New York Senate Republicans unveiled a new legislative package Wednesday aimed at making housing more affordable, lowering construction costs, and helping first-time buyers stay in the state.
The proposals include tax incentives, streamlined environmental reviews, and measures to ensure rent-controlled and stabilized units go to those who need them most. The package also calls for repealing the all-electric building mandate and allowing developers to comply with less costly energy codes, steps designed to cut the cost of new homes by thousands of dollars.
Key bills in the package included efforts towards:
Increased Housing Supply
S.538 (Martins) – Means test rent-controlled apartments to ensure that people who need affordable housing are occupying them.
S.3545 (Borrello) – Streamlines the environmental review process to make it easier to build more homes.
S.529 (Martins) – Establishes the local initiatives task force on housing, in order to collaborate with local government officials, state agencies, and stakeholders to develop best practices for local governments to incentivize housing development.
S.576 (Helming) – Create tax incentives for manufactured housing developers to build affordable homes in rural areas.
Homeownership Affordability
S.850 (Helming) – Provides a first-time homebuyer tax credit for local property taxes
S.8489 (Weber) – Freezes real property taxes for three years to provide relief to New York homeowners. New York has some of the highest property taxes in the nation.
S.852 (Helming) – Give homebuyers who rehabilitate dilapidated properties an exemption from property tax reassessment.
S.9270 (Chan) – Establishes a new part of the housing court dedicated exclusively to buildings
35 units or less. The owners and tenants of these smaller buildings would benefit from faster
resolution of issues.
Lower Construction Costs
S.1167 (Mattera) – Repeal the All-Electric Building Act. The all-electric mandate will increase the cost of the average single-family home by about $20,000.
S.8621 (Mattera) – Allow building developers to comply with the less costly and less burdensome 2020 Energy Codes in lieu of the 2025 Energy Code. This would result in lowering the cost of an average single-family home by approximately $7,400.
“To keep New Yorkers living here, we need to ensure that housing is attainable and reasonably priced,” Senate Republican Leader Robert Ortt said in a statement. “This legislative package is about cutting costs, building more, and keeping New Yorkers here.”
The plan also includes first-time homebuyer tax credits, property tax freezes, and incentives for rehabilitating older homes. Senators emphasized the package as a practical response to the state’s ongoing affordability crisis, which has forced many residents — particularly young families and retirees — to leave New York.
