If you've read the frenzied media coverage surrounding the implementation of the state's new pied-à-terre tax, you know that some property owners are livid about having to submit forms to prove that they are exempt, let alone pay the actual surcharge.
Over the weekend, Mayor Zohran Mamdani extended the deadline for owners to provide proof that they shouldn't have to pay the tax, and according to the administration, they aren't wasting any time.
Of the roughly 17,000 property holders who received letters from the City's Department of Finance about their homes potentially being subject to the second home tax, around 2,000 have completed their applications for exemptions, while some 4,800 have started them, according to a DOF spokesperson.
With all the attention paid to the feelings of a small, wealthier subset of New York City, you may have forgotten that some 70 percent of New York City residents rent their homes. What do these New Yorkers think of the pied-à-terre tax rollout?
"I think it speaks to how detached rich people are from everybody else's life that they don't feel embarrassed about complaining about it," Aleksey Weintraub, who grew up with his mother in a rent-stabilized unit on the Upper West Side and currently lives in Washington Heights, told Hell Gate.