Housing in New York

Housing in New York provides accurate, current, and easily understood in-formation on New York's supply and location of housing, including data on rents and housing conditions; and on housing needs, including information on the incomes, socioeconomic characteristics, and housing expense bur-dens of the city's nearly two million renters. Wherever possible, the author compares current and past housing and market conditions to help gauge whether things are improving or getting worse.The study begins with a review of the major findings from the 1984 Housing and Vacancy Survey. The author summarizes recent changes in the size and composition of the city's population and housing stock. Emphasis is on changes in the control status of rental housing and the growth in cooperative ownership since 1981 and on changes in the racial and ethnic mix of New Yorkers.Stegman offers a thorough analysis of rental vacancies in New York, in-cluding the physical condition of the city's occupied rental stock. He deals in considerable detail with rent levels and with how rents have changed since 1981 for various types of households. He also examines how well owners and renters have fared in their battle to stay ahead of the rising cost of living.In the final chapter Stegman analyzes changes in new construction activ-ity and other sources of housing supply, including the return to the oc-cupied stock of units that had been declared losses at the time of the 1981 Housing and Vacancy Survey. He concludes with an analysis of the size, composition, location, and occupancy characteristics of the city's in rem housing inventory. This detailed study is invaluable in understanding the continuing debate concerning housing needs and conditions and the appro-priate public responsibilities to meet those needs.