A more balanced market offers opportunities for buyers
Even before he was elected mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani was the subject of headlines across the country. The mortgage industry didn’t escape those headlines about the NYC mayor.
Headlines declared that Mamdani’s policies would cause a mass exodus of the wealthy from the city. Real estate investors declared that New Yorkers would suffer under his policies.
Meanwhile, others had a more measured approach, saying that New York had seen many political swings over the years and would withstand the latest move.
For those still thinking that people were lined up to flee the city to escape its new mayor, one veteran broker said that reality was much different.
Kevin Leibowitz (pictured top), founder and mortgage broker at Grayton Mortgage, said the sensational headlines about New York’s new mayor reminded him of a famous quote from a legendary 19th-century author.
“It’s like Mark Twain’s quote, ‘reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated,’” Leibowitz told Mortgage Professional America. “Too many people get their news from Facebook and the algorithms, and the self-serving news cycle that serves you up whatever works toward what your opinion is. It’s really a bad feedback mechanism.”
Clearing up misconceptions
Leibowitz said that for those who are bombarded with horror stories about New York City, that’s not the reality of the city he lives in. He said his daughters take the subway almost every day. While things may have been more dangerous when he moved to the city in the ‘90s, it’s a different place now.
He emphasized that things are going well in the city, but they’re not quite back to 100% from the drop-off during the pandemic.
“New York is fine,” he said. “They're still putting up buildings. Jamie Dimon just put up a $3 billion headquarters for JPMorgan Chase. Older people are clamoring for back to work in person. My wife works in Midtown. Midtown is not back, business-wise.
“I think that's hurt, because if people are there three days a week, that guy doing salads, smoothies, sandwiches, his business just fell off 40% with the rents that they're paying. Some of the cool stuff, like New York being 24/7, hasn't come back yet. I think I'd like to see it come back.”
He said any thoughts that people are fleeing the city due to any new political policies in place simply don’t match the reality of what’s going on.
“I don't get the sense of a mass exodus,” Leibowitz said. “We did see some of that happen during COVID. But I wouldn't say it's still a mass exodus. There are still enough people who live here, work here, and want to be here, that there's still enough value ascribed to real estate here in the city.”
A measured approach
While there isn’t a mass exodus, that doesn’t mean New York has become a wild buyer’s market either. He thinks the market has balanced out.
“We've gone from an absolute feeding frenzy in real estate during COVID, where people were just trying to get any type of space in and around and outside the city, to more of a measured approach,” Leibowitz said. “I'd say we went from an unhealthy market with too much pent-up demand and a bona fide seller’s market to more of a balanced market. I still think we have a housing drought. We just don't have enough housing.”
As far as the job Mamdani is doing so far, while Leibowitz might not agree with all of his politics, he admires the way the new mayor fired up the electorate and is working to get things done.
“As soon as he got elected, he reached out to the power brokers in New York City who are paying the taxes and employing people and signing paychecks and leases,” he said. “I thought that was a very mature thing to do. It excites me that somebody young and charismatic could come to power. Some of his messaging and what he’s done, I would say without a doubt, I’m not a fan of some of the things.
“I’ll put aside that there’s a whole bunch of his politics that he’s espousing that I don’t like, and plans that I don’t think will work. But the fact that we can get new young blood and get people behind them, and get people out to vote. We need to get that times 50 in our entire country, and get everybody energized.”
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