Harlem Rents Keep Rising As More Inventory Doesn't Bring Relief: Study

HARLEM, NY — Even as the number of available apartments has stopped dropping across Harlem, renters still have not seen any relief, according to a new study by StreetEasy.

That's because many of the newly available homes are being given up by tenants whose pandemic-era leases are expiring, leaving them to face dramatic rent increases, according to the study.

The study, released last week, found that at least 34 percent of New York City's listed apartments had discounted leases during the pandemic — only to return to the market now at historically high prices.

That trend has been most notable in Manhattan, where rental inventory rose by 33 percent between the first and second quarters of 2022. But a full 44 percent of that inventory was freed up by tenants who were priced out of their suddenly-expensive apartments, according to StreetEasy's analysis, which examined rental listings across the city during the year's second quarter.

Harlem, too, has seen a growth in its inventory, as Patch reported earlier this summer. After a huge surge in demand caused the number of available homes to bottom out at just 1,182 in February, Harlem has gained inventory since then, with 1,354 units on the market across its four sub-neighborhoods by June, according to StreetEasy data.

But that hasn't brought relief to the neighborhood's tenants. The median asking rent rose between the first and second quarters of 2022 in all four sections of Harlem included in the study: Central Harlem, East Harlem, Hamilton Heights and West Harlem.

Central Harlem is the priciest of them all, with a median asking rent of $2,727 during this year's second quarter — a $203 increase from the previous quarter, and a 15.6 percent rise compared to the same time last year.

Each sub-neighborhood is now more expensive than it was even before the pandemic. Hamilton Heights, for example, recorded a $2,798 median asking rent in June, compared to $2,600 in March 2020, just before COVID-19 arrived.

StreetEasy economist Kenny Lee explained that landlords have begun amping up prices in a mass wave — with asking rents jumping about 20 percent citywide — and left tenants of formerly-discounted homes with a tough decision to make.

"Either pay painfully higher annual rent," Lee said, "or...[face] an incredibly hot market in terms of options."

The current situation stands in pointed contrast to the COVID-19 pandemic's early days, many New Yorkers fled the city and landlords lowered rents to entice new tenants, Lee said.

The sky-high prices in Manhattan — which were the most expensive in the city during this year's second quarter — prompted many renters to flee to Brooklyn and Queens, Lee said.

The release of StreetEasy's study last week came one day before the Legal Aid Society made an alarming announcement about the growing number of evictions across the city — with data showing evictions have tripled from 104 in January to 315 in June, for a total of 1,313 so far in 2022.

The growing number of evictions prompted attorneys with The Legal Aid Society to press lawmakers Tuesday to pass a "Good Cause Eviction" bill that would provide additional protections, especially against massive rent hikes, for tenants in unregulated apartments.

"New York's eviction machine is ramping up," said Judith Goldiner, attorney-in-charge of the Civil Law Reform Unit. "This is indeed a crisis, especially with rent amounts reaching unprecedented levels."

Patch reporter Matt Troutman contributed.