'Vital for tenants' or 'textbook' bad policy: How rent control works in NYC
New York's system of rent regulation is a mix of rent-controlled and rent-stabilized units

Before Ontario's provincial government announced its plans to expand rent control, some economists were already sounding alarm bells about imposing the controversial policy.
In response to some Toronto tenants who say their rents have doubled, the government on Thursday unveiled its Fair Housing Plan. It included the closing of a loophole that exempted rental units built after 1991 from rent control.
In a report released weeks before, CIBC economist Benjamin Tal had slammed the idea, arguing that such regulations only discourage developers from building rental properties.
"If history is a guide, such policy will mostly hurt the people it's trying to protect," Tal wrote.
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Look no further than New York City to observe the ramifications of a failed policy, he said. The housing market there is constantly under-supplied, he said, and the share of rent-controlled units that are in poor maintenance is almost four times higher than seen among uncontrolled units.
Achieved 'near opposite of its goals'
The city "should be featured in any economics textbook as an example of public policy that achieved the near opposite of its goals," Tal wrote.

Rent regulations in New York have also dried up rental supply by spurring developers to convert rental units into condos, says Harvard University economics professor Edward Glaeser.
"A lot of the nicest buildings, the prewar buildings in Manhattan built originally as rentals, when rent control comes in...they figure out a way to take them off the rental market and switch them over to cooperatives and condominiums."
"You are basically ensuring that anyone who builds is going to want to build for the condo market instead of this highly regulated rental market."
Glaeser said it's difficult to estimate what effect rent regulation has had on development, but suggested it has had a chilling effect on new construction.
"Why you'd want to have a targeted policy that essentially pushes builders and existing properties to withdraw rental units from the market and switch them over to something else — that seems like a very hard thing to justify."
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But housing rights advocate Jenny Laurie believes rent regulations in New York have played a "vital role" in preserving affordable housing.
'A great benefit' for tenants
"We're very happy to have rent regulations in the NYC," she said. "We think they are a great benefit, particularly for low- and moderate-income tenants."
At initial glance, it would seem such controls have had little effect on New York rental rates. According to a recent study by RentCafe, a U.S.-based online service that helps people find apartments, the average price for a one-bedroom apartment in NYC is $4,900 Cdn per month. In comparison, the average rent for a one-bedroom Toronto apartment of just under 1,000 square feet is about $1,600 per month.
But those New York rents are for vacant apartments and don't necessarily give a complete picture of the current rents paid by those who for years have been living in rent-regulated units.