It is no secret that the real estate industry is not Zohran Mamdani’s biggest fan.
In fact, landlords have spent millions of dollars supporting former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, in part because they see the mayoral race whittling down to a two-way race between him and Mamdani, and they desperately do not want to see a socialist in Gracie Mansion.
Mamdani, currently a state Assembly member, has pledged to freeze rents for stabilized tenants, borrow $70 billion to subsidize 200,000 “genuinely affordable homes” over the next 10 years and pay for it by raising $10 billion in revenue through raising the corporate tax rate and adding a 2 percent income tax on those making more than $1 million a year. Such taxes would require state approval, as would racking up additional debt. The city’s Rent Stabilization Board decides allowable rent increases on stabilized apartments, but Mamdani has pointed to previous mayors’ influence over the board (the board froze rents three times during the de Blasio administration, after the mayor publicly called for it)…