The NY Post reports: As many as 90,000 city apartment units could go into foreclosure as the housing crisis spreads from single-family homes to rental properties, city officials warned yesterday.
Rafael Cestero, commissioner at the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, said 2.6 percent of the city’s apartment units — which could reach up to 90,000 — are in danger due to so-called “predatory equity” practices.
Generally, those practices involved investors’ betting wrong — buying affordable housing during the recent boom in hopes of selling the buildings at market rates, Cestero told the City Council Community Development Committee.
The fallout from those bad bets could be rising homelessness if buildings go into foreclosure, council members and tenants said at yesterday’s hearing.
“As we come to terms with the downturn in our economy, it’s becoming clear that many of these deals were a lot more bust than originally projected,” Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan) said.