{"id":201377,"date":"2026-04-17T23:52:44","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T23:52:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/201377\/"},"modified":"2026-04-17T23:52:44","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T23:52:44","slug":"hochuls-11th-hour-tax-pitch-angers-real-estate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/201377\/","title":{"rendered":"Hochul\u2019s 11th-hour tax pitch angers real estate"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gov. Kathy Hochul\u2019s eleventh-hour state budget pitch for a new tax on second homes<\/a> owned by out of towners is winning her support in the legislature \u2014 and skepticism from the real estate industry.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The move is also encouraging some lawmakers to hold their ground on the larger tax asks.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What You Need To Know<\/p>\n

Gov. Kathy Hochul\u2019s eleventh-hour state budget pitch for\u00a0a new tax on second homes\u00a0owned by out of towners is winning her support in the legislature \u2014 and skepticism from the real estate industry
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Sources told NY1 she called Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Monday, April 13, telling him she was ready to back a tax on the wealthy
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If passed, the measure would apply to non-primary residents\u2019 second homes in New York City valued over $5 million
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But before her public endorsement, legislators in both the state Senate and Assembly were discussing this tax \u2014 among others \u2014 as a Plan B should Hochul hold the line on the current personal income and corporate tax rates<\/p>\n

Sources told NY1 she called Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Monday, April 13, telling him she was ready to back a tax on the wealthy.<\/p>\n

Hochul has been putting out feelers for weeks, quietly securing support and researching the tax known as pied-\u00e0-terre<\/a>, according to multiple sources familiar with the governor\u2019s movements. If passed, the measure would apply to non-primary residents\u2019 second homes in New York City valued over $5 million.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis proposal that we\u2019ve worked on with the governor is one that speaks exactly to that need and does so while funding the essential city services that New Yorkers can\u2019t go without,\u201d said the mayor on Friday during a news conference.<\/p>\n

But before her public endorsement, legislators in both the state Senate and Assembly were discussing this tax \u2014 among others \u2014 as a Plan B should Hochul hold the line on the current personal income and corporate tax rates.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m happy to see that the governor understands that the city of New York needs the revenue, and so hopefully we\u2019ll close this down,\u201d Heastie told NY1 exclusively on Friday.<\/p>\n

Real estate cautions against the move \u2014 and is seeking answers on the exact tax rate, whether the law will have to be renewed in the future, and if it will even raise the $500 million promised.<\/p>\n

\u201cI worry that there\u2019ll be a cutback of projects, and that this will hurt jobs and wages and make the city less affordable for working-class New Yorkers,\u201d said Jason Haber, a real estate agent at Compass.<\/p>\n

He told NY1 that it could also compromise tax dollars that flow to city programs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think once you introduce a pied-\u00e0-terre tax, you introduce doubt, you introduce uncertainty, and you\u2019re risking buyers going elsewhere and hurting overall transaction value,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want people buying and selling in the city of New York, if for no other reason, to collect the taxes on those transactions. They are critically important to the functioning of this city, is to have the transfer tax and the mansion tax collected. And if you drop transactions, you will see those numbers spiral down. And that is not good for public education,\u201d added Haber.<\/p>\n

The bill\u2019s former sponsor, Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman, who formerly represented parts of Greenwich Village and Upper West Side in the state\u2019s Senate, defended the measure.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor example, Ken Griffin\u2019s trophy apartment. He\u2019s not a New Yorker. It was sold for $238 million. He pays a lower effective tax rate than a single-family homeowner on Staten Island,\u201d he said, referring to the CEO of Citadel LLC.<\/p>\n

\u201cMiami is sinking, quite literally, in the luxury condo market; New York is staying strong now. There\u2019s no question that whenever you impose a new tax, you have to see what its impact is,\u201d he added. \u201cIt\u2019s not going to dissuade them from protecting their money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Manhattan Assemblywoman Grace Lee has a proposal called the Teardown Tax Act for a new $10,000 surcharge on multi-million dollar apartment alterations or demolitions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not only losing housing, but we\u2019re losing the neighbors who lived in these homes,\u201d she said, standing outside a former multi-family unit on Bank Street recently sold and on track to be converted into a single-family home.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is about revenue, but it\u2019s also about slowing gentrification and making sure that we are preserving housing, not losing housing. You know, we have ultra-wealthy people who are coming in, converting multi-family housing into single-family homes,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

Lee said she\u2019s also not backing down from other taxes to plug the city\u2019s $5.4 billion budget hole.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the assembly spoke when we issued our one-house proposal that included revenue raisers and taxes on the ultra-wealthy. We would love to see that happen in the final budget,\u201d said Lee.<\/p>\n

Hochul also favors other taxes, including one on nicotine products, like Zyn.<\/p>\n

But the company says Hochul\u2019s fight is misguided and instead attacks an alternative for smoking addicts.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeven billion dollars a year in New York\u2019s Medicaid funds go toward taking care of people who smoke and got sick. So nicotine pouches, on the other hand, still are delivering nicotine, but with much lower risk,\u201d said Brian Erkkila, of Philip Morris International on behalf of Zyn.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also opposed by business groups, including the Business Council of New York.<\/p>\n

The state budget is now 17 days past its April 1 deadline. Legislators are due back in Albany to pass another budget extender providing temporary funding for state workers on Monday, April 20.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gov. Kathy Hochul\u2019s eleventh-hour state budget pitch for a new tax on second homes owned by out of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":125212,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[109,116,25,8889,9,24,55,54,49,12,56,112,108,87,27,200],"class_list":{"0":"post-201377","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-app-local-state-politics","9":"tag-app-ny-state-of-politics","10":"tag-app-top-stories","11":"tag-bernadette-hogan","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-new-york-city-headlines","15":"tag-new-york-city-news","16":"tag-new-york-state","17":"tag-news","18":"tag-ny","19":"tag-ny-state-of-politics","20":"tag-ny-state-of-politics-blog","21":"tag-politics","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-vod"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201377"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201377\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}