The Latest on the Pied-à-Terre Tax Rollout

**Brian Lehrer** (0:10)
Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now we'll talk about the rollout of New York City's new Pied-A-Tear tax on second homes in the city, valued at $5 million or more. You probably know that last month, Mayor Mamdani sent out a tweet address to anyone who owns a second home in New York City worth more than $5 million. It said, You've got mail. New York City's Department of Finance sent letters to thousands of high-value homeowners informing them that their property would soon be subject to this so-called Pied-A-Tear tax aimed again to be really clear at people who own expensive homes here, but do not live in the city full time. But a lot of people who got mail say they shouldn't have got mail, because they do, in fact, live in the city, and these are their primary residences. For some background, Governor Hokel signed what people are calling a Pied-A-Tear tax in the spring, and it was framed as an alternative to Mamdani's campaign promise to tax the rich and the richest corporations more broadly. The state projected that this tax would generate about $500 million, helping to close the city's whopping $6 billion budget deficit that Mamdani was saddled with when he took office. So after a few months ironing out the details, the Department of Finance recently released a list of properties that may qualify for the tax, and they sent around about 17,000 letters to homeowners they deemed eligible or responsible. Another complication, that information was technically already public as real estate ownership records generally are. But some owners and critics of the mayor, especially from the right, are saying that by publicizing the list and making it easily accessible, the city was effectively doxing them. As I mentioned, many who got the letter say they've been full-time residents for decades. The city says it will of course grant exemptions to anyone who can prove residency.
But a lot of reporting that's come out in the past couple of weeks has shown that process of appealing to the city saying, wait, you made a mistake, can be pretty cumbersome and confusing.
The original deadline to appeal was originally August 21st, but because of the apparent confusion, it's been moved back to September.
Kathryn Brenzel is a senior political reporter for Crain's New York Business, and she's with us now to parse through some of these weeds and to answer your questions if you're confused about the rollout, which some people are. Kathryn, thanks so much for joining us. Welcome to WNYC.

**Kathryn Brenzel** (2:51)
Thank you. Thank you so much for having me.

**Brian Lehrer** (2:53)
Listeners, if you have questions, if you were hit with one of these letters, even though you do actually live in the city, you can call in, what has the appeals process been like, and how do you feel about the Pied-a-Terre tax more broadly? Do you have questions for our guest about how it works? You don't have to own anything worth $5 million to participate. But what do you think of the controversial list itself, and the way it was highlighted? Anything, we're taking your calls and texts to 1-2-433-WNYC, 2-1-2-433-9692.
You want to talk about the list first. It's a searchable database of over 900,000 homes and their ownership records. What kinds of properties made it on to that very big list?

**Kathryn Brenzel** (3:49)
Yeah. So there was a lot of confusion around this list when it was first posted.
I think initially folks thought this list was a comprehensive list of all of the properties that are subject to the pitotaire tax. But in fact, it is those properties potentially plus hundreds of thousands of more properties. Every year, the city publishes its tax roll list, so addresses the evaluation of those properties, something that happens every year. As part of, and it's mandated by state law. As part of the pitotaire tax rollout, the state legislation did require the city to publish a list that gave some kind of sense of what properties could be subject to the tax, and essentially, the city's interpretation of that was basically townhouses, condos, co-ops, basically residential properties that are taxed in the city. Somewhere in that list are properties that eventually will be subject to the tax, but it includes far more properties than that.

**Brian Lehrer** (5:07)
This blowback like in the New York Post, where they say the mayor was, quote, effectively doxing thousands of wealthy New Yorkers. I'm curious whether you think, whether your reporting indicates that this hyperpublic aspect of the rollout was an unintended consequence or maybe not entirely unintended. It's worth noting perhaps that the mayor got flack a few months back for filming the announcement video of the tax in front of one particular home, the billionaire Ken Griffin's $238 million penthouse.