New York City mayor signs law giving certified nonprofits the first chance to buy distressed apartment buildings
Mayor Zohran Mamdani signed the Community Opportunity to Purchase Act on Nov. 10. It takes effect in November 2027, after the city's housing agency certifies the nonprofits and land trusts that may use it.
New York. Mayor Zohran Mamdani signed the Community Opportunity to Purchase Act on Nov. 10, giving certified nonprofit housing groups and community land trusts in New York City the first chance to buy certain distressed and affordable apartment buildings when their owners sell.
The City Council passed the measure, Introduction 905-A, sponsored by Council Member Sandy Nurse, on Oct. 22. It is now Local Law 164 of 2026, according to the Council's legislative record, and takes effect one year after it became law. Former Mayor Eric Adams vetoed an earlier version in December 2025, the mayor's office said. The signing took place at Chestnut Commons in East New York, Brooklyn, at a ceremony hosted by Cypress Hills Local Development Corporation, amNewYork reported.
A year to build the list of buyers
The city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development will now build a list of qualified entities: vetted nonprofits, tenant groups, community land trusts and other mission-driven organizations with experience preserving and managing affordable housing and the capacity to buy and run covered buildings. It will also set up a way to tell them when a covered building goes up for sale, the mayor's office said.
Covered buildings include those with four or more apartments in significant disrepair and buildings under the department's affordability agreements. Under the law, a qualified entity has 20 days after an owner's notice to state its interest and 70 more days to make an offer. The mayor's office describes the whole exclusive period to complete a purchase as 145 days. If the owner rejects the group's offer and another buyer makes one within the following year, the group may match it.
Money for purchases
The law does not force owners to sell and creates no dedicated fund for acquisitions, amNewYork reported. Cea Weaver, director of the Mayor's Office to Protect Tenants, said the city budget includes more than $2 billion for preserving affordable housing over the next two years, without saying how much could go to purchases under the law.
“But opportunity alone isn't enough. Making preservation possible will take acquisition financing, preservation funding, and technical assistance.”
Supporters included New Economy Project, which coordinates the NYC Community Land Initiative coalition. At the ceremony, Debra Ack, a founding member of the East New York Community Land Trust, described the trust's 2024 purchase of a 20-unit rent-stabilized building on Arlington Avenue, which is expected to become a tenant-owned cooperative while the trust keeps the land, amNewYork reported.
The New York Apartment Association, a landlord group, opposed the law. Its chief executive, Kenny Burgos, said that rising expenses, a two-year rent freeze and rent-stabilized vacancies were driving properties toward financial collapse.
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