Staff Reports
Effects of Financing Constraints on Maintenance Investments in Rent-Stabilized Apartments
Previous titles: “The Effects of Leverage on Investments in Maintenance: Evidence from Apartments," "Financing Constraints and Maintenance Investments: Evidence from Apartments”
Number 1000
December 2021 Revised August 2024

JEL classification: G3, G31, R30

Authors: Lee Seltzer

This paper studies whether financing constraints adversely affect renters by reducing maintenance. Consistent with a sensitivity of maintenance to financial resources, housing code violations increased after a change in the law that effectively decreased cash flows available to maintain some rent stabilized buildings in New York City. The effect is most severe when financing constraints are present. Moreover, results of panel regressions using a dataset of 45 cities obtained with Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests are consistent with a hypothesis that buildings with higher LTV ratio mortgages have more code violations. Together, the results provide evidence that financing constraints reduce maintenance, an outcome that exacerbates the unintended consequences of rent control.

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Author Disclosure Statement(s)
Lee Seltzer
The author received funding for this project from the Real Estate Center at the McCombs School of Business while a PhD student at McCombs. Prior to circulation, this paper was reviewed in accordance with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York review policy, available at https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/staff_reports/index.html.
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