.
Commercial Evictions
Commercial tenants are also increasingly at risk for eviction, and the prevalence of vacant storefronts is an ongoing challenge for New York City neighborhoods.
20% of storefronts were vacant in 2018, an increase from 7% in 2016.
Commercial vacancies stem from a combination of issues, including rising rents, the growing e-commerce market and complex landlord-tenant law.
Across the City, long-standing and historic local establishments have closed, negatively impacting the communities that have relied on these businesses for generations.
Commercial Evictions 2018
20% of Storefronts Vacant
Commerical Evictions by Borough
Manhattan had the highest number of commerical evictions in 2018. Conversely, Staten Island saw the fewest commerical evictions in 2018.
Brooklyn and Queens had a similar number of commercial evictions, with 456 and 407 commerical evictions respectively. Together Brookly and Queens make up roughly half of all commercial evictions in 2018.
Commercial Evictions by Borough 2018
Manhattan: 678 Evictions (37%)
Brooklyn: 456 Evictions (25%)
Queens: 407 Evictions (22%)
Bronx: 280 Evictions (15%)
Staten Island: 32 Evictions (2%)
Total: 1,853 Evictions
Commercial Evictions Jan 2017 – Present
Eviction Rate
Some boroughs have more residential units than others.
The Bronx has the most evictions for every apartment or house.
Though Brooklyn experiences a lot of evictions, the borough also has a large number of residential units, so the rate of eviction is less.
Eviction Rate 2018
Bronx: 1 Eviction per 1,770 Units.
Manhattan: 1 Eviction per 2,042 Units.
Brooklyn: 1 Eviction per 6,083 Units.
Staten Island: 1 Eviction per 6,810 Units.
Queens: 1 Eviction per 6,841 Units.
Total: 1,853 Evictions
Boro, Block & Lot (BBL)
The BBL field is used as the key column to match across all the datasets in the analysis. It is a unique property identifier for every lot in New York City. The BBL is composed of the borough number, block number and lot number. You may find the BBL for an address here. The NYC Department of City Planning’s MapPLUTO is used to map properties and to obtain property information.
Evictions
The evictions in the analysis are City Marshal executed evictions from 2017 to the present. The dataset is updated daily on the NYC Open Data Portal and is provided by the Department of Investigations.
Eviction addresses are geocoded to obtain latitude, longitude and BBL information. Eviction addresses are cleaned before geocoding. For more details on how the addresses are cleaned, click here. The addresses are geocoded with Geoclient API, a RESTful web service interface of the NYC Department of City Planning’s Geosupport system. In the case where the Geoclient API is unable to provide latitude, longitude, and BBL information, the eviction is removed from the analysis.
On the residential evictions map, the evictions point layer displays eviction address locations. In the case where there is more than one eviction at an address the point will appear darker, but information for only one eviction will be available in the pop up. Aggregated eviction information for an address is available on the building history map.
The eviction rate is calculated by dividing the total number evictions a property has ever had by the total number of residential units. Since the evictions are at the unit or apartment level, the assumption is made that an eviction can occur for a specific unit more than once over the time period of the dataset. It is rare for the same apartment to have had more than one tenant be evicted in a year. Apartment or unit information is left out to avoid the possibility of identifying anyone. Eviction rates for the district boundaries are calculated by dividing the aggregated total number of evictions and residential units in that district.
Universal Language Access Law
The Universal Access Law layer in the analysis are the current zipcodes where income eligible New Yorkers can have access to free legal aid. In 2022, income eligible New Yorkers in all of NYC will have access.
HPD Housing Maintenance Code Violations
The Housing Maintenance Code Violations in the analysis are class C violations that have been issued this year and the previous year. Class C violations are the most serious. The dataset is updated daily on the NYC Open Data Portal and is provided by the Department of Housing Preservation & Development.
DOB OATH/ECB Violations
The DOB ECB violations in the analysis are class 1 violations that have been issued this year and the previous year. Class 1 violations are the most serious. The Department of Building’s penalty schedule was used to filter the infraction codes classified as class 1. The dataset is updated every weekday on the NYC Open Data Portal and is provided by the Department of Buildings.
311 Service Requests
The 311 Service Requests in the analysis are Heat & Hot Water requests that have been made this year and the previous year. Heat and Hot Water complaints contain more detail on whether the incident affects the entire building or the apartment. The dataset is updated daily on the NYC Open Data Portal by 311.
Certificate of No Harassment (CONH) Pilot Building List
The CONH Pilot Building List is a dataset that lists the buildings where property owners are required to file for Certificate of No Harassment before beginning certain construction work. The dataset is updated monthly on the NYC Open Data Portal by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development.
Speculation Watch List
The Speculation Watch List is a dataset that lists rent-regulated multiple dwelling properties that have a potential for speculation due to their recent sales. The dataset is updated quarterly on the NYC Open Data Portal by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development.
Subsidies or Rent Stabilization
The Subsidies or Rent Stabilization layer is made up of the Subsidized Housing Database from the NYU Furman Center’s CoreData.nyc and the NYC Rent Stabilized Building Listings from the NYC Rent Guidelines Board. The Subsidized Housing Database is up to date as of June 27, 2018. For more information on a specific subsidy program, visit Furman Center’s Directory of New York City Housing Programs. The Rent Stabilized Building Listings is updated every year. The Building Listing for 2017 is being used for the analysis while waiting for the 2018 listing to be posted.
District Boundaries
Eviction totals are aggregated for zip codes, City Council, Community Board, State Senate, and State Assembly districts. District boundary shapefiles are available on the open data portal here.
For feedback, comments, and questions please email DataInfo@council.nyc.gov.
Created by the NYC City Council Data Team.