{"id":374126,"date":"2026-10-15T19:13:15","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T19:13:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/374126\/"},"modified":"2026-10-15T19:13:15","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T19:13:15","slug":"the-affordable-housing-lottery-winner-losers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/374126\/","title":{"rendered":"The Affordable-Housing Lottery Winner-Losers"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"There <\/p>\n

\n There are affordable-housing-lottery apartments at the Eagle + West complex, as seen in this advertising photo, but it apparently isn\u2019t always clear to prospective tenants that they might not get the more upscale perks.
\n Photo-Illustration: Curbed; Photos: Brookfield Properties, Getty\n <\/p>\n

Miguel Castro couldn\u2019t believe his luck. After the slog of filling out housing-lottery paperwork and months of waiting<\/a>, the brand ambassador and bartender got picked for a rent-stabilized studio at 25 Water Street<\/a>, a brand-new 1,300-unit office-to-residential conversion in the Financial District. The listing photos and renderings showed<\/a> glistening lacquered cabinets, hardwood floors, and stainless-steel appliances,\u00a0all on top of an amenity spread that included an outdoor and indoor swimming pool, a basketball court, and a library. The rent was just $2,250 a month (plus another $150 for amenity fees), compared<\/a> to around $4,300 for a market-rate studio\u00a0in the neighborhood; more important, it was stabilized<\/a>. He was happy with his housing setup at the time \u2014 a spacious, one-bedroom apartment in Jamaica, Queens, which he also had won through the lottery \u2014\u00a0but the idea of living in the city proper was hard to pass up. \u201cThe allure of living in Manhattan was intense,\u201d he says. \u201cThe Financial District \u2014\u00a0it sounds so elevated.\u201d He grabbed it and moved in.<\/p>\n

Gradually, the red flags he had faintly picked up on during his tour became hard to ignore. It\u2019s the tiniest apartment Castro has ever lived in, with just enough room for a full-size bed, a TV, and a small sofa. The walls are thin and uninsulated, which makes it easy to hear his neighbors and impossible to get a decent night\u2019s sleep. There isn\u2019t much natural light or ventilation, so he and some of his neighbors tend to keep their blinds up despite looking out in a shared courtyard \u2014 meaning that he occasionally glimpses people running around in the buff<\/a> and vice versa. \u201cThis place is like a prison,\u201d he says. \u201cI am so mad at myself for moving here.\u201d<\/p>\n

To New Yorkers who have been waiting years, sometimes more than a\u00a0decade<\/a>,\u00a0to get picked in the affordable-housing lottery, it\u2019s perhaps hard to hear Castro bemoaning his circumstances. Competition for the lottery is cutthroat, with more than 7 million applications submitted on the Housing Connect portal in 2025 for the 13,000 units advertised. Between the record-breaking rents<\/a> this year and Zohran Mamdani\u2019s historic two-year freeze<\/a> for rent-regulated units (legal challenges pending<\/a>), a stabilized lease that isn\u2019t in a roach-infested, slumlord building seems like, well, winning the lottery. Yet Castro isn\u2019t alone in reconsidering\u00a0the open market \u2014\u00a0or at least having some serious regrets about his prize.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe thought we were getting a silver bullet,\u201d Elijah DuPonty, a registrar at David Zwirner Gallery, says about getting picked to tour a lottery apartment earlier this year. He was living in a one-bedroom railroad flat on the Upper West Side with his partner and cat when he got a call to come down immediately to Tompkins Avenue in Bedford-Stuyvesant to see a one-bedroom unit there. He was excited \u2014 at least until he got to the address. Yes, it was a one-bedroom, with big, loftlike windows and sleek new appliances. But it was smaller than his current place, and the monthly rent, while stabilized, still was nearly $200 more than the $2,820 he was paying at the time for his market-rate unit. Near the very end of the application process, DuPonty pulled out, shocking his co-workers. It puzzled the building\u2019s lottery manager, too. When DuPonty said he wasn\u2019t interested, he recalls, \u201cThey replied, \u2018Why not?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

\n A lottery unit at 25 Water Street, seen in this listing photo, seems at least in some ways comparable to what you\u2019d find in a market-rate apartment with new appliances and shiny lacquered cabinetry.
\n Photo: SoMA Leasing\n <\/p>\n

This sort of pickiness isn\u2019t all that uncommon among middle-income applicants \u2014 that is, those who typically make around 130 percent of the area median income. Subsidized housing is offered in several \u201cbands\u201d that are tied to various income tiers, each based on a percentage of the local median income. Some apartments are restricted to the lowest incomes, 30 percent of the median, and those, unsurprisingly, are usually flooded with applications, according to a 2020 analysis<\/a> by the City Reporter. The upper tiers \u2014 some of which accept people with incomes up to 130 percent of the median, like DuPonty \u2014 have far fewer applicants, and thus an acceptance rate that\u2019s six times higher than at the lower levels. Better chances mean more options, and more ability to pay means they might find something on the open market as well. Which, if you spend any amount of time on the sub-Reddit dedicated to the city\u2019s housing lottery, seems to check out: A number of people in this relatively high income bracket share their experiences of repeatedly getting picked<\/a> \u2014\u00a0and turning down<\/a> \u2014 apartments that weren\u2019t much of a deal. One person who claims to fall in this category tells me that, even after repeatedly getting picked, he doesn\u2019t want to leave his large $2,400-a-month one-bedroom for, say, a nearly $4,400 two-bedroom in Chelsea that\u2019s much stingier on space. \u201cThere are one or two dream lottery apartments I applied to and would take in a heartbeat, but they have not contacted me,\u201d this person says.<\/p>\n

