Activists are none too thrilled about the return of this Giuliani-era policy

Property ownership may seem like a fever dream for many New Yorkers. But if you or your family earned your part of that dream, don’t let hard times take away your own stake in the city. And if you’re a renter, don’t let the city make it even harder to get recourse against your deadbeat landlord. All of which is to say: Believe it or not, you really should care about a newly-reinstated policy known as the “tax lien sale.”Let us explain: The Department of Finance has announced that come May 20, almost 30,000 property owners may face a tax lien sale. This means the city will bundle overdue property taxes, water bills and some unpaid fines and sell off the debt to private investors. The city council hasn’t reauthorized this type of sale since 2021, when activists organized to stop the practice entirely. They say the sale lets absentee landlords milk aging buildings, then walk away without repairing them, and also creates another obstacle for New Yorkers of color looking to build generational wealth with their homes.”Low-income renters and homeowners, seniors and communities of color have suffered as a result [of tax lien sales], but we’re fighting back,” housing activist Albert Scott, Jr. told a group preparing to canvass their neighborhoods about the lien sale in the coming weeks. “Our organizing led to the city council to enact major reforms to the lien sale, but we have not abolished this predatory policy yet.”

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