Nate Bliss, a former executive director for economic development under the Adams administration who now runs a real-estate advisory firm, Latent Urban Ventures, explains that those higher rents come from the calculations that developers are doing to fund mixed-income housing projects \u2014 with public dollars coming from varying city, state, and federal programs, each with their own affordability requirements. \u201cWhatever pencils\u201d \u2014 that is, works out financially \u2014 \u201cand is feasible, that is what gets delivered,\u201d he says. In those buildings that include 130 percent\u2013AMI tenants, the rents come out so close to market rate that those middle-income tenants simply have a lot of other options. Obtaining subsidized housing also demands that prospective renters submit a mountain of paperwork and undergo a process that Bliss describes as \u201cinvasive,\u201d \u201ccumbersome,\u201d and \u201ctime-consuming,\u201d and some may not think it\u2019s worth what they see as mild savings.<\/p>\n

If there\u2019s any savings to be had at all. Tanoopa, an executive assistant at a fintech firm, had been filling out housing-lottery applications since 1999 and turned down a handful of offers she received for apartments in less-than-ideal neighborhoods. In June 2025, she finally got picked for a 475-square-foot place in Greenpoint, at the Dupont<\/a>. \u201cFinally!\u201d she says. \u201cI felt like a kid in a candy store.\u201d The apartment, she says, was an alcove studio on the 30th floor with the biggest bathroom she\u2019d ever seen. The setup was tight on her finances \u2014 the roughly $3,100-a-month rent was eating up half her take-home pay \u2014 but still worth it for the location. But then she lost her job three months into the lease. \u201cThey said to me, \u2018You can\u2019t break your lease, because you will still owe that money until we find someone to rent your apartment,\u2019\u201d she claims, adding that the management company insisted it couldn\u2019t show the apartment while she was still living there. \u201cI was forced to stay until my lease was over,\u201d she says. \u201cIt was a nightmare from start to finish.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"An <\/p>\n

\n An affordable-housing unit at 25 Water Street, seen in this listing photo, looks out into a shared courtyard, which means privacy might be hard to come by if you keep your blinds open for natural light.
\n Photo: SoMA Leasing\n <\/p>\n

Many of these buildings also contain market-rate apartments, and among the lottery tenants, that can sometimes create a sense \u2014 whether based in fact or merely in vibes \u2014 of second-class citizenry. \u201cI feel these people can smell you don\u2019t have a trust fund,\u201d Castro says about his wealthier neighbors at 25 Water. At the Eagle + West complex along the Greenpoint waterfront, a number of affordable units are clustered in one building in the complex, 27 Eagle Street. One of the lottery winners, a health-care manager, learned late in his application process that many of the sleek amenities in the building complex that were flaunted in the listing, like indoor and outdoor pools and a huge fitness center, wouldn\u2019t be accessible to him or anyone else at 27 Eagle. (Tenants renting affordable apartments in 227 West, one of the other towers in the complex, are allowed to use these amenities.) He took the apartment, a studio for which he pays around $1,800 a month and gets access to a dingy basement gym. But, he says, \u201cI definitely do feel like I was catfished.\u201d Every summer, when he walks through the park area right outside his home, he has to take in the smell of barbecue wafting from Eagle + West\u2019s\u00a0communal grills that are also off-limits. He even got a reminder about his status this July when he learned that residents in his building weren\u2019t allowed to watch the East River fireworks from the second-floor terrace with tenants from the other two towers, despite receiving a message from management informing him about the gathering. \u201cYou get that reminder of \u2018Oh, there\u2019s the haves and there\u2019s the have-nots,\u2019\u201d he says. \u201cI think of it like Animal Farm.\u201d Are these indignities bad enough that he\u2019s considering moving out? \u201cI have looked at StreetEasy, and the rent is outrageous,\u201d he says. (A spokesperson for Eagle + West tells me that it is clear during the application process which amenities come with which building. \u201cWe are proud to provide high-quality affordable housing in New York City and are committed to delivering a positive experience for all residents,\u201d the spokesperson says.)<\/p>\n

Castro is more motivated to get out of what he sees as his velvet coffin at 25 Water, but he\u2019s still in the same bind; the asking rents he\u2019s seen for apartments on the market today dwarf his current rent. The lottery hasn\u2019t given him another win, either, since the only building he was in the running for offered him a decent-size studio, but in East New York. (\u201cThe neighborhood was a deal-breaker,\u201d he says.) He even looked into moving back to his old building in Jamaica. Except that a market-rate one-bedroom apartment there, not unlike the unit he once paid $2,000 for, is $2,900 a month. \u201cPlease, God,\u201d he says, \u201cdon\u2019t let my luck run out.\u201d<\/p>\n

